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The American dream? Top 20% pulling away from the rest, study finds

A SERVICES ECONOMY

Harshaw said:
Explain why income inequality, in and of itself, is a problem.
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Because it "incarcerates" people below the Poverty Threshold, which in turn is the likely cause of America's inordinate amount of crime (per capita) compared to other developed nations.

As explained in this Atlantic article, here: America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed (Sept., 2015) - excerpt:
... the Census Bureau released its latest data on income and poverty for the country, and despite a falling unemployment rate and a rising GDP—two promising macroeconomic signs—things haven’t improved all that much for American families in the past year.

The news was, of course, worse for minorities and women. The rate of poverty among blacks and Hispanics was well over 20 percent. Women, too, remained more likely to struggle to make ends meet, especially elderly women, whose poverty rate was nearly double that of men in the 75 and older age group. And though more women than ever are participating in the workforce, with 61 percent of women employed full time in 2014, their earnings remained about 79 percent of their male colleagues.

Poverty Rate by Race
210575be2.png
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Note how the numbers remain comparatively static even if the percentages are very different according to race since the beginning of the 1970s. That is, almost half a century ...

To answer your question, which is worthwhile: Income Inequality is a bane upon the public, like some terrible disease. But, unlike a disease, we have a permanent cure for it. It is called Tertiary Education by which Americans can obtain the qualifications that permit them better paying jobs in a country that is now almost wholly a "Services Economy". (The Manufacturing Industry nowadays employs barely 12% of the total working population.)

PS

Also there is an age-variation that is also important to notice. Excerpt from the same article:
That’s why for the first time, the bureau released a supplemental poverty measure along with its official figures. According to the supplemental data, the poverty rate in the U.S. was about 15.3 percent—0.4 percentage points higher than the report’s official rate. But the additional measure shows differences in age groups.

For instance, those under the age of 18 have a poverty rate of 16.7 percent—quite a bit lower than the 21.5 percent reported in the main findings. For older Americans, the tweaked metrics paint a grimmer picture, with the share of seniors living in poverty reported as nearly 5 percentage points higher than the official measure.
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Lafayette said:
A SERVICES ECONOMY



Because it "incarcerates" people below the Poverty Threshold, which in turn is the likely cause of America's inordinate amount of crime (per capita) compared to other developed nations.

As explained in this Atlantic article, here: America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed (Sept., 2015) - excerpt:


Note how the numbers remain comparatively static even if the percentages are very different according to race since the beginning of the 1970s. That is, almost half a century ...

To answer your question, which is worthwhile: Income Inequality is a bane upon the public, like some terrible disease. But, unlike a disease, we have a permanent cure for it. It is called Tertiary Education by which Americans can obtain the qualifications that permit them better paying jobs in a country that is now almost wholly a "Services Economy". (The Manufacturing Industry nowadays employs barely 12% of the total working population.)

PS

Also there is an age-variation that is also important to notice. Excerpt from the same article:
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Your chart disproves the claim you made in your OP--that Reagans tax cuts are the reason for the nations ills. Poverty rates have actually declined since 1980, not risen.

As a side note, it is funny to see leftists demand we stop blaming Obama for anything now that he has been out of office for 130 days, but is still OK to blame Reagan who left office nearly 30 years ago. If it wasn't for hypocrisy, you liberals would have nothing to say at all.
 
Lafayette said:
A SERVICES ECONOMY



Because it "incarcerates" people below the Poverty Threshold, which in turn is the likely cause of America's inordinate amount of crime (per capita) compared to other developed nations.

As explained in this Atlantic article, here: America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed (Sept., 2015) - excerpt:


Note how the numbers remain comparatively static even if the percentages are very different according to race since the beginning of the 1970s. That is, almost half a century ...

To answer your question, which is worthwhile: Income Inequality is a bane upon the public, like some terrible disease. But, unlike a disease, we have a permanent cure for it. It is called Tertiary Education by which Americans can obtain the qualifications that permit them better paying jobs in a country that is now almost wholly a "Services Economy". (The Manufacturing Industry nowadays employs barely 12% of the total working population.)

