Income inequality and America needs a mustache

[EnjoyIt]

The problem with income inequality is in the name itself. There is absolutely no reason why all incomes should be equal. When everyone gets paid the same amount there is no motivation to excel. This has been proven countless times in history. Therefor, there is absolutely nothing wrong with a doctor making a lot more than the janitor, or even a CEO making more then the secretary.

Actually in society, you want to have income inequality. This inequality is a motivating factor for ingenuity. It is also a reason why entrepreneurs take risk. Without a decent reward, why take the risk at all?

So what is the issue at hand if it is not "income inequality?" Is it that the poor of this country can't succeed and become the 1 percent?  That is completely not true. There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it. This is what makes America so great.  Actually the poor in this country are far better off today than they were 30 years ago. We have better access to healthcare, multi car families, smart phones, cheaper groceries with more variety, multiple TVs, air conditioning, water filters, and more.

Therefor I do not believe the poor's mobility or access to goods and services is the problem either.

I believe the core of the problem in the US is no different than most Americans.  The US is addicted to debt and spending. We don't have a taxation problem but a spending problem.  We spend too much money on military and foreign subsidies. We spend too much money on corporate subsidies. We have a corrupt system where money is spent frivolously on over priced programs. Our tax system is rediculously convoluted with way too many loop holes. The US needs to become more mustachian and get back to simplicity. With decreased spending we will have less debt and less debt is increased cash flow. With this cash flow we can rebuild the infrastructure of America leading to more and better jobs. This will lead to even more cash flow for America and taxes can be lowered. Corporations will start bringing jobs back to the US increasing cash flow even more. Increasing the GDP and increasing prosperity for everyone.

Increasing minimum wage to $15/hr everywhere is unwise. It is great for everyone making under $15/hr but does very little good for the middle class who always gets squeezed the hardest as they find the cost of their goods and services rise.  I would assume if everyone at the grocery store had their salary double, I'm sure grocery prices would have to rise as well. Maybe not by 100% but rise it will. Increasing minimum wage slowly to coincide with the cost of living is completely appropriate.

Due to crony capitalism our financial industry has become to big and too powerful. It is still "too big to fail." That needs to be starightend out before Anerican tax payers have to find another financial bailout.

My last comment is in regards to the massive compensation to CEOs of large corporations. If I run a taco shop, do I have the right to make some profit on every taco I sell? What if I own 2 taco shops? What about 3 shops? Can I at least make one penny profit per taco? In 2012 Taco Bell sold almost half a million Doritos tacos. No reason why the CEO of Taco Bell doesn't deserve $5million from just those sales. Add another penny for the other tacos they sell, another for soft drinks, and his salary is $10 million+. It is fair because he sells volume.

How do we convince the US to become more mustachian is the real question?

[Yaeger]

Some misconceptions to clear up, from my ever-so-humble point of view. In most corporations the Board of Directors, with guidance from the shareholders, set the CEO's salary. The CEO doesn't take money from the worker, the CEO takes it from the shareholders. If I'm a shareholder and I pay the CEO $25 mil per year, I expect the CEO to generate more than $25 mil in additional revenue for us. THAT's why CEOs get paid more.

The financial bailout was a mess. The Secretary of the Treasury rounded up 9 CEOs representing the largest banks and financial firms and held a meeting. He told them that he was going to force them all to take a stimulus. Several declined and tried to refuse, it was forced on them anyways and given to all of them to hide, from the public, the failing financial firms. If you give one firm emergency funding, people will grab their cash and run.

Per the CBO and GAO, EVERY SINGLE YEAR they caution about the growth of spending on a couple key areas of spending. Social Security, Healthcare, and interest on the debt. Those are the spending programs we need to adjust. Not military, not foreign aid, those are drops in the bucket in comparison. They will naturally be squeezed out as mandatory spending consumes the budget. We need changes, we need to desperately cut entitlement spending.
https://www.cbo.gov/publication/51129

I agree with you on income/wealth inequality. It's not necessarily a problem though it does ramp up the envy and resentment rhetoric. You can't bring the poor up by bringing the rich down, JFK said "a rising tide lifts all boats." Inequality isn't the problem, it's our hostility to jobs and industry.

