Western democracies presumably have similar mixes of large-amygdala and large-anterior_cingulate individuals, so to fully connect this to Der Trihs’ point, and explain American uniqueness, one needs to look at the way America is dominated by an elite group. That’s too broad a topic for a short post; theocracy plays a role, as does the fact that America lacks a national memory like Bastille Day. (The American Revolution had an altogether different source.)
Something which caught my eye in an Elections thread: A “libertarian”'s platform featured
Not “strengthening right-to-work laws”, mind you, just “No unions.” The hatred directed against the common man by American right-wing opinion makers is something special.
There’s so much economic illiteracy in this thread that’s it’s hard to know where to start.
But as usual, the most common misconception is that economics is zero-sum, and for one guy to be rich, another person must be poor.
I’m living in china right now, where many millions have been pulled out of poverty in one of the great success stories of our age. And at who’s expense? Where are the super-rich people who had to give up their wealth for that to happen, or poor who got poorer?
Actually, no one is quite sure why they attempted suicide and Foxconn employs more than a million people, so the number of people who tried to kill themselves is actually lower than the country’s overall suicide rate.
It’s a tragedy whenever anyone attempts to kill themselves, but in this case, it’s much more complicated than “Working at Foxconn Sucks = Suicide.”
The majority of people who commit suicide in China are elderly and women living in village, not young people just starting their lives, as is the case with all or nearly all of the Foxconn suicides. And working at Foxconn does indeed suck.
Perhaps you are not in the super rich category you are talking about, but you’re probably still in the top 1-2% richest people on the globe. A fact which you have every means to do something about if you wanted. It’s a simple matter of selling your stuff and giving away the cash.
Yes, there seems to be some economic illiteracy here, as well as some comprehension problems, and you appear to be exhibiting both.
Of course economies aren’t zero-sum, and no one has claimed that they are. And I think most of us have been around long enough to understand how public and private enterprises create wealth. None of that is at issue here.
This thread is about the vast discrepancies between the super-rich and the poor, and yes, it does matter, and it matters for two important reasons. Firstly it matters because the fact remains that at any given time, resources are finite and limited and so it matters how a particular economic system tends to distribute them. But even more importantly, it matters because grossly unequal wealth distribution also tends to reflect grossly unequal concentration of power and influence, which becomes self-perpetuating and creates governance that reflects the interests of the wealthy over the public good. This has already been stated several times but ignored by the fans of unbridled pure capitalism opining here. If anyone needs to understand why China has such rampant pollution and product safety issues or the US has such a poor social safety net and still doesn’t have a national health care system, they need look no further.
One such metric of wealth distribution is the Gini coefficient, which measures income inequality – the higher the Gini, the greater the divide between super-rich and very poor. And the worst Gini indexes among major industrialized countries? One of the worst is your proclaimed “economic success story of our age” that you admire so much: China. Another is the United States. Some representative Gini numbers from the World Bank: Australia 30.5, Canada 32.6, Denmark 24.0, Germany 28.3, Sweden 25.0, United Kingdom 34.0. And then we have the United States at 45.0, and China at 47.0. And yes, it matters. It matters very much.
There are other problems associated with relative poverty. For examples, it induces stress and apathy in the underclass; much more so than absolute poverty does.
When I first started visiting Thailand 33 years ago, I was startled by the income inequality on display. At that date, Thailand’s Gini coefficent was about .45 compared to U.S. .40. Since then, the two countries have essentially swapped Ginis!
Soon, someone will be along to say “if moving Gini from .45 back to .40 is good, why not take it to zero … i.e. distribute wealth equally?” By now, I hope serious Dopers will know to ignore such foolish prattle. And, BTW, restoring a sane Gini doesn’t require massive social engineering. Restore pre-GWB taxes and sane banking regulations would be a good start.
If someone commented on unequal incidence of hepatitis, would you recommend they inject themselves with a dirty needle? Sheeesh.
Don’t think the situations are comparable. I’m not recommending that he gives away his money and stuff. Just commenting on the fact that he is probably among the top richest persons on Earth, and it is completely within his capability to do something about that if he wants.
Oh look. Liberals invented a a number to measure some stuff that liberals think is important! And, shocking to absolutely no one, it measures that the United States is bad.
One telling phrase: “wealth distribution.”
Wealth should not be distributed. Wealth is created.
Wood, paint, and nails can be handed to three people. If one is Homer Simpson, he’ll end up with an ugly and useless pile of wood, good only for kindling. He’s reduced his wealth. One might be me: I can take the material and build a reasonably competent dog and attractive dog house, worth more than the wood and paint and nails were. The third guy might be David Flood, and he’ll create a sculpture that will sell for $2000, vastly more than the original materials were worth.
And at the end of the day, the liberals will wring their hands at the unfair system that concentrates all the wealth in the hands of me and Flood.
The largest lobbying groups are workers unions, not corporations.
Corporations and the wealthy have different interests to lobby for, depending on their industry and personal politics, such that at any point two groups might be diametrically opposed to one another. Whereas all unions are interested in bettering the financial stability of the average worker.
The interests of the wealthy are negative to the public good? So far as I’m aware, they’re part of the public, they’re in charge of the largest social security net in our country, and very few of them roast babies on spits behind their house. Can you provide any cite to this fact, that’s not just pulling out one or two things that you personally object to?
I would be worried about an increasing wealth gap causing the downturn of meritocracy and re-establishing a classist society. But your political fears aren’t very realistic.
Really? I was referring to comments such as They’d be better off if it weren’t for the 85 stealing from them what’s rightfully theirs.
I didn’t say that it didn’t matter. Better wealth distribution is good for society, no arguments from me on that. The best way to do that IMO is relatively high taxes, and a good social safety net.
However, anything like a free market will always have huge inequalities, and I don’t think you could ever entirely fix that without losing all the benefits.
On the subject of china specifically, you didn’t answer my question. Hundreds of millions have been raised out of poverty in china within a generation. Where are the corresponding millions who have lost out because of this?
Educate me on this please. My understanding is the top tax brackets for income tax and capital gains tax are as high or higher now than pre-Bush. Dividend rates are lower at 23.8% versus ordinary income back then. Estate taxes have a higher exemption now at $5 million versus around $1 million. Seems like the remaining Bush tax cuts affect the other brackets. How would raising the taxes of the other brackets change the Gini coefficient? What am I missing?
Further, seems to me that the wealthy have been better off under Obama, despite the higher tax rates, due mainly to quantitative easing’s affect on the stock market.
