After reading Shimmeringstar's excellent proposition [0], I've decided to ween myself from environmental politics for a spell and tackle the issue of a maximum wage. I rated it excellent simply because Shimmeringstar eloquently categorized wealthy Americans as, "sports players, movie stars" and my personal favorite, "oil mongrels."

Think, for a moment, about what this world could be like if there was such thing as a maximum wage. We know all about minimum wages. Most of us have probably worked a minimum wage job at some time in our lives.

We live in a rep-democratic system that distributes wealth unequally. Ain't that the truth. It's probably part of the reason an issue like health care reform is part of the discussion in this country. And that's well and fair. I dig that. An ABC News/Washington Post poll [1] that was conducted last October shows exactly how much dissatisfied we are with the status-quo.

In an extensive ABCNEWS/Washington Post poll, Americans by a 2-1 margin, 62-32 percent, prefer a universal health insurance program over the current employer-based system.

And so I agree with Shimmer in one sense, except I WILL NOT beat around the bush. What in the hell makes William McGuire's product as CEO of UnitedHealth Group so inflated? The DissidentVoice [2] reports,

His pay of $124.8 million could cover the average health insurance premiums of nearly 34,000 people…. While workers are having a tougher time making ends meet, CEOs are getting perks worth more than worker paychecks. CEO freeloaders expect perks such as lifetime use of company jets, chauffeured cars, company apartments, club memberships, sports tickets, financial planning, personal assistants and more. In CEO World, the more money you make, the less you should have to pay for.

My idealistic democratic ideal has me on a short leash today. I really believe we should advocate a more progressive, 1960s-style, progressive income tax. http://healthcare-economist.com/2006/02/14/united-health-ceo-earned-1248-million-in-2005/ http://abcnews.go.com/sections/living/US/healthcare031020_poll.html http://www.dissidentvoice.org/May05/Sklar0512.htm