[woopwoop]

The huge jump in CEO pay (from a multiplier of 30 to a multiplier of 300 over the course of a single decade) has nothing to do with merit and everything to do with how CEO pay negotiation changed to a structure where recruiters and consultants WHO ARE HIRED BY THE CEOS THEMSELVES make a judgment on what CEOs "deserve" based not on performance or merit but on constantly increasing averages in CEO pay. No consultant who wants to be hired again says that a CEO should be paid less than average. It doesn't take a brilliant mathematician to realize that this thinking is fundamentally flawed:

"So when the “average” CEO pay is announced, any CEO would be expected to go to the board, tell them the published average and ask, “Well, don’t you think I’ve done a great job? Don’t you think I’m above average? If so, then shouldn’t I be compensated at some percentage greater than average?”

Repeat this process 350 times, every year, and you can see how large company CEO pay keeps going up. And data in the EPI report supports this. Those who have the greatest pay increase are the 20% who are paid the lowest. The group with the second greatest pay increase are the 20% in the next to lowest paid quintile. These lower paid CEOs say, “Shouldn’t I be paid at least average – if not more?”

The board agrees to this logic, since they think the CEO is doing a good job (otherwise they would fire him). So they step up his or her pay. This then pushes up the average. And every year this process is repeated, pushing pay higher and higher and higher.

Oh, and if you replace a CEO then the new person certainly is not going to take the job for below-average compensation. They are expected to do great things, so they must be brought in with compensation that is up toward the top. The recruiters will assure the board that finding the right CEO is challenging, and they must “pay up” to obtain the “right talent.” Again, driving up the average."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamhartung/2015/06/22/why-ceos-make-so-much-money/#2fb4be4412a3

It's absolutely idiotic and so is your bootstraps reasoning. Poor children who don't have enough to eat have their brains starved from an early age, they are born meth addicted, they are left to rot in failing schools. America is becoming less of a meritocracy every day. Open your goddamn eyes and show some compassion to those less fortunate than yourself. Yes, we should all be more mustachian. No, this alone will not fix the systemic issues of poverty and inequality facing our country. That is an absolutely ridiculous notion.

[EnjoyIt]

I wonder if CEO incomes have something to do with globalization and increased sales? I'm sure the law of averages has something to do with it also.  I'm also pretty sure the board of directors are not a bunch of mindless idiots just saying OK to huge salaries without thought of profit margins.

As for your second comment. I grew up in the projects hungry, getting government cheese and school lunches. Today I make an excellent income. I work with many people who grew up very poor and now have terrific lives and jobs. Unfortunately there is indeed the parent lottery and a child born to a meth addict has all odds against him/her. Though the answer to this problem is not fixed by throwing money at the drug addicted parent.  If a child is born to parents with no motivation for achievement then you are once again correct that those children will be very unlikely to achieve much. And again, no amount of money will change that. You can't teach someone how to be successful if they are not interested, not motivated, and don't have the support of their family.

Mrswhipple, some of your comments above were uncalled for. No need to pull heads from rectums. This is a discussion. Once insults are thrown around the discussion ends.  I recommend tossing solutions as opposed to mud.

To continue I have a buddy who is a science teacher in the inner city. He says that there are some kids who really try and study and work on good grades. The rest just don't care and their parents don't care. How do you recommend to fix that problem?

[mxt0133]

When everyone gets paid the same amount there is no motivation to excel.

You are correct if people, people have no motivation to go beyond the minimum requirements if everyone gets paid the same if their only motivation to do the activity or job is to get paid.  Be we all know that people have motivations beyond getting paid to do a particular activity.  That is why you see people that still excel and go above and beyond their expected duties even if they are getting paid the same as those that are not as productive.  Sure some are motivated by the fact that they will might get a promotion or a raise.  But there are some, like most of us here, that can't stand to do something half-assed.  Some individuals actually believe in the saying, 'if it's worth doing it's worth doing right.'  Regardless of how much they are getting paid relative to everyone else.

I guess I am going beyond your initial intent of this post.  Imagine evolving beyond a capitalistic economic model where everyone is provided basic necessities, think of a society where every individual is afforded the opportunity to reach their highest potential.  Sure 99% of the people probably won't do anything that will significantly impact or improve human progress, but imagine all the possible Einsteins, Mozarts, Platos, (insert any individual that has significantly impact on human history) that could have been if they had the ability and resources to purse their passion without regard of having to support themselves or their families.

<end idealistic and Utopian rant>

[Yaeger]

To continue I have a buddy who is a science teacher in the inner city. He says that there are some kids who really try and study and work on good grades. The rest just don't care and their parents don't care. How do you recommend to fix that problem?

The same way we've been going the last 50 years as we slide down the global education scale, take more money from the rich and throw it at the schools hoping some of it accomplishes something good. I'm only half serious. We decry the plight of the poor yet continue down the same road of self-destruction with our inefficient bureaucracies and federal standards. We need innovation and creativity from teachers and the schools, and we hamstring them with arbitrary metrics that drive their funding.

