How Unequal Can America Get Before We Snap?

[fat wee robin]

Actually, I wasn't saying that at all. I was saying that Obama encourages people to be envious of each other, and then he uses that envy to make promises to fulfill their envy with what they want.

I was being ever so slightly ironic as although I appreciate things like the internet,I resent the bad effect it has on 'world culture ;dragging everwhere down to shallow, empty, consumeristic fad culture ;knowing the Price of everything and the Value of nothing .Here now we get 'trash' all day long on the TV and the adverts.You have no idea how to use 'freedom' ;you have to limit yourself or it will kill .That is the message of the Gospel .Just because to can have it ,do it does not mean that you should .We are supposed to set limits on ourselves ,discipline ourselves not to overstep on to others territories ;You 'freedoms ' should stop when my 'rights' begin ,but in a selfish culture ,a non philosophical culture like the U.S., you get people who say they are 'christian ' who have not the foggiest idea what that means . It happens everywhere but is magnified there .

 

[fat wee robin]

Syria has that on lock down ATM. Also see Nigeria.

Syria and much of the Middle East is America's supply, dump .

 

[HannahT]

This issue is multi faceted, and it does no good to just concentrate on one aspect as the popular whipping boy. Reich knows this, and so do others that push it. They do a good job manipulating certain aspects, while they leave out others on purpose. You have to wonder if they feel if you show the whole story - since it is complicated, and has many roots - that the majority wouldn't be able to keep up with it, be overwhelmed as their reason NOT to show those sides to often.

 

[ChristsSoldier115]

So we either give people more livable wages and hope they don't raise prices to keep their insane profits, or we can keep paying them pennies and let them live off of government benefits. Isn't having people not live off the government the ideal for most conservatives? What is wrong with companies giving people more money so people can stop sucking on the uncle sam money teat?

 

[KarateCowboy]

I still don't see what is wrong with economic diversity, or why it would make us "snap"

 

[variant]

Why the fear of economic diversity? Paranoid much?

It doesn't really have a good track record.

 

[KarateCowboy]

It doesn't really have a good track record.

What, exactly, is the problem with economic diversity?

 

[variant]

What, exactly, is the problem with economic diversity?

At a certain point people who buy most of the stuff don't have enough money and the people who invest in growth ventures don't have anything to invest in.

I posted a graph in my last post to show the result of the problem, there are spikes of income inequality right before the great depression and the housing crisis.

 

[HannahT]

Isn't having people not live off the government the ideal for most conservatives? What is wrong with companies giving people more money so people can stop sucking on the uncle sam money teat?

From what I have heard is they want more good paying jobs to come back. You can get them off Uncle Sam as you put it that way.

I would think that Mr. Fry Guy would rather have a trade to do at a decent wage, and have a career is easier to move up with compared to the fast food and retail that many wish them to stay at. Trades tend to pay more than $15/hr in the long run, and when you stick to Retail or Fast Food? Your .15 -.25/hr wage increase (max amount) annually won't keep up with prices going up very well. You move to another fast food or retail? You start again at the bottom, and move your way up once again in most cases. They consider them a no skill level worker at those positions, and we need more skilled paying jobs today.

I never did understand why people seem to feel adults would want to stay at those jobs forever, and yet all the talk about keeping them there is all the rage. Keep them there and give them $15/hr, because the jobs have dried up isn't helping in the long run. Short term maybe - long term? Not so much.

Also, with our labor participation rate where it is? Who do you think will get those no skill labor jobs first if there is nothing else out there? Employers will take the best they can get, and once again you have the working poor - that were NOT encouraged to get a trade, just stick to fries - stuck with nothing once again.

 

[morningstar2651]

What, exactly, is the problem with economic diversity?

We're not talking about economic diversity. We're talking about the disappearing middle class. The widening wealth gap shows us that the middle class is being pushed down into the lower class.

The highest point on the chart below is the Great Depression. I recommend watching the Khan Academy video series I recommended in a previous post if you don't understand the potential consequences of growing income inequality.

To quote Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis on the Great Depression:

"Other writers have shown that, coincident with the growth of these giant corporations, there has occurred a marked concentration of individual wealth; and that the resulting disparity in incomes is a major cause of the existing depression."​

It doesn't really have a good track record.

 

[morningstar2651]

Economic inequality in the US reaches levels not seen since Great Depression
Wealth inequality in the US is reaching its most extreme point since just before the start of the Great Depression in 1929, according to a new economic analysis. Even the 1 percent are lagging behind the 0.01 percent.

