On 2/23/2012 11:43 AM, jk wrote:

Just look at what it used to be like here back in the fifties when it
comes to income distribution. It was much more equal. The country's
wealth is far more unequally distributed now.


Can you support that statement. I am NOT saying you are wrong, I just
don't think there is evidence to support it.

Yes, I can. I don't have the figures right in front of me but I know
that is the case. I can get them if you want but I don't have them at
the moment. But just look at the facts. The highest wage for workers was
in 1973 and it has remained flat ever since. For the top earners they
saw a 260 point gain. Then look at taxes and you see the government is
only taking in 14 or 15 percent of GDP, which is really low. The tax
cuts mainly went to the top class. So the top has seen it's income rise
and it's taxes cut while everybody else is getting paid the same or less
and has not had much in the way of tax cuts either. That recipe makes
the top better off an everyone else worse.

I think there is certainly a PERCEPTION that the wealth is
concentrated in fewer hands, but is it really.

I'm sure the facts show the rich really have gotten a whole lot richer.


I think that perception is driven by media.

I think it's more a matter of the media is following that story because
it is important to a lot of people.

OTOH I am quite sure there are far more millionaires today, than
there were in the 50's, but a million bucks ain't what it used to be.

Yep, that's right on both counts. Lots more people are millionaires but
a million buys a lot less than it did in the fifties.


That is wrong in my book.
Way too much money is concentrated in too few hands. As a political
scientist
You forgot to put that first word in quotes. If it isn't
quantitative, it isn't science.

If it's true it's true, right? Science or not. The figure I hear a lot
is that six members of the Walton family have as much wealth as the
bottom 150 million Americans. I'm pretty sure that one is true too. That
means six people have as much as half the population of America. If that
doesn't tell you things are out of kilter I don't know what it would take.


I see that as a threat to the political system and to
democracy. Too much wealth in the hands of too few is a recipe for a
corrupt country and regime.

There are all kinds of reasons why a more equal wealth distribution
would be better for most Americans than what we have now. I really don't
see any argument you could make why 1% should be in control of most of
any country's wealth.


In the past that almost always leads to a
revolution. Is that what you want?



Oh really? When, Where?

Cuba, 1962. The wealth of that country was nearly all in the hands of an
small elite plutocracy. The rest of the population were peasants. That
led to a revolution.

How about Syria, right now?

When a small elite gets its hands on the majority of a nation's wealth
bad things happen and revolution is one of them.


I can think off hand of two cases where that probably was seen as one
of the causes of the "revolutions" but a half dozen or so where
similar distributions did NOT lead to revolutions.

Revolutions are not just a matter of wealth inequality but it always
seems to be one of them.


In both of the first cases, the regimes revolted against were also
totalitarian.

When does a totalitarian regime not make a small elite group fabulously
wealthy at the expense of the rest of the population? It's pretty
common. Maybe not Nazi Germany but it's usually a good thing to be one
of the rich in a totalitarian country, in a poor one too.

Hawke