MrsWhipple is correct about the leverage that CEOs can use to increase their pay. Some game the system. But that's really a crime against the shareholders, the owners and the people paying the CEO's wage. It doesn't mean that if the CEO to worker ratio jumps from 30 to 300 over a decade that the CEO is appropriating his salary from the workers. That's nonsense. In the broadest sense the labor market does, and will always, determine wage. The CEO is eating the profits of the shareholders.

I'm going to play Devil's Advocate here (This is always fun, go ahead and shoot!). Part of me hopes that people starve, that we start experiencing real poverty. When people enter the military they shave their head, treat them like crap, strip them of their identity. Once they're at their low point, they're vulnerable, beaten, weak. You see their true character, put them into situations where they dig down into their reserves for the first time in their life and realize that they're so much more capable than they thought. The human mind is a powerful thing. Pain and loss are powerful motivators, used correctly it's an important tool in a free market society. An addict needs to hit bottom before they realize it's a problem. It used to be that nearly 1/3 of immigrants in the US returned home after failing.

Our problem isn't poverty, our problem is the limited opportunities that our business-adverse society is creating. Opportunities for those willing to take the risks to climb out of poverty. The removal of rungs on that ladder of economic mobility and then blaming the results on things like inequality, racism, sexism, etc. Bring back the polluting factories, the steel mills, the coal mines.

[EnjoyIt]

. . . But there are some, like most of us here, that can't stand to do something half-assed.  Some individuals actually believe in the saying, 'if it's worth doing it's worth doing right.'  Regardless of how much they are getting paid relative to everyone else.

Ahh yes, the mules that work tirelessly for the good of the masses.  Look around you; I mean around where you live and where you work. Look at your friends and your family. Think how many of those people will pull the extra effort for the sake of the effort.  There is a saying in the old soviet union.  I will give a loose translation "If they think they are paying us, let them think we are working."

There are not enough mules in the world to make this work.

[JudaBaker]

Imagine evolving beyond a capitalistic economic model where everyone is provided basic necessities, think of a society where every individual is afforded the opportunity to reach their highest potential.  Sure 99% of the people probably won't do anything that will significantly impact or improve human progress, but imagine all the possible Einsteins, Mozarts, Platos, (insert any individual that has significantly impact on human history) that could have been if they had the ability and resources to purse their passion without regard of having to support themselves or their families.

<end idealistic and Utopian rant>

I really like what you're saying here. It can sound like a crazy pipe dream, but with technology advancing in an exponential fashion, it's completely possible.

An eye opening video on the advancement of robotics and artificial intelligence is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

The short version of the video is pretty much this: Robots are becoming cheaper and more effective than humans and AI is improving. It's not a matter of if but a matter of when - massive portions of the workplace will be replaced by automation.


There's already massive inequality in income and it's growing. Then there's the difference in living standards between first and third world counties, which is colossal. Image how much worse all of this will get when it's more economically efficient to hire a bunch of robots instead of people. I don't think this would be a good thing under capitalism.

But a world where free labor (robots) can supply our food, clothing and more with a much smaller footprint than we currently have (think lab grown meat, 3D printed fabrics etc) then we can completely change the way in which our economy works. It would be possible to have a base standard of living for everyone (base income) with extra wealth earned by going out and working to the advancement of society.

People would then be free to pursue work in any area they choose without having to worry about paying the rent or buying food. Much better than the current system, where many people have to overload themselves with student debt before they even start earning just to have a chance of earning a decent living.

Of course this all sounds pretty far fetched, but it was only a handful of generations ago that things such as electricity, automobiles and space exploration would have been considered fantasy.

This would of course bring about an entirely new set of problems for society to deal with. However, with the way technology is advancing, either we figure out another way of doing things economically or life gets much worse for the lower and middle class.

[Bucksandreds]

So glad you guys understand that people concerned about income inequality are all advocating for a communist system of 100% equal pay to all. It's refreshing that you all haven't fallen for the ruse of the concern being for degree of inequality in comparison to historical and similar country levels. No more need for me to comment. You all have it figured out.

[PathtoFIRE]

While there are many many things to take issue with in the OP's post, I would like to highlight one thing, the fallacy that "money" is some kind of commodity or resource, that we are at the whim of its appearance into our economy, and that we must fret about its use, etc. Money is the oil in the system, the lubricant. It's not timber, metal, water, people, machines, products, ad naseum, it's a social construct, a system, notation.

