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Inequality Troubles Americans Across Party Lines, Times/CBS Poll Finds

The idea that when wealth is concentrated in few hand trying to redistribute that wealth to those that lack it "doesn't work" has no historical credibility. That's exactly what the nation did to address inequality that existed in the the early part of the 20th Century and was fixed by New Deal policies.

The idea of taxing the rich more goes back to Adam Smith and The Wealth of Nations.

This IMF paper on redistribution and growth (pdf), concludes that there is no negative effect of redistributionist policies. What is does do is reduce inequality.

Claiming redistribution is "theft"(or as Mitt Romney claimed during his failed Presidential run, that redistribution is un-American) is silly. We have been redistributing income and wealth for generations. Medicare, for example, is in effect a strongly redistributive program: it’s supported by a payroll tax (and other revenue) in which the amount you pay in depends on your income, but it supplies a benefit that depends only on your medical costs. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!

So no, we liberals here aren't radical for suggesting that we should continue to do what we're already doing; the real radicals are the people on the right who want to declare much of what our government has been doing these past three generations illegitimate.

Just because it's been happening for generations doesn't make it right. I have no problem helping people move up. I have a problem with people permanently living off me.
 
This country was founded by rebelling against an aristocracy. We have built a new aristocracy, ensuring that the rich are very very rich and stay that way across generations, while poverty is inherited and the lower middle class has little chance to move up. Of course that troubles us. It is antithetical to everything we believe in. Unfortunately, we try to pretend that this problem doesn't exist and many people oppose measures to equal the playing field because they don't want anything holding them down when they become rich.

the death tax and high progressive rates on income keep the uber rich free from competition
 
Just because it's been happening for generations doesn't make it right. I have no problem helping people move up. I have a problem with people permanently living off me.

worse yet is the phony indignation of rich "socialists" who pander the poor in order to get richer through public office
 
When you take no responsibility for yourself, indiscriminately have kids with whoever, don't raise them properly, and make no effort to improve yourself or your kids through example and work ethic, then you're going to end up on the wrong end of the economic scale.

That unfortunately describes a growing percentage of this country as liberalism continues to rot the core values of this nation.

Honestly, it's not that difficult to do pretty well in America. It just isn't.
 
When you take no responsibility for yourself, indiscriminately have kids with whoever, don't raise them properly, and make no effort to improve yourself or your kids through example and work ethic, then you're going to end up on the wrong end of the economic scale.

That unfortunately describes a growing percentage of this country as liberalism continues to rot the core values of this nation.

Honestly, it's not that difficult to do pretty well in America. It just isn't.
Disposable income in the United States is more unequally distributed than in most other advanced countries. Do Europeans have a better work ethic, make more effort to improve themselves, or take more responsibility? Um, no.

The source of US inequality lies in the unusually low amount of redistribution we do through our tax and transfer system. Figure 1, below, shows Gini coefficients before and after taxes and transfers for a number of advanced economies. The US after-tax-after-transfer Gini is the highest of the group, but its pre-tax-pre-transfer Gini -- the inequality of market income -- isn’t all that special. What this figure suggests, then, is that it’s all about redistribution rather than about market inequality -- not that America has become a bunch of lazy good-for-nothings, except for the rich -- who do all the heavy lifting.

050415krugman2-tmagArticle.png


The lazy-American view is further undermined by the fact that Americans typically retire later than their European counterparts and work harder.
America's Productivity Climbs But Wages Stagnate

Conservative and liberal economists agree on many of the forces that have driven the wage share down. Corporate America’s push to outsource jobs — whether call-center jobs to India or factory jobs to China — has fattened corporate earnings, while holding down wages at home. New technologies have raised productivity and profits, while enabling companies to shed workers and slice payroll. Computers have replaced workers who tabulated numbers; robots have pushed aside many factory workers.

“Some people think it’s a law that when productivity goes up, everybody benefits,” says Erik Brynjolfsson, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “There is no economic law that says technological progress has to benefit everybody or even most people. It’s possible that productivity can go up and the economic pie gets bigger, but the majority of people don’t share in that gain.”

From 1973 to 2011, worker productivity grew 80 percent, while median hourly compensation, after inflation, grew by just one-eighth that amount
, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research group. And since 2000, productivity has risen 23 percent while real hourly pay has essentially stagnated.
 
Why should I care about the gap?

If you a top1%er, the income gap is in your favor. But there is a 99% chance that you aren't a 1%er.
 
This is stupid. It's no one else's responsibility to make money for me.

Is being concerned about someone elses income jealousy? Like it's none of my bizness what anyone else makes because it doesn't effect me?
 
