Income disparity

noetsi · #1 (**permalink**) 06-03-2006, 10:18 AM

All agree that income disparity has increased signficantly since 1975. Conservatives generally pay it little attention or dont see problem with it, while liberals see it as perhaps the most serious economic problem in the US. These following comments reflect views on this issue.

Quote:

Bonus payments, commissions, stock options and other incentive income surged in the past year even as lower-skilled workers struggled to keep up with the rising cost of gasoline, health care and education. "I'm concerned about this. It's a major issue in this country," said Mr. Greenspan, who has announced he will retire in January. "A free-market, democratic society is ill-served by an economy in which the rewards are distributed in a way" that leaves out the majority, he said. "Too many of our population ... don't feel the advantages and benefits coming from the system."

Quote:

That Americans are disaffected by the growing income gap can be seen in public opinion polls. A survey this month by Public Opinion Strategies and National Public Radio found that 53 percent have a negative opinion of the economy, citing reduced job benefits, rising costs and exported jobs.

This was at a time, 2005 when economist felt the economy was booming.

http://www.newsdesk.org/archives/000254.php

A reflection on just how much things have changed in recent decades (by an article that takes a middle ground generally between right and left on this issue)

Quote:

A quarter century ago, one percent of the U. S. households owned about twenty percent of the national wealth, and a typical CEO of a large corporation earned forty times as much as the average worker. Today, that one percent owns over forty percent of the national wealth, and that same typical CEO is paid four hundred times as much as his worker. One individual, Microsoft's Bill Gates, is worth more than the combined GNPs of all of Central America, excluding Mexico. (See Collins, Hartman and Sklar, "Divided Decade: Economic Disparity at the Century's Turn," United for a Fair Economy ).

Many analysis place the multiplier between CEO's and workers as much higher than that.

http://gadfly.igc.org/liberal/deserving.html

If you go to page five here it reflects part of the poll data that shows increased public support for government intervention to deal with disparity.

http://tinyurl.com/p6uwh

For those interested a bibliography on this issue.

http://tinyurl.com/me2dr

nonsqtr · #2 (**permalink**) 06-03-2006, 11:16 AM

The crux of this issue is the opportunity that is available at the various levels of income.

As a right-thinking nation, it seems to me, we should do our best to equalize the level of "opportunity" across the board.

It strikes me as very unfair to give rich people more opportunity that poor people (at any level, whether that be through taxation or through other means).

On the other hand, we as a nation have historically recognized that poor people sometimes have a competitive disadvantage when it comes to the practical domain of opportunity, so we've institutionalized all manner of "assistance" (like small business loans at low interest, and so on).

Giving tax breaks to big corporations is wrong-headed, IMO. Regardless of what excuse is used (the usual one being "keeping prices down"). It seems to me that encouraging competition is more right-headed than allowing monopolies.

And the same would be true at the level of individual citizens - the rich don't need public help, but the poor sometimes do.

rota · #3 (**permalink**) 06-03-2006, 01:24 PM

The Global Robber Barons are in control looting this country and have perverted every mechanism for the peons to ever get them out. This country is dieing as we speak.

noetsi · #4 (**permalink**) 06-03-2006, 03:27 PM

People born into families with limited wealth and education rarely have remotely the same opportunity that those with them have in the US.

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