When I hear someone say we have a spending problem, my ears perk up, only to flatten once I hear that we are spending too much in general, or too much on healthcare or retirees or education. We do have a spending problem, but it's 90 degrees from what many think. If money is the lubricant, then the problem (or better yet puzzle) is what parts of our economy do when need to better lubricate? Right now, I see large parts of our economy dedicated to building great palaces, stadiums, yachts, dedicated to hurling sophisticated bombs at people far away, used to monitor and observe citizens and visitors.

Our spending problem, at least in my opinion, is that we've collectively bought into this idea that the ideal market is a blind market, and that any attempt to steer this ship away from some """natural""" course (can you tell I don't buy that anything in this realm is truly natural in any scientific cosmological sense) is foolish.

Damnit, someone is deciding where our collective efforts are being directed to, and the issue about spending problems and economic inequality is that some efforts do more to help us now and in the future than others. Bombing enemy combatants certainly provides some technological benefits, as well as direct pay to soldiers, engineers, factory workers. But maybe directly spending on research would give us more bang for our buck. Giant stadiums and glittering buildings look nice, but maybe if 90% of people made more, and 10% made less compared to the current situation, we'd see more job opportunities for those who have given up.

tl;dr: we need to break the illusion that money is a resource, and recognize that it's a tool, and one that we can wield for specific purposes, and right now, I believe our current politics prevents us from wielding it for the best use for the most people

[Bucksandreds]

While there are many many things to take issue with in the OP's post, I would like to highlight one thing, the fallacy that "money" is some kind of commodity or resource, that we are at the whim of its appearance into our economy, and that we must fret about its use, etc. Money is the oil in the system, the lubricant. It's not timber, metal, water, people, machines, products, ad naseum, it's a social construct, a system, notation.

When I hear someone say we have a spending problem, my ears perk up, only to flatten once I hear that we are spending too much in general, or too much on healthcare or retirees or education. We do have a spending problem, but it's 90 degrees from what many think. If money is the lubricant, then the problem (or better yet puzzle) is what parts of our economy do when need to better lubricate? Right now, I see large parts of our economy dedicated to building great palaces, stadiums, yachts, dedicated to hurling sophisticated bombs at people far away, used to monitor and observe citizens and visitors.

Our spending problem, at least in my opinion, is that we've collectively bought into this idea that the ideal market is a blind market, and that any attempt to steer this ship away from some """natural""" course (can you tell I don't buy that anything in this realm is truly natural in any scientific cosmological sense) is foolish.

Damnit, someone is deciding where our collective efforts are being directed to, and the issue about spending problems and economic inequality is that some efforts do more to help us now and in the future than others. Bombing enemy combatants certainly provides some technological benefits, as well as direct pay to soldiers, engineers, factory workers. But maybe directly spending on research would give us more bang for our buck. Giant stadiums and glittering buildings look nice, but maybe if 90% of people made more, and 10% made less compared to the current situation, we'd see more job opportunities for those who have given up.

tl;dr: we need to break the illusion that money is a resource, and recognize that it's a tool, and one that we can wield for specific purposes, and right now, I believe our current politics prevents us from wielding it for the best use for the most people

You must have missed the memo. See, whenever someone thinks it's a good idea to stop the rich and powerful from acquiring nearly all resources and bending the common man to his whim, that person just doesn't understand the way things ought to be. Ted Cruz has taken his axiomatic economic philosophy (one that's done nothing but draw us deeper into federal debt by significantly lowering tax revenues while benefitting only those who have too much already) and implanted it into the OP. William F Buckley would be so proud of him. These are the same ideas of mainstream men who 50 years ago advocated for whites to rule all blacks in the south because whites were the 'more advanced race.'  Read about the evolution of the mid 20th century conservative movement that still is in vogue in the Republican Party. These ideas came along with some other ideas that even today's republicans would be ashamed of.

[2Cent]

Studies have shown that its not a matter of in-equal opportunities, but of knowing how to use those opportunities. If you grow up around a bunch of business savvy CEO's you will learn to take advantage of things someone who grew up around a bunch of construction workers will never even know exist.

[2lazy2retire]

Imagine evolving beyond a capitalistic economic model where everyone is provided basic necessities, think of a society where every individual is afforded the opportunity to reach their highest potential.  Sure 99% of the people probably won't do anything that will significantly impact or improve human progress, but imagine all the possible Einsteins, Mozarts, Platos, (insert any individual that has significantly impact on human history) that could have been if they had the ability and resources to purse their passion without regard of having to support themselves or their families.