Is being concerned about someone elses income jealousy? Like it's none of my bizness what anyone else makes because it doesn't effect me?

bingo

we have a winner

i dont care if you make 25k, 250k, or 250m a year

it is none of my business....and if you are making 250m a year....hopefully you are bringing a few others with you into that stratosphere

this country is all about opportunity......the sky is the limit.....

we make more millionaires in this country than anywhere else.....period

my wife and i make a nice living......we also give back

my boss makes a ton more than i do.....he earns it.....his fed income tax paid in april was in the mid 7 figures

he gives back too

the idea is to get as many successful people around as we can....and let others work for them

that is the capitalist society i know.....and it works
 
When it comes down to it forced wealth redistribution ( theft ) is basically all the left have left as a economic plan for growth.

Its their solution to a problem they made much worse and if its ever implemented it will backfire on the Middle class in epic proportions.

A fair and progressive tax system is not theft.
 
Simply untrue. Government policy can make a difference. Democrats would not allow business friendly solutions to incenting corporations to move manufacturing to the U.S. Lets remember that NAFTA was voted in under Clinton and Obama wants to craft a similar deal with Asian nations. Anything that would provide tax breaks to move into inner cities would be decried as "giveaways" to big business.

I don't think that's true. We already have a production (manufacturing) credit and Obama proposed to expand it and double it for certain industries, and I really don't think democrats as a group would be against tax breaks to move into the inner cities, where they have HUGE voter support.

It's true NAFTA was Clinton and Obama strongly supports TPP, but that's true of probably anyone who can get elected POTUS. The Democratic base isn't happy about it, and the democratic wing of the democratic party is against the trade deals.

Allowing students to pick charter schools so kids can get a better education is ranted about as being anti-union.

A little off topic, but I've changed my views on "charter schools." I had thought the charter schools would be like the non-profit high school I went to. Instead, what we seem to be getting are corporate, for profit schools that from what I can see exist mainly to capture and privatize what has been many $billions in public spending. And I haven't seen any evidence that they do a better job, and they appear to at least frequently be dogged with lack of transparency and obvious conflicts of interests, with tons of the spending getting siphoned off into related companies for various services, management and the like and the public unable to see exactly where there money is going. I know this varies by school district so generalities are difficult, but the trends I've seen aren't good.

So as is I don't support expanding charter schools or funding them with taxpayer money. Bottom line is if corporations could make money with private schools, not funded with deals they can buy with captured legislators, they'd have been funding them all over the country long ago. It's only happening now that they can get public money, so I'm very worried this is just another example of public costs, privatized profits, with little if any benefit for students.

On the Republican side any thought of a higher tax rate on the super wealthy is a non-starter. How about changing the rules on donating away wealth upon death like Buffet will do to bypass the estate tax. Why not have a limit on charitable contributions, so the uber wealthy can't build a fancy gym at a university and have your name on it like Nike did.

How about limiting deductions for plants and equipment to those built in the U.S.

So yes there is plenty that can be done but it more fun to accuse the other guy of not caring or being stupid.

I agree with the general ideas, but the specifics are very hard to implement. The deductions for plants overseas is part of income in those countries, not here, and I guess we could tax that income more heavily than we do now, but already the firms keep the profits offshore to avoid the U.S. tax. My preference is strongly to subsidize/incentivize domestic production. I'm generally not a big "tax cuts for the plutocrats will save us" crowd, but I'd be OK with far lower marginal tax rates on corporations in the U.S. accompanied with higher taxes on distributions to shareholders. Or not. Other countries heavily subsidize their domestic firms - I'm fine if we do the same however we can do it. Yes, perhaps it's going to mostly accrue to shareholders, but it's worth a try IMO. So little is actually collected from the corporate income tax that we could halve it and not do all that much damage to collections, especially with just a small increase in taxes on corporate distributions to shareholders.
 
If you a top1%er, the income gap is in your favor. But there is a 99% chance that you aren't a 1%er.

And that is STILL irrelevant. If you make 35k and bill gates makes 10 million, then 20 years later you are making 45k and bill gates is making 10 billion it does not matter.

He didn't steal your pennies and he didn't inhibit your earning potential. All this frothy crap about the disparity is simply economic penis envy. It's NOT YOURS. You CANT HAVE IT. You ARENT ENTITLED TO IT.
 
Disposable income in the United States is more unequally distributed than in most other advanced countries. Do Europeans have a better work ethic, make more effort to improve themselves, or take more responsibility? Um, no.

The source of US inequality lies in the unusually low amount of redistribution we do through our tax and transfer system. Figure 1, below, shows Gini coefficients before and after taxes and transfers for a number of advanced economies. The US after-tax-after-transfer Gini is the highest of the group, but its pre-tax-pre-transfer Gini -- the inequality of market income -- isn’t all that special. What this figure suggests, then, is that it’s all about redistribution rather than about market inequality -- not that America has become a bunch of lazy good-for-nothings, except for the rich -- who do all the heavy lifting.

050415krugman2-tmagArticle.png


The lazy-American view is further undermined by the fact that Americans typically retire later than their European counterparts and work harder.

Blah, blah, blah.

