What these individuals either don't know (out of pure ignorance) or are concealing from the folks is that the main drivers of income inequality are a) age (the top wage earners tend to be in their 40s and 50s while the bottom wage earners are frequently in their 20s), b) level of education (the top wage earners tend to have at least one college degree while those at the bottom tend to have less than a high school diploma), c) number of workers per family (families at the top average 2 workers per family while those at the bottom average just .5), and d) family cohesion (broken families and out of wedlock births being much more likely at the lower socioeconomic levels) - NOT CAPITALISTIC REPRESSION, RACISM, ETC...........................................................................................................They also don't tell us that there is incredible movement within these categories (58% of the people in the bottom quintile in 1996 were out of it by 2005 and almost 50% of those in the top 1% were also out of that category during that same time frame) and that the categories largely reflect the same people at different stages of their lives....And as to why the gap between these static (static from the statist viewpoint) categories has widened so much, it's elementary. The world has gotten much more competitive and technologically driven and so OF COURSE the reward for success and experience has far outstripped that of youth, inexperience, sitting idly at home, etc..........................................................................................................Now, is there anything that the government do to ameliorate this and make it so that uneducated, idle, single parent, and youthful families can close the gap between them and the higher earning families? I suppose so. But if that means doubling down on policies that have already failed (minimum wage laws that have frozen black youngsters out of the job market, piling more money into a corrupt and antiquated public school system, regulating the shit out of small businesses, draconian top tax rates that have stifled economic growth, throwing more and more taxpayer money at healthcare, education, and entitlements, affirmative action policies that have severely harmed blacks, etc.), I'd probably have to say, not so fast, and that we as a nation can do so significantly better than listening to these demagogues.
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Check this out
"Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) signed legislation Monday that will increase the state’s minimum wage for most workers to $10.10 by 2018, the last major legislative priority of his tenure."
An action designed to punish employers for daring to hire and pay those whose skills are worth less than $10.10. All the gradual increase means is that even if someone with skills only worth about $8.00 an hour is hired now. the company is strongly encouraged by the state government to fire them by 2018.
One can't argue that terrible anti-worker, anti-jobs, and anti-small-business actions helped make things better with the root causes of the conflagration in Baltimore. What is left is to argue the extent of damage done by laws like this which only force companies to fire low-skilled workers or never hire them to begin with... a policy that hits young people more than anything.
I'd have much rather seen Gov. O'Malley (D) sign a law to help train these people to earn more money, rather than sign a purely destructive law which treats low-earning, low-skilled workers as cannon fodder, better off earning nothing at all.
Another thing we know for certain, well at least some of us "idiots" do anyway, is repeating the policies of the last administration, cutting taxes whole waging unfunded conflicts around the globe really doesn't make sense either.
Another thing us "idiots" realize is that griwing wealth concentration at the top while the middle class shrinks and the underclass (economic underclass) grows will lead to a neo fuedalism and eventual social unrest and upheaval.
Economic opportunity is not equally spread across society as we become ever more technologically advanced and robots take more and more opportunity ogf the table there will less. There will come a day of artificial intelligence. I read an interesting article awhile back about this very issue. At some point in the future machines will be able to out think intelligent humans and make decisions quickly and accurately as humans. Think about the ramifications.
Time to start thinking outside the box. I'm pretty sure Jefferson and Rand would agree. I know Marx would for sure.
"draconian top tax rates that have stifled economic growth,.."
--golly, those days are long gone.
I remember them: the fifties and the economy seemed to be doing quite well, thank you.
I totally agree, dmarks, and the last time that the black unemployment rate was lower than that of the white population? Yep, you got it; the year before the 1st minimum wage was passed.
You're not a Luddite, are you, Les? That, and do you really think that Ayn Rand would find ANYTHING redeeming in Piketty and Warren (2 people who most assuredly do NOT think outside the box)? To me, that's quite a stretch.......And as for the wealthiest amongst us, the number one demographic there is seniors 70-74. I'm in favor of means-testing SS and Medicare (as is Jimmy Carter, to his credit). Progressives, not so much.
Les is the modern day chicken little......run..the sky is falling...run.... " neo-feudalism "....jesus Christ,is he hiding under his bed....
And the '50s were actually a pretty stagnant decade, BB; numerous economic downturns, not a lot of revenue gotten from the so-called wealthy, etc..............That, and nobody even came close to paying 91% in that there were way, way more deductions back then (tax reform didn't happen until the '80s). Maybe they paid about a third of that (the effective tax rate).
I don't foresee a robot taking my job, Russ. I could be wrong.
Will: Maybe not your highly skilled, valuable job.
But that is what would surely happen if those lazy and greedy "oinkers" who demand to be paid double what the job is worth at McDonalds get their way. There's a robot smiling somewhere every time one of these boars or sows pickets a McDonalds.
Les is the modern day chicken little......run..the sky is falling...run.... " neo-feudalism "....jesus Christ,is he hiding under his bed....
Again, and it certainly is not surprising, Shackelford is showing his abject ignorance.
So, Shakey, why not take your blather back to the Stench Trench wher you are hailed as a great thinker among the ignorant.
I don't foresee a robot taking my job, Russ. I could be wrong.
History is replete with naysayers.
I won't go into the long list of things that were once considered the stuff of science fiction that is now reality.
Not everything can be performed by robots and artificial intelligence is something for the future. But in the minds of some possibilities are not even worth considering. Especially if ones worldview is stuck in the 18th or 19th century. Not that I believe yours is Will but the individual you responded to just may very well fit that mold.
Admittedly, Will, I see the fifties through rose-colored lenses, my idyllic years from
9-19. Lots of men coming back
from wwII, houses going up all
over, plenty of mfg jobs, etc.
My Dad bought a new car and a new house during that time, (he survived part of the depression in CCC camps) and I easily found part-time warehouse work at a high (for then) $1.44
an hour. My first college tuition
was $123.75 a semester and I got an even higher paying pt job as a
lab assistant after hours. So, in hindsight, it wasn't 'stagnant' for me.
E X A C T L Y BB Idaho. Held true in the 60's and very early 70's as well.
dmarks, it is already heading that way. It has happened in industry and the lower paying labor intensive jobs are affected first. I know, I was there and wrote the justifications for purchase of machinery to eliminate those lower paying labor intensive jobs. They never come back.
Les... how many years has this trend been going on? I was thinking on this before I saw this comment.
Maybe train those who are displaced (those that aren't also "oinkers" who go through life expecting great things will just be handed to them) in robotics... or....
Skilled trades even? I've personality noticed how lacking society is in that area too.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/07/08/report-economy-will-face-shortage-of-5-million-workers-in-2020
And you're making my point, BB; the fact that we should be tracking actual human beings and NOT static categories.......And, no, Les, it didn't stop in the '60s and'70s. Data from the Treasury Department show that 6 out of 10 people in the bottom quintile in 1996 were out of it in less than a decade (with a fair number of those folks moving up several quintiles) and the income of these people actually rose 91%.
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