<end idealistic and Utopian rant>

I really like what you're saying here. It can sound like a crazy pipe dream, but with technology advancing in an exponential fashion, it's completely possible.

An eye opening video on the advancement of robotics and artificial intelligence is here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

The short version of the video is pretty much this: Robots are becoming cheaper and more effective than humans and AI is improving. It's not a matter of if but a matter of when - massive portions of the workplace will be replaced by automation.


There's already massive inequality in income and it's growing. Then there's the difference in living standards between first and third world counties, which is colossal. Image how much worse all of this will get when it's more economically efficient to hire a bunch of robots instead of people. I don't think this would be a good thing under capitalism.

But a world where free labor (robots) can supply our food, clothing and more with a much smaller footprint than we currently have (think lab grown meat, 3D printed fabrics etc) then we can completely change the way in which our economy works. It would be possible to have a base standard of living for everyone (base income) with extra wealth earned by going out and working to the advancement of society.

People would then be free to pursue work in any area they choose without having to worry about paying the rent or buying food. Much better than the current system, where many people have to overload themselves with student debt before they even start earning just to have a chance of earning a decent living.

Of course this all sounds pretty far fetched, but it was only a handful of generations ago that things such as electricity, automobiles and space exploration would have been considered fantasy.

This would of course bring about an entirely new set of problems for society to deal with. However, with the way technology is advancing, either we figure out another way of doing things economically or life gets much worse for the lower and middle class.

This is surely the future and the sooner the better, a Basic Income has been discussed extensively on here before. The future belongs to those who control information and technology, the challenge is to ensure the wealth generated goes back to all in the form of a dividend. Alaska has something similar on a smaller scale where all residents get a cut of the state's resources - the same must happen with technology.

[mathlete]

It never ceases to amaze me the extent to which the working man can be convinced that stagnant wages are "not bad".

[Yaeger]

It never ceases to amaze me the extent to which the working man can be convinced that stagnant wages are "not bad".

They're not if total compensation tracks with productivity. Wages is an incomplete metric when workers are demanding more non-monetary benefits (sick leave, maternity leave, pensions, flexible hours, etc) in lieu of direct pay.

http://www.nber.org/digest/oct08/w13953.html
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/07/productivity-and-compensation-growing-together

[gaja]

There are plenty of studies that show little or no link between money and performance n the work place. This article quotes a few of them: http://www.ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/ijbm/article/viewFile/21179/18282

Most people will agree that it is nice to get a higher salary or bonuses, but if you want someone to perform well, they need to like their job, have an inner motivation for it, feel they are treated and paid fairly, and that they have control over their work load and are trusted to do the work the way they judge is best.

Now that we have established that people respons better to getting paid fairly that getting paid extra or more; what would be a fair way to establish pay grades? Education is one, level of hazard and risk is another, number of hours worked is a third. Very few janitors will feel that it is unfair that they are paid less than a doctor. I have no problem with accepting that my friends from university who went to work on oil platforms make more than I do. I get to see my kids every day, they don't. But I do wonder why the CEO of a small enterprice think they need 20 or even 50 times the salary of our prime minister.

There needs to be a logic to the system, and there needs to be a real choice for everyone to get education, or be considered for a position based on what they have done, not their family background.

[mm1970]

Is it that the poor of this country can't succeed and become the 1 percent?  That is completely not true. There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it.

Huh, well as someone already pointed out, it depends.

I grew up poor and succeeded.  Not the 1%, but the 5%.
Same with a few relatives, specifically thinking of a cousin or two.

But...my friends have adopted 2 girls from foster care.  Man, can you imagine being 2 years old and having all of your baby teeth pulled because there is no enamel?  And having the adopted mom just hoping that the adult teeth are okay? All because of what happened in the womb man.  And just consider the emotional and mental effects that drug and alcohol abuse have on children.

It's pretty scary stuff.  My friend once said "I used to worry that the state was too quick to take kids away from their families, then I got into the system and saw what was happening."

I have a problem with the income inequality of late, when CEOs essentially vote themselves more and more money, while jobs disappear and other incomes stagnate.  I have no problem with general income inequality where jobs that are harder, require more education, are more disgusting, are harder to fill = more money.  But when power and money go hand in hand like they do, it's a problem.

I'm not really sure when it became okay for people to look down on or crap on people who work hard at a full time job, but don't make much money.  Maybe it's new, or maybe it's always been that way but I now just know people with money.  But when I was a kid, it was an honorable thing to work hard at a job - didn't matter if you were a janitor, a dentist, the lunch lady, the stock person at the grocery store, or an accountant.