 

[Ajax 777]

Actually, I wasn't saying that at all. I was saying that Obama encourages people to be envious of each other, and then he uses that envy to make promises to fulfill their envy with what they want.

Yup. "Free stuff!"

 

[variant]

Yup. "Free stuff!"

The root of income inequality is that it is becoming more and more difficult to make a decent living through work while everything becomes increasingly more expensive.

Inflation is underestimated so your share of the economy is probably actually dropping steadily.

 

[FanthatSpark]

Syria and much of the Middle East is America's supply, dump .

But most important, resource for Empire. No corporation/Our government Same thing same entity can stay stagnate and survive for population grows. Thus Oil and a cheap workforce in Syria. However, the World is starting to grasp our corporation drive as we term it "democracy". Its Hitler not of race but Empire/Corporation growth. Thus we break international law on a continuous basis but Putin/Russia does not. He follows international law (He pulls out of countries occupied we stay) thus he has the moral high ground and our allies are starting to listen. Trump made me poot from laughing so hard when he said I'd go in and blow the oil up. When he sees the money numbers of who he supports in that region he then knows he was puking non sense when that question was asked. ISIS "IS" us in funding and weapons , in a future resource acquisition.

 

[Ajax 777]

Hm... I can honestly say, with a view to world history, financial tyranny and economic oppression embedded in social systems have always existed to various degrees, but the only nations I have seen get away from it are the communist nations like the former Soviet bloc, where everyone equally had nothing, and everyone had equal say - which was none at all.

I know it's already been said, but I reiterate that the answer to income inequality is NOT wealth redistribution. Opportunities for higher education and open doors for them that are driven and diligent to work "harder and smarter" are what needs to be made freely and equally available to all — though I've no wish to derail the thread to another discussion on how to pay for it.

 

[ChristJudgeOfAll]

At a certain point people who buy most of the stuff don't have enough money and the people who invest in growth ventures don't have anything to invest in.

I posted a graph in my last post to show the result of the problem, there are spikes of income inequality right before the great depression and the housing crisis.

Correlation isn't causation, I bet people were wearing pants too, pants must have caused the great depression.

 

[ChristsSoldier115]

From what I have heard is they want more good paying jobs to come back. You can get them off Uncle Sam as you put it that way.

I would think that Mr. Fry Guy would rather have a trade to do at a decent wage, and have a career is easier to move up with compared to the fast food and retail that many wish them to stay at. Trades tend to pay more than $15/hr in the long run, and when you stick to Retail or Fast Food? Your .15 -.25/hr wage increase (max amount) annually won't keep up with prices going up very well. You move to another fast food or retail? You start again at the bottom, and move your way up once again in most cases. They consider them a no skill level worker at those positions, and we need more skilled paying jobs today.

I never did understand why people seem to feel adults would want to stay at those jobs forever, and yet all the talk about keeping them there is all the rage. Keep them there and give them $15/hr, because the jobs have dried up isn't helping in the long run. Short term maybe - long term? Not so much.

Also, with our labor participation rate where it is? Who do you think will get those no skill labor jobs first if there is nothing else out there? Employers will take the best they can get, and once again you have the working poor - that were NOT encouraged to get a trade, just stick to fries - stuck with nothing once again.

Its simple, the higher paying jobs get even higher pay. Paying people more doesn't take money away from the rich, because they still have their money in the bank, but they won't be making as much money as they used to.

 

[variant]

Correlation isn't causation, I bet people were wearing pants too, pants must have caused the great depression.

Look at the graph again, it shows us spikes before the great depression, the S&L scandal, the dot com bust, and the housing crisis.

It also coorilates to economic instability where seen in other countries.

The theorized mechanism is just as I said, general people don't have enough money to spend on things and investors can't find growth, so they speculate into more and more risk causing an eventual bubble collapse.

The worst was the great depression but it also lead to the longest period of sustained long term growth when economic practices were put into place to curve the income inequality.

I'm sure everything is fine though, the fed propping up the investor class after the housing crisis has maintained the high income inequality by printing money. I'm sure nothing will come of it.

I'm sure a decade of 0% fed rates, quantitative easing, activist bailouts of major financial institution and TARP, all aimed protecting the wealth of the richest of us won't come back to bite us at all.

 

[Vylo]

A bigger problem is we have to actually spend the taxes we get from the wealthy on services and infrastructure that will build the middle class. Education, transportation, and work programs (as opposed to welfare).

 

[FanthatSpark]

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/16/quantitative-easing-was-a-bust-lets-try-higher-wages-instead/ How about grandmas pension being stolen ,,,AGAIN. Concentrate on "They are pulling cash like cabbage and stuffing pockets" .