It’s Time for Americans to “Wake the F*#@ Up!"

The housing industry is the engine that drives the economy. It has long ripple effect which benefits millions of other jobs. When people have more income they spend it. They go buy new shoes, they go out to dinner, buy furniture, appliances, roofing, and on and on. Don’t forget that the shoe salesperson, the furniture manufacturer and delivery drivers also prosper. Add into that group the companies that make the products have employees with families to feed. Their suppliers are another level of industry. The waiter/waitress makes more for their family and the ripple effect continues to drive the economic engine. Without home ownership this ripple effect stops and the economy stalls, homeowners lose equity (money) from decreased value.

The home mortgage interest deduction is an important tax deduction for millions of homeowners. Let’s look at some real numbers for real people. An average home here in Seattle is approximately $400,000. Let’s look at the savings for the homeowner who is financing 80% of the home at a 30 year loan with a fixed interest rate of 4% in the 28% tax bracket. To figure out how much this means to the middle class our example looks like this: $400,000 x .04 = $16,000 in interest deduction per year.  The property taxes are also deductible and in our example the tax on that home would be in the range of $4,000. Therefore the homeowner can deduct the $16,000 + $4,000 = $20,000 total income deduction  Now take 28% of $20,000  deduction and the homeowner receives an annual tax savings of $5,600 which is $466 per month into that middle class’s family pocket. And we all know that money will be spent on consumer goods.

The Defense Department’s budget is $800 billion to $1 trillion per year to support 700 military bases around the world. Each week we spend $2 billion just for the two wars. For every dollar that you send in for your income tax 53 cents (53%) of it goes to the military. This doesn’t include money for the CIA.

To put millions, billions, and trillions into perspective consider this. If you spent $100,000 per day it would take you 10 days to spend a $1 million, 27 years to spend a $1 billion, and 27,000 years to spend a $1 trillion.

Any proposal by any political party that calls for the elimination of the mortgage interest deduction which saves middle class taxpayers about $80 billion per year and bolsters the economy should not be supported. There are many more avenues to achieve fiscal stability, we still give hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks for huge multinational companies, there is massive waste documented in the pentagon budget.  The people at the top are raking in more money; the people on the bottom are getting poorer, when more of our brothers and sisters are living in tent cities, then leave the middle class alone! Regardless which political philosophy one choses to quote Samuel L. Jackson in a new video regarding the election, it is time for Americans to “Wake the f*#@ up!