[crazyworld]

http://www.epi.org/publication/understanding-the-historic-divergence-between-productivity-and-a-typical-workers-pay-why-it-matters-and-why-its-real/

Not sure why so much divergence in data from one place vs another...

[mathlete]

They're not if total compensation tracks with productivity. Wages is an incomplete metric when workers are demanding more non-monetary benefits (sick leave, maternity leave, pensions, flexible hours, etc) in lieu of direct pay.

http://www.nber.org/digest/oct08/w13953.html
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2013/07/productivity-and-compensation-growing-together

I'm trying to dig into the Heritage numbers.

Questions and issues I have so far:

Their metric for percentage of total compensation attributable to non-cash benefits is calculated from a report on GDP. There is no data at the household level. By this token, we can say that real wages have risen in the past 10, 20, or 30 years because they have. It is the bottom 80% of households that I'm mostly interested in though. Also, labor participation is around 2% higher than it was in 1972, so we would expect real compensation (from wages or from non-cash benefits) to go up.

How much of the supposed benefits compensation increase is due to an increase in the cost of healthcare?

How does the switch from DB to DC retirement plans affect things?

[Yaeger]

How much of the supposed benefits compensation increase is due to an increase in the cost of healthcare?

How does the switch from DB to DC retirement plans affect things?

I'm not an economist, but I'll try to answer this as best I can. I'd say that since the data uses the CPI and IPD it includes and adjusts for the cost of healthcare through the comparison metrics.

I'm not sure what the impact is of DB vs DC as it relates to total compensation. That's probably a study in itself.

[MasterStache]

The problem with income inequality is in the name itself. There is absolutely no reason why all incomes should be equal.

I think the problem is your interpretation of the "name" (phrase). I am sure they do exist (much like flat Earthers still exist), but I don't know anyone who advocates a CEO should get paid the same as a janitor. That's a bit of a straw-man fallacy to begin your argument.

When everyone gets paid the same amount there is no motivation to excel. This has been proven countless times in history.

Gawd I would hate to live in a society purely and conclusively motivated by money. I'll be happy to point to an entire industry that is motivated by something other than money. Go talk to someone who serves our country and ask them how much they make. I made about the same as a janitor when I served. 

This inequality is a motivating factor for ingenuity.

Umm, what? Sorry but I laughed at this one. So only poor people are motivated to invent? I can't fathom to read anymore.   

[tobitonic]

To continue I have a buddy who is a science teacher in the inner city. He says that there are some kids who really try and study and work on good grades. The rest just don't care and their parents don't care. How do you recommend to fix that problem?

Fix poverty first via living wages, free childcare, universal healthcare, affordable housing and transportation, etc. Get the child poverty percentage down to 5%, the way it is in Finland. Decouple school funding from property taxes so there aren't "good schools" and "bad schools." Slash student/teacher ratios and trust teachers with curriculum choices. Give kids in public schools throughout the country the same kinds of educations kids are receiving in the best private schools in the country. Do all of this honestly and fully for a decade, and then get back to me.

I'm also a teacher in a city with high levels of poverty, by the way.

[marty998]

This thread is ridiculous.

Nobody here has ever argued all incomes should be equal in order to eliminate inequality.

The argument is that the benefits of capitalism are disproportionately accruing to far too few, and this is fucking up society.

[Bucksandreds]

To continue I have a buddy who is a science teacher in the inner city. He says that there are some kids who really try and study and work on good grades. The rest just don't care and their parents don't care. How do you recommend to fix that problem?

Fix poverty first via living wages, free childcare, universal healthcare, affordable housing and transportation, etc. Get the child poverty percentage down to 5%, the way it is in Finland. Decouple school funding from property taxes so there aren't "good schools" and "bad schools." Slash student/teacher ratios and trust teachers with curriculum choices. Give kids in public schools throughout the country the same kinds of educations kids are receiving in the best private schools in the country. Do all of this honestly and fully for a decade, and then get back to me.

I'm also a teacher in a city with high levels of poverty, by the way.

Shut up commie. Ted Cruz the OP has it all figured out. We should be going back to a system that oppressed every one except powerful white men. 8 year olds should work in mines, women should stay at home and not vote. Blacks should be separated from their white overlords. The OP said the way we did things in the late 1800s and early 1900s was better.  Just allow his genius to fix everything.  I have one question. Are conservatives sociopaths or are they just dumb?