PS

Also there is an age-variation that is also important to notice. Excerpt from the same article:
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In all of this, you didn't actually answer the question.

Even in the part where you said you were answering it, you basically said "it's a problem because it's a problem."
 
MIRACLE-MAKER

Furthermore, as explained in the above linked Atlantic article, here: America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed (Sept., 2015) - excerpt:
... the Census Bureau released its latest data on income and poverty for the country, and despite a falling unemployment rate and a rising GDP—two promising macroeconomic signs—things haven’t improved all that much for American families in the past year.
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Donald Dork, Miracle-maker, is going to change all that with mountains of jobs for all those who clamored for them during his candidature. He was going to Make America Great Again, right?

Those jobs that required only rudimentary competencies were automated long ago, so they are just not coming back. And a country that has been nourished on superlatives had better wake up to the reality of the change of ages from the Industrial to the Information Age.

Robotics started replacing humans on the shop floor a half a century ago. Uni-mation was founded and put the first robot into service at a General Motors plant in 1961 for extracting parts. From there to the robotic applications on the production line took a mere 7/8 years.

By the 1970s, most manufacturing industries were using them to replace labor. Thus, the phenomenon is by no means recent!

And it is by no means over ...
 
Lafayette said:
A SERVICES ECONOMY



Because it "incarcerates" people below the Poverty Threshold, which in turn is the likely cause of America's inordinate amount of crime (per capita) compared to other developed nations.

As explained in this Atlantic article, here: America’s Poverty Problem Hasn’t Changed (Sept., 2015) - excerpt:


Note how the numbers remain comparatively static even if the percentages are very different according to race since the beginning of the 1970s. That is, almost half a century ...

To answer your question, which is worthwhile: Income Inequality is a bane upon the public, like some terrible disease. But, unlike a disease, we have a permanent cure for it. It is called Tertiary Education by which Americans can obtain the qualifications that permit them better paying jobs in a country that is now almost wholly a "Services Economy". (The Manufacturing Industry nowadays employs barely 12% of the total working population.)

PS

Also there is an age-variation that is also important to notice. Excerpt from the same article:
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I see you are again abusing those of little understanding of statistics with that deceptive argument about poverty. The level of simplification within which you use it together with the hope of creating irrational anger and disunity is populism in the worst and feigned anger BS manner. You are not economically so uneducated that you might believe it. So what is it that drives you?
 
Mycroft said:
He knows the best solution to that situation is more of a "Main Street" focused economy and less of a "Wall Street" focus.
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You hope.

He's never worked on Main Street in his life. He's always been the boss and never the underdog perpeturally hobnobbing with the hoi-polloi because that was where the money was to finance his real-estate projects.

You are going to be very, very disappointed. He's already bumbling through a presidency that he did not win but lost - and it was by trickery that he got the Oval Office.

Typical of his career to date in a long straight line of recurrent deceit and manipulation ...
 
Oh pshaw to the OP, didn't you read the fine print?? The American dream is VERY real - it's just that it requires an 80% fallout rate. If you're not in the 20%, just be glad you're contributing. Murica!!
 
WRONG, WRONG, WRONG

ttwtt78640 said:
More BS about blaming federal income taxation rates for some very poor schools funded at the state and local level. The good news about federal income tax cuts is that leaves the pot ripe for more skimming at the state and local level for those that believe (lack of?) funding is the cause of poor performing public schools.
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Secondary-schooling is all local/state. There is very little Federal money involved in proportion to its total cost.

If the DoD was run like that, we would have been defeated by Hitler, and this blog would be in German.

Hillary had the solution, borrowed from Bernie. Face this fact: 45% of our children will never obtain a post-secondary degree! Which is going to be the source of all future unemployment as well as the 14% of the population living below the Poverty Threshold

ttwtt78640 said:
IMHO, the public educational systems suffer from using a (union?) certification and seniority based pay/retention system rather than using a (non-union?) job performance based pay/retention system. Where we differ is at which levels of government that the proposed changes (better education and broader access to it) should be made.
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Take primary/secondary education out of the hands of the state. There is no National Control of a public-service that is key to employment in a country striding out of the Industrial Age and into the Information Age. There must be a straight Post-secondary Educational Path (funded, monitored and controlled) by one central entity (just like the DoD, or the FBI).

