Tag: 1 Percent

¡Yay, Miami es Numero-Uno!

Buck Banks

Copyright: Image by StockUnlimited
Copyright: Image by StockUnlimited
Having just dodged the first major hurricane to hit Florida in more than a decade, Miami, it would appear, has something else to celebrate. Or not.

According to Bloomberg, Miami is now the most unequal city in the United States, having leapfrogged five ranks in just a year to reach the top. Yay! We have greater income disparity than anybody!

Bloomberg ordered large cities – those with populations of at least 250,000 – based on the Gini coefficient. The index measures the distribution of household income using 2015 data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. The ratio ranges from zero, which reflects absolute equality, to one, complete inequality. Miami took the top spot in 2016 with a coefficient of .58, followed by Atlanta and New Orleans.

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Did Leona Helmsley’s Reanimated Corpse Attend Romney’s East Hampton Fundraiser?

Jon Ponder
Left: Helmsley's mug shot; cast of "Real Housewives of New York City"
Left: Helmsley's mug shot; cast of "Real Housewives of New York City"

Los Angeles Times reporter Maeve Reston went out on Long Island over the weekend to cover the fundraisers for Mitt Romney in the Hamptons. She hit paydirt with a a quote from a woman Reston described as a “New York City donor … who would not give her name” sitting in the “passenger seat of a Range Rover stamped with East Hampton beach permits.”

“I don’t think the common person is getting it. Nobody understands why Obama is hurting them. We’ve got the message. But my college kid, the baby sitters, the nails ladies — everybody who’s got the right to vote — they don’t understand what’s going on. I just think if you’re lower income — one, you’re not as educated, two, they don’t understand how it works, they don’t understand how the systems work, they don’t understand the impact.”

That sounds oddly reminiscent of another poster child of New York 1 Percenters, Leona Helmsley, the billionaire “Queen of Mean,” who was convicted of tax evasion in 1988. During her trial, one of her former housekeepers quoted her as saying, “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.”

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