I don't think that, on the surface, your rejection of the "left wing's redistribution" of the sweat of your labor is ludicrous, but aspects of it are, perhaps, short-sighted.
I'm not sure that it would be productive to argue that farmers shouldn't get subsidies because it isn't really a partisan issue. Some conservatives have argued against them because they aren't "free market" or they represent "big government" (
here) and some liberals have argued against them for the wealthiest farmers because the wealthiest farmers arguably don't need them year in and year out. All have argued that many farms are using them fraudulently:
here and
here. But, for the most part, there is broad bipartisan support for them.
Also, the military doesn't receive nebulous redistribution like a social program, they receive very definitive appropriations, but I understand what you are saying. Corporate taxation is another matter altogether, however.
Interestingly enough, the longest periods of booming prosperity in the U.S. have been during times when the top earners' marginal tax rates were the highest (like
91% at one point). Of course, they didn't actually pay 91% of their income, but they did pay
some actual taxes, unlike now where they mostly end up paying net zero taxes. Many
more people were able to get ahead and stay ahead during these long periods of time.
Over the last 100 years, the top 1% of earners' income share (as well as the difference between the top and bottom earners, a.k.a. wealth inequality) peaked in 1928 and 2007. We all know what happened in 1929 and 2008. This correlates inversely to the top marginal tax rates, as would be expected. It correlates directly with money made in the financial sector, which promptly crashed in those years. From 1947 to 1977, normal workers' wages increased and became the highest, adjusted for inflation, than they had ever been on average. Then, in a strange correlation, wages started stagnating (a stagnation from which we have never recovered) but productivity (and prices) continued rising. This coincides with top marginal tax rates lowering (and continuing to lower) very significantly over time. This also shows that corporations are getting more and more out of their workers for less and less pay to those workers for the commensurate rise in productivity. Brilliant for the corporations' top executives, not so great for the 99%.
This is why I laugh when people cite the stock market's success as their barometer of overall economic prosperity. The problem is that people, as a general rule, are not interested in dealing with complexities of things they don't understand fully. They want black and white, and there is not much in life that is actually black and white. The stock market
is an indicator of prosperity, but only when coupled with rising overall wages. When coupled with stagnated wages, it is only a blip that quickly corrects with no real long-term prosperity for anyone other than the top earners.
If, as a whole, we want our economy to work for the oligarchy, by all means, we should continue our current economic policies as they are because they is working great for those few at the top, since they have the monetary influence to help nudge policy makers (of both parties) to set the rules of the game in their favor. If that's what we want as a society, then it makes perfect sense to stay status quo. If we want the many to prosper then we have to adjust policies.