Turn on your TV and look at Baltimore. Look at south Texas where almost nobody speaks English. Look at rural Alabama where most don't graduate high school. Look EVERYWHERE where so many kids come from broken homes and don't know their dad.

We have a political party which is built solely on making excuses for people and telling them that none of these actions or decisions are truly their fault. It is a grotesque cannibalism just for political gain.

And then we want to blame the people who chose not to make these decisions? It's their fault?

There are motions now declaring it educationally unfair if a child has a parent reading bedtime stories to them at night. Suddenly, that is the vast exception, not the rule.

This nation is screwed.
 
Are you asking me to convince you to care about the poor?

Are the rich preventing people from getting rich? Or do you believe there is a finite supply of money?
 
If you a top1%er, the income gap is in your favor. But there is a 99% chance that you aren't a 1%er.

So what if someone make more than me. If they are actively trying to keep me more then there is a problem.
 
Are the rich preventing people from getting rich? Or do you believe there is a finite supply of money?

That's not in any way an answer to my question.
 
Blah, blah, blah.

Turn on your TV and look at Baltimore. Look at south Texas where almost nobody speaks English. Look at rural Alabama where most don't graduate high school. Look EVERYWHERE where so many kids come from broken homes and don't know their dad.

We have a political party which is built solely on making excuses for people and telling them that none of these actions or decisions are truly their fault. It is a grotesque cannibalism just for political gain.

And then we want to blame the people who chose not to make these decisions? It's their fault?

There are motions now declaring it educationally unfair if a child has a parent reading bedtime stories to them at night. Suddenly, that is the vast exception, not the rule.

This nation is screwed.

TRANSLATION: 'I dismiss your facts and figures because I want to believe what I want to believe.'

In Sweden most children are born to unmarried women and it doesn't seem to be degrading Sweden.

The fact is that everyone except for the top 1% have been economically stagnant or lost ground over the last 30 years. That can't be simply explained by accusing the bottom 99% of being lazy.
 
Wonderful. Read the article. Now...how does Bill Gates making 10 Billion a year prevent you from becoming successful? How does the fact that the top 1% are REALLY REALLY REALLY wealthy prevent you from becoming successful? How do you reconcile the fact that there have MILLIONS of NEW MILLIONAIRESaround the globe over the last several years (an average of 1000 per day)with your constant bemoaning the success and largess of the 1%? '
 
bingo

we have a winner

i dont care if you make 25k, 250k, or 250m a year...

What someone else makes doesn't effect you. I got it.

Doesn't matter if the CEO of your company pays himself a zillion dollars.

Doesn't matter how high we make minimum wage either, after all minimum wage workers are paid out of the same income pool that CEO's are.
 
This country was founded by rebelling against an aristocracy. We have built a new aristocracy, ensuring that the rich are very very rich and stay that way across generations, while poverty is inherited and the lower middle class has little chance to move up. Of course that troubles us. It is antithetical to everything we believe in. Unfortunately, we try to pretend that this problem doesn't exist and many people oppose measures to equal the playing field because they don't want anything holding them down when they become rich.

Well, Thomas Paine in Common Sense certainly complained about the evils of inherited wealth and power but I don't recall any founders who were concerned about income inequality. They seemed concerned about individual freedoms and how King George and the progressive statists were not following their own laws which gave power to individuals.
We should not become slaves to the Christian morality about the evils of wealth and the importance of charity and compassion. Anti-wealth is not a universal theme-it is Christian based. Other religions and philosophies may believe in some charity but not nearly to the extent of Christianity. Moslems are content with 2.5% to charity and believe that a person's first concern is to take care of his extended family. Buddhists believe that if a person is wealthy, they must have good karma and probably earned it. Hindus recognize that money is not really important in the scheme of things. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs seems to understand that beyond some basics the main needs have nothing to do with money.
But Christians are imbued with the evils of wealth. The rich man goes to Hell and has no chance of getting to heaven. The poor are the privileged ones, in god's eyes, in Christian thinking. Don't know why governments get involved. If people don't want their wealth give it away.

And the real issue is not income inequality but wealth inequality and inherited wealth. Denmark and Switzerland rank very high in income equality but as bad as the US in terms of wealth inequality. The rich are entitled to their income, as long as legally obtained. The children of the rich are not. But no party seems to want to deal with that. Chelsea is set for life.
 
What someone else makes doesn't effect you. I got it.

Doesn't matter if the CEO of your company pays himself a zillion dollars.

Doesn't matter how high we make minimum wage either, after all minimum wage workers are paid out of the same income pool that CEO's are.

The ceo isn't asking for, or taking anything that he/she hasn't earned

There is that word.....earned

So many on your side of the equation want to give money to people that haven't earned it

You want or need to earn more....it is relatively easy to make that happen

You earn it by learning skills and taking on more responsibility

And if you earn it, you will be paid it

Just as the 155 employees that work for me all want to make more

They know how to do it......make me and the company more...and they make more

Kinda works like that everywhere
 
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