Iow, the Dept. of Education!

Only this will allow those who need it most equitably throughout the nation the opportunity to graduate from high-school with the intelligence and wherewithal to enter and succeed in a Tertiary Education program - without which their lives will be consigned to continuous abject poverty in low-paying jobs.

For which, it would also help to institute a minimum wage of $13/15 per hour in order for those obliged to do so (and they will be many!) to earn a decent-living above the Poverty Threshold ($24K annually for a family of 4).

IOW, you got it all wrong, wrong, wrong ...
 
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Hawkeye10 said:
... the wealth holders have over a couple generations generated a system that serves their interests, and no one elses.
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It goes longer back in history than that. The upper-incomes before 1913 were never even taxed. So, the percentage of Wealth they earned was likely even greater than it is today.

Moreover, if we, the American voters, do not wake up and "change the system", then there is no reason for the it to change.

It will remain a disadvantage in terms of Income Inequality that favors a very, very small segment of American families long, long into the future.

Until another "Watts" happens, but next time on a national level. You don't want to be living in the US when it happens ...
 
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ludin said:
Income disparity is nothing more than an appeal to emotion argument.
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Yeah, which is why I concocted this Gini Index in my dreams:
720px-Gini_since_WWII.svg.png


Some people just dont wanna learn.

They take a weird sense of pleasure in denying the patently obvious. Income Disparity in America EXISTS.

It is the worst of any developed nation ...
 
Lafayette said:
You hope.

He's never worked on Main Street in his life. He's always been the boss and never the underdog perpeturally hobnobbing with the hoi-polloi because that was where the money was to finance his real-estate projects.

You are going to be very, very disappointed. He's already bumbling through a presidency that he did not win but lost - and it was by trickery that he got the Oval Office.

Typical of his career to date in a long straight line of recurrent deceit and manipulation ...
Click to expand...

I don't think you know the difference between Main Street and Wall Street. Main Street makes things...does things. Wall Street plays with money.
 
Lafayette said:
Yeah, which is why I concocted this Gini Index in my dreams

Some people just dont wanna learn.
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No you don't want to learn that is why you continue post these types of threads over and over again.

They take a weird sense of pleasure in denying the patently obvious. Income Disparity in America EXISTS.
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which is irrelevant. income disparity is irrelevant. our banking system makes it irrelevant. our economy is not a zero sum game.
neither is our money system. those on the lower end have the opportunity to not be there. someone making more than them does not prevent that from
happening. you don't seem to understand this.

that is the precise reason we have the federal reserve.

It is the worst of any developed nation ...
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no it isn't. trust me I have been to places who really have problems.
their economy and banking system doesn't allow for that move up like in the US.

the US is one of the few countries that you can have nothing and become a millionaire with work and effort.
 
joG said:
I see you are again abusing those of little understanding of statistics with that deceptive argument about poverty. The level of simplification within which you use it together with the hope of creating irrational anger and disunity is populism in the worst and feigned anger BS manner. You are not economically so uneducated that you might believe it. So what is it that drives you?
Click to expand...

Still complaining are we?

And still without the slightest justification, nor evidence to the contrary of that which I have posted.

Iow, "cheap shot" ...
 
Harshaw said:
Explain why income inequality, in and of itself, is a problem.
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Well for starters, it gives the rich a large degree of control over poor people's lives. It deprives the poor of the value of their labor. It gives the rich a way to undermine our political institutions.



http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/06/daily-chart

Then there's the moral argument surrounding is it right to let fellow citizens suffer whilst people buy yachts etc but that's obviously far more subjective so won't go into it too much.
 
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Lafayette said:
From the Guardian: The American dream? Top 20% pulling away from the rest, study finds



Once again, America's problem of Income Disparity is rearing its ugly head in the news. This was brought about by Reckless Ronnie, in the 1980s, who fundamentally changed Upper-income Taxation. (See infographic here.)

