# Does income inequality in one nation have global consequences, or is it localized **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 25, 2018, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479 "2018-01-25T20:40:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2018, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479/21 "2018-01-27T14:21:21Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Same with the Haitian Revolution. It didn’t start as a slave revolt. It was the middle class that started it. L’Ouverture was enslaved for his first 33 years and worked as a coachman after that, I’m not sure if that qualifies as middle class. Lower middle class at best. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2018, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479/22 "2018-01-27T14:42:34Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > The biggest criticism of the Gini index and international development standards is that its very good dealing with rich countries and poor countries, not so much with middle-income ones like India, Pakistan, South Africa, Indonesia, Brazil etc. > > Social mobility is a better indicator that “inequality”. The sub-continent has seen a massive increase in social mobility since Pakistan (in the 60’s) and India (late to early 90’s) started getting rid of British imposed fetters and constraints. China everyone knows about. I’m not sure social mobility is always a better indicator (at least for what I care about) than inequality. I don’t want anyone to be living in extreme deprivation, whether or not their deprivation is the result of downward mobility or whether their children might be upwardly mobile or whatever. India is better off on the whole than they used to be (don’t know enough about Pakistan to say), but I have some very serious problems with the kind of rises in inequality that they’ve experienced. That being said, I’d be interested to see more on what you were saying about the Gini index failing for middle income countries. What is it about middle income countries specifically that makes them a bad indicator? (I guess India qualifies as a middle income country today: I wouldn’t have put it in that box 20 years ago). ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2018, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479/23 "2018-01-28T13:29:19Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > :dubious: > The American Revolution’s leaders were almost entirely professionals, yeoman farmers or businessman who were unhappy about Perfidious Albion hampering what they saw as their natural growth. That’s what I said too, so I don’t know what’s so dubious about it. What they weren’t, was starving peasants. > [@](#): > > Confederate Civil War leaders tended to be the men who had made money on large plantations in the generation before the Civil War. Like Davis. Others were professional class. You’re the first person to bring up the American Civil War. I was talking about the \*English \*one. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2018, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479/24 "2018-01-28T13:30:56Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > You could add the Cuban revolution to that list, too. > > That being said, though, in the case of Russia wouldn’t it be fair to say that while the _leaders_ were middle class, they relied on support from the worker’s soviets and the military? Yes, which is why I said it was mostly peasants doing the dying. I’m including factory proles under that peasant umbrella. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-income-inequality-in-one-nation-have-global-consequences-or-is-it-localized/807479.md?page=1)