[MOD EDIT: Forum Rule #1.]

[acroy]

........... you want to have income inequality. This inequality is a motivating factor for ingenuity. It is also a reason why entrepreneurs take risk. Without a decent reward, why take the risk at all?

Nicely stated. The rest is details.

[Gondolin]

There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it. This is what makes America so great.

Unless you're a poor black 12 year old who gets shot by a cop.

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

[Bucksandreds]

There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it. This is what makes America so great.

Unless you're a poor black 12 year old who gets shot by a cop.

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

It's coming from the fact that the system that they support (one of more power and money for white men who already have power and money) benefits them. If you grew up without much holding you back, it takes more deep thinking to understand disadvantage. I am a white male from an upper middle class family and hold a doctorate. I understand that, in the short run, a Ted Cruz style presidency would benefit me due to lower taxes and policies benefitting people like me.  I also am sure that regression to policies which hold back all but the advantaged will make my children's and children's children's country a more dangerous and less healthy place.  Progress has always occurred while dragging along those who are terrified of it.

[PathtoFIRE]

Income equality leading to motivation gets it completely backwards. All in all, people need agency and acknowledgment. Agency to make their own life choices and goals, and acknowledgment from society of their contribution and part in the whole. Income is a part of that acknowledgment, not truly the real motivator, and part of the message of this blog and forum is that it is also one of our greatest tools to achieve agency. Having inequality to create gradation to influence people into more productive work also fails to account for the important foundation, and that's opportunity. With opportunity for all, then I really believe that some people here would claim that even one person born into poverty achieving financial success means that system works! But if the system fails to provide real accessible opportunity for all (and as some are at so much pain to point out, people are different, and therefore opportunity looks different to many), then you're just arguing for a system of all sticks and one carrot.

[Northwestie]

The financial bailout was a mess.

Interesting.   It was the private financial markets and greed that caused the Great Recession.  Remember how Saint Greenspan kept telling us that government needed to stay out of the way?  Later he admitted that he was wrong - thanks Greenie!  And yea, who had to pick up the tab? Middle income America as usual.

[MasterStache]

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

+1

You can't make sense of nonsense.

[Northwestie]

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

+1

You can't make sense of nonsense.

..........and que the music for the Trump rally.  Scary, scary.

[mm1970]

There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it. This is what makes America so great.

Unless you're a poor black 12 year old who gets shot by a cop.

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

It's coming from the fact that the system that they support (one of more power and money for white men who already have power and money) benefits them. If you grew up without much holding you back, it takes more deep thinking to understand disadvantage. I am a white male from an upper middle class family and hold a doctorate. I understand that, in the short run, a Ted Cruz style presidency would benefit me due to lower taxes and policies benefitting people like me.  I also am sure that regression to policies which hold back all but the advantaged will make my children's and children's children's country a more dangerous and less healthy place.  Progress has always occurred while dragging along those who are terrified of it.

This is interesting because I have a few HS friends who are very conservative, pro Cruz types talking about how libs are stupid and want to give away "free stuff".  Shoot, our federal income tax bill is around $50k per year.  Liberal policies cost me money, but I'm happy to pay so my friends don't go bankrupt from lack of health insurance.

[Bucksandreds]

There is absolutely no reason why any single person in the US can't achieve greatness if they are willing to work hard for it. This is what makes America so great.

Unless you're a poor black 12 year old who gets shot by a cop.

Seriously, where the heck is this polemic coming from? OP is "responding" to a claim that no one on this forum has ever made with a bunch of half-assed propaganda.

It's coming from the fact that the system that they support (one of more power and money for white men who already have power and money) benefits them. If you grew up without much holding you back, it takes more deep thinking to understand disadvantage. I am a white male from an upper middle class family and hold a doctorate. I understand that, in the short run, a Ted Cruz style presidency would benefit me due to lower taxes and policies benefitting people like me.  I also am sure that regression to policies which hold back all but the advantaged will make my children's and children's children's country a more dangerous and less healthy place.  Progress has always occurred while dragging along those who are terrified of it.

This is interesting because I have a few HS friends who are very conservative, pro Cruz types talking about how libs are stupid and want to give away "free stuff".  Shoot, our federal income tax bill is around $50k per year.  Liberal policies cost me money, but I'm happy to pay so my friends don't go bankrupt from lack of health insurance.

