Something is seriously wrong with our nation when the working poor have more disposable income than the middle class.

Tonight’s stunning financial piece de resistance comes from Wyatt Emerich of The Cleveland Current. In what is sure to inspire some serious ire among all those who once believed Ronald Reagan that it was the USSR that was the “Evil Empire”, Emmerich analyzes disposable income and economic benefits among several key income classes and comes to the stunning (and verifiable) conclusion that “a one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimum wage) has more disposable income than a family making $60,000 a year.” And that excludes benefits from Supplemental Security Income disability checks. America is now a country which punishes those middle-class people who not only try to work hard, but avoid scamming the system. Not surprisingly, it is not only the richest and most audacious thieves that prosper – it is also the penny scammers at the very bottom of the economic ladder that rip off the middle class each and every day, courtesy of the world’s most generous entitlement system. Perhaps if Reagan were alive today, he would wish to modify the object of his once legendary remark.

Any wonder that I hear students tell me that working a real job is for suckers not smart enough to get a government check and then hustle off the books?

And as a working American, I'd like to suggest that the new Congress start its budget cutting with some of these programs that make such a travesty possible. Indeed, it might not be a bad idea to let the Bush tax cuts expire and start over with a system that does not cut put so many people in the 0% tax bracket. After all, if they start having to pay taxes instead of being net consumers of tax dollars, such folks might think twice about how much is spent keeping society's parasites on the government gravy train.