# Income \[in\]equality - is it a bad thing? Why? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 28, 2015, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226 "2015-03-28T19:02:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![SmartAlecCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/67e7ee/32.png) [@SmartAlecCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAlecCat)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2015, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226/101 "2015-04-09T22:48:13Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Equality of opportunity is not equality of result. If a race is held between a guy in top shape and a guy who is 50 pounds overweight who hasn’t exercised in years, we know who is going to win. But if the lanes are clear, they have equal opportunity. There is no excuse for putting hurdles in the lane of the second guy - which is what our society does. Say you had a race between two people, but one of them had been held captive by a madman for several years being force fed until he was 50 pounds overweight, and prevented from exercising. Then you start the race and say “hey, the lanes are clear – they both have an equal opportunity to win.” ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2015, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226/102 "2015-04-09T22:49:16Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > Even with no hurdles placed in front of anyone, opportunity will not be equal. Someone 7’ tall is going to have a better shot at getting into the NBA vs. a person who is 4’8". A person born to parents who highly value education will have more opportunity than one who is born to lazy meth addicts. Family is important. However given loving parents, and equal intelligence, the child of a rich family is going to have a better life outcome than the child of a poor family. More life experiences, better schools, more tutoring. In fact I’d say that the dumber rich kid will do better than the smarter poor kid. I’m not worried about the outcomes when comparing kids with IQs of 80 and 120. Let’s not put obstacles like crappy schools, inadequate funding for college, enough food, and decent housing. In my parents’ generation in NY tons of poor kids got an excellent education for free at City College, and a bunch of them went on to become famous. Why not today for everyone? For basketball, don’t compare the tall guy with the short guy. Compare two tall guys, one of whom can’t afford a basketball. How is he going to do? ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2015, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226/103 "2015-04-09T22:50:57Z")
> [@SmartAlecCat](#): > > Say you had a race between two people, but one of them had been held captive by a madman for several years being force fed until he was 50 pounds overweight, and prevented from exercising. > > Then you start the race and say “hey, the lanes are clear – they both have an equal opportunity to win.” Good point. I agree. You can’t screw up a kids education all his life and then dump him in college and tell him to start learning. That counts as inequality of opportunity also. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226/104 "2015-04-11T17:05:47Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > Are we? Social mobility as highlighted upthread is not all that different than it was 20 years ago. The study you linked doesn’t say anything about the generation that are kids today (as in fact, no study could). If social mobility is no worse for that generation than for 20 or 40 years ago, then hey, great. > [@](#): > > I agree that lack of opportunity in underserved neighborhoods is a problem. I don’t think that problem is aided in any way focusing on income inequality and using that as a boogeyman is more of a appeal to populism rather than an effort towards improving the situation. I think that increased income/wealth inequality strongly contributes to increased inequality of opportunity, as it seems like it almost has to. If half the population makes $50K and half makes $100K, how hard is it going to be for a child of the $50K to make it to $100K and vice versa? But compare that to if 98% of the population makes $10K and 2% makes $10M? And in fact you’ll note in my OP that my single biggest problem with income/wealth inequality is its effect on inequality of opportunity. > [@](#): > > Doesn’t this work both ways then? Extreme wealth can be the source of the disparity in experiences but it is not sufficient by itself, nor is wealth the only thing that can lead to this type of disparity. Voting normalizes everyone’s influence to enact policy change. This is the way everyone no matter what their experience works together as a group. Yes, it certainly works both ways. I certainly didn’t say being rich is the problem, I said the inequality is the problem. Which doesn’t mean that I automatically blame the rich people for the inequality. But I think there are a variety of reasons (outlined way back in my OP) why society generally functions better with less (but not zero) inequality. (And this certainly doesn’t apply solely to inequality of wealth. There have been some interesting and troubling studies which suggest that people interact with their neighbors more, and form more social bonds, when society is racially homogeneous.) > [@](#): > > If a person is willing to do a job for say, $100 and a person is willing to pay that other person $110 for that job, what is the “right” amount, all other things being equal? My contention is there is no right amount, just what is agreed upon. If a company hires a new CEO for a ridiculously huge sum and that CEO makes a bunch of terrible decisions and then that company goes out of business 6 months later, I think it’s entirely reasonable for a sober analysis after the fact to decide that the company was hurting itself by paying the CEO that salary, although that’s obviously something that’s hard to really demonstrated in non-extreme cases. I think your point in general, that there usually isn’t a “right” price other than what the market sets, is a good one. But there are certainly circumstances in which markets are wrong. Bubbles. Monopolies. Etc. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/income-in-equality-is-it-a-bad-thing-why/716226.md?page=5)