Everyone is thinking about economic hard times these days.
Especially the New Orleans Hornets, who happened to be in Indiana where they got fancy seats to a major presidential campaign rally.
(I could tell you which candidate they met, and shook hands with, but I really have been trying hard not to stick my neck into that third rail political conversation too much, and it doesn't matter to this story anyway. And you can easily click and read the whole story if you're interested. Here's a clue, though: The speaker asked the audience if they made less than $250,000 a year. Chandler writes: "And everybody there raised their hand, except for this one small section of guys. That was our section. And everybody around us was laughing.")
What struck me, however, was that the whole thing got Chandler thinking about paying taxes, and his conclusions are, I think, uncommon, noteworthy, and wholly distinct from the stereotype of the selfish rich jock. Chandler wrote about it on his NBA.com blog:
... the way I look at it is that I can afford to pay more in taxes. But my parents, my grandparents, my cousins ... with what they make, they can't afford to cut back in their household with what they're trying to survive with. I can afford to make cuts and still survive. They can't take that knock.
I think that's what's going on now and the reason why the middle class is struggling so much. The upper class, we can take that hit. Obviously, nobody wants to take it, but we still can. And we can afford to live nice lives.
I've lived in both situations. And not only that, I'm obviously the only one in my family that can say that I'm a millionaire. I've seen my entire family struggle. So, would I rather see my whole family struggle while I get a break, or have me not get a break while the rest of my family gets one? I'll take my entire family getting a break.
