A primer on why we occupy:

The U.S. is a constitutional republic, wherein the elected representatives of each district are tasked with representing the interests of their constituency. The motivation behind the Occupy movement is based on the belief that our legislators are no longer representing the interests of their constituency, but rather the interests of whomever funds their campaign most heavily. That is something with which the average American can not compete. Since money is now considered speech by the US government, and there is a gross wealth disparity here (38th worst in the world, going by our GINI coefficient), the system is currently functioning so that our votes mean almost nothing. Regardless of who wins elections, most politicians will be bought by corporate or union interests: whoever has more. This is against the very foundation of a represenatitve democracy, and since voting no longer works, the only remaining form of democratic participation in our government provided to us by our founding fathers is the right to peaceful protest. It was afforded just for cases like these.