Aside from changing taxation rates, what is definitively required is Hillary's platform promise (borrowed from Bernie) that free Tertiary Education must be made available to all comers at state schools by means of Federal subventions ...
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Assortative mating... educated people tend to marry other educated people and uneducated people tend to marry other uneducated people compounding the disparity.

article said:
But what would it mean for America, where the more and less educated are drifting apart in countless other ways as well, if this “assortative mating” tendency rose continuously for decades? We are destined to find out, because that is exactly what is happening. And while the highly educated pair off and marry before having children, the less educated have become more likely to have kids out of wedlock or divorce later. These trends, combined, could one day prove a substantial obstacle to social mobility.
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Read more at: Assortative Mating Uptick: People Marry Others with Same Level of Education
 
Harshaw said:
How does income inequality do any of these things?

What does this have to do with my question?
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Because if there were inequality in income people would not be able to achieve the things I described in as much as they currently do. Rich special interests would find it harder to sway politicians, woudl find it harder to corrupt, would find it harder to control. You can see these in action to an incredible degree in places like Africa where income inequality is much more visible.

The link shows how the rich twist existing economic and govt systems to suit themselves. Which is unfair on the rest of the population, as it means said rich people don't contribute fairly to society.
 
ludin said:
... the US is one of the few countries that you can have nothing and become a millionaire with work and effort.
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As if becoming a millionaire was the raison d'etre of our existence on earth.

Stupid, stupid, stupid reasoning ...
 
Nilly said:
Because if there were inequality in income people would not be able to achieve the things I described in as much as they currently do. Rich special interests would find it harder to sway politicians, woudl find it harder to corrupt, would find it harder to control. You can see these in action to an incredible degree in places like Africa where income inequality is much more visible.
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This all assumes that "equality" means everyone being equally poor, rather than the other way around.

But no, it doesn't follow. Being rich allows you to do certain plutocratic things; it doesn't matter if other people are rich, too. You can still do them.

And why on earth would politicians be harder to corrupt if income were more equal? Under any circumstances, for that matter? What politicians DO -- hold power -- is what corrupts them; that doesn't change.

The link shows how the rich twist existing economic and govt systems to suit themselves. Which is unfair on the rest of the population.
Click to expand...

Which . . . they can do regardless of inequality.
 
Harshaw said:
This all assumes that "equality" means everyone being equally poor, rather than the other way around.

But no, it doesn't follow. Being rich allows you to do certain plutocratic things; it doesn't matter if other people are rich, too. You can still do them.

And why on earth would politicians be harder to corrupt if income were more equal? Under any circumstances, for that matter? What politicians DO -- hold power -- is what corrupts them; that doesn't change.

Which . . . they can do regardless of inequality.
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It's gonna be much harder to pay off a politician when

a) the politician is as wealthy as the mysterious benefactor #1 in the first place
b) there's another benefactor who's just as rich as mb1 who wants do something in the other direction
c) many people can band up to offer far more than any individual special interest can
 
Nilly said:
It's gonna be much harder to pay off a politician when

a) the politician is as wealthy as the mysterious benefactor #1 in the first place
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There are always going to be those who are very rich. This happens everywhere, in every time, in every economic system. Same for those who are very poor.

Equality of the type you're talking about here doesn't happen, ever.

b) there's another benefactor who's just as rich as mb1 who wants do something in the other direction
c) many people can band up to offer far more than any individual special interest can
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These things are already true, and are true in any economic situation. There's never just one very rich guy, and the many can always assert greater influence, IF they can organize themselves and have the discipline to do it.
 
Harshaw said:
This really does not answer what I said.
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"There's never just one rich guy"

"8 people hold the same amount of wealth as 3.5bn people"

:roll:
 
Nilly said:
"There's never just one rich guy"

"8 people hold the same amount of wealth as 3.5bn people"

:roll:
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OK. Re-read that a couple of times and really think about it.
 
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