Editorial voices from across the country
Editorial voices from newspapers around the United States:
Many politicians like to claim the chaotic federal budget process is in marked contrast to the care Americans take managing their finances.
But U.S. consumer debt – mortgages, car loans, credit cards and student loans – stood at $12.2 trillion in 2015 or $130,992 per household, according to the online site nerdwallet, which extrapolated New York Federal Reserve Board and U.S. Census Bureau figures and commissioned a Harris Poll.
Much of consumer debt is taken for granted. Buying a residence for cash is beyond the means of most Americans, but the investment, equity accumulated and tax deductions that come with a mortgage are highly valued.
The problem isn’t limited to lower-income households.
A Brookings Institution study found a significant percentage of households earning $100,000 to $150,000 annually are “financially fragile.” A quarter couldn’t come up with $2,000 within 30 days for an unexpected expense, while another 19 percent would resort to selling possessions or using payday loans.
While some Americans are guilty of poor budgeting practices or purchases far beyond their means, the burgeoning debt burden is due in great part to basic expenses far outstripping incomes.
Median household income have increased 26 percent since 2003, but essential expenses are up substantially more — medical costs, 51 percent and food and beverage 37 percent.
If financially strapped Americans are averse to government spending and debt, their own debt burdens are a primary reason why.
The gun lobby and its shills in Congress argue that no amount of gun control can prevent the kind of carnage the nation witnessed in Orlando, Fla., two weeks ago and they’re right – so long we continue to let them write legislation.
Take gunman Omar Mateen’s primary weapon of choice in the June 12 massacre: a SIG Sauer MCX semi-automatic rifle.
It was developed at the request of the U.S. Army’s special forces. The National Rifle Association and industry execs, of course, don’t market it as an assault weapon, preferring the label “modern sporting rifle.”
Some sport.
Similar to the better-known AR-15, this weapon was designed expressly to kill people quickly and efficiently.
The SIG Sauer MCX comes stock with a magazine capacity of 30 rounds. In some states, similarly styled weapons can have even larger capacities, giving madmen like Mateen maximum opportunity to kill with minimum interruption.
When opponents criticize gun control as ineffective, it’s in truth an indictment of their own role in the process. Ample research shows that limits on the types of weapons and magazine capacities reduces gun deaths, just as empirical evidence demonstrates more restrictive background checks would prevent most mass shooters from purchasing their weapons.
Pill pushers are not just shady guys on the streets. Sometimes, they are entire pharmaceutical corporations, as was the case with Delaware-based Salix, which is now forced to pay a $1.39 million settlement to the state of Ohio for its actions.
Salix was paying kickbacks to prescribers who recommended, promoted and prescribed its products. The company was caught by whistleblowers who noticed the false Medicaid claims and illegal kickbacks.
If doctors were receiving kickbacks for prescribing a drug that treats the side-effects of opioids, it stands to reason those doctors might be prescribing a fairly high number of opioids as well.
Lawmakers and attorneys general across the region should continue to shine a very bright light on other pharmaceutical companies and the drugs they funnel in grossly disproportionate numbers to our states. Their ads may tout these products as medicines, but they can be poisons; and encouraging their sale to patients who do not need them should be a crime.