Mine's more like $30,000 plus about $10,000 or more in SS and Medicare tax. I lose about 30% of my income in FIT, FICA, state and city taxes. A conservative would gladly find a way to put $10,000 or more per year back in my pocket. The problem is society, at least one that you'd want to live in costs money. We need a military to keep us safe from invaders. We need schools to raise a society of literate people. We need financial security for the elderly and disabled. We need police, fire, EMS, hospitals, public parks, etc,etc,etc.  This does not come free. The deficit more than tripling during the Reagan administration (you read that right the federal deficit was more than 3 times greater In 1989 than 1981) proved trickle down economics is a sham. Reagan claimed vastly lowering taxes would get the rich to spend more thus raising the amount people earned thus offsetting the lower tax rates and it does NOT happen in real life. This was not during a time where any financial stimulus was needed. Inflation was high when Reagan took over and spending more by the Fed wasn't going to lower inflation.  Lowering taxes for those who already have more than enough does NOT lead to a significant widening of the tax base, it lowers government revenue while only benefitting the savings accounts of the rich.  Society costs money. You can have a shitty one that's cheap or you can have a good one that costs more. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

[Abe]

My experience living in NC (not to single out that great state, but to use as an example), is that many of the people who complained about government taxes actually paid very little federal income tax; the majority of their taxes were state (income & sales) and Social Security & Medicare. Based on their savings rate I'm sure they will need the latter two. Based on the state they lived in, they didn't have to worry about money being "wasted" on social services and education.

Now I live in Chicago, and still hear people complaining about taxes. They then also complain about lack of government spending on education, pensions, and whatever thing about living in a big city annoys them this week.

There's an amazing amount of lack of understanding on how government money is spent, mostly due to the government's significant opacity in this regard and most people's lack of interest (outside of complaining). Education on these matters is not hard to come by, and helps one appreciate both the limits and powers of government spending to affect change.

[MoneyCat]

Both sides of this issue have some good points.

I grew up in rural poverty in a low-income family with far too many mouths to feed. Was this my fault? No, I didn't have a choice which family I was going to be born into. I also didn't have a choice that I was given parents who didn't know how to handle money and taught me a lot of bad habits. Luckily, they valued education or I probably would have learned not to try to improve myself at all. (Even if their respect for education was based more on social status than actual self-improvement.)

If it wasn't for WIC, heating oil assistance, subsidized school lunches and other government assistance, I would not have been able to survive. Was that my fault as a child? No, I didn't have any control over it.

So, that's why I'm in favor of government programs to help the needy, because there are a lot of people out there who won't survive without it and it's not because of any fault of their own (especially children.) And you can't depend on the generosity of private donors, because let's face it. How many people out there skip sticking a dollar in the can at the supermarket? I know I do.

On the other hand, though, being in poverty and subsisting on those programs did give me a sense of "learned helplessness" that led to abusive relationships, lack of motivation for self-improvement in employment, lack of willingness to take risks, and other problems I had as an adult. I didn't even try to improve my financial situation until I was 29. I really needed that "kick in the pants" to get me in gear and motivate myself to improve my life.

There has to be some kind of balance in the USA of helping people who need it, but teaching them to embrace self-sufficiency. I had to learn a lot of hard lessons on my own, because this stuff is only taught for a price in our country and poor people don't really have access to this kind of information. Conservatives scoff because this stuff is so easy for them, basically because they are privileged, but it's really hard to even know that you are supposed to do things differently, when you have never known any other way to live.

[Yaeger]

Society costs money. You can have a shitty one that's cheap or you can have a good one that costs more. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

This is why I bang my head into a wall. A better society isn't the one that costs the most. It's this kind of attitude that forces us to keep around failing programs like Social Security, Medicare, and our education system even if historically they're abysmal failures. You want to know why trickle down was a sham, it's because we didn't shrink the size of government as a percentage of GDP. That's the real metric.

I do agree that you owe society for a lot of your success, but that's not specific enough. You owe the taxpayers that provide these services for you and more specifically you owe the rich. Society and government are made of individuals, you're stealing from your fellow citizens, and you owe your fellow citizens their money back with interest with what they've invested into you. We need to raise taxes on the poor and middle class, they've gotten more tax cuts than the rich and need to 'pay their fair share'.

[TRBeck]

Taxes are not theft.

[Eric]

Social Security is by far one of the most successful programs ever.  The fact that you'd call if failing, depsite the fact that it has kept hundreds of millions of elderly fed and off the streets, tells me all I need to know.  You have no idea what you're talking about.  You're simply against government because it's government. 

[mathlete]

A better society isn't the one that costs the most.

It kind of is.

Here is a list of OECD countries by per-capita government spending. https://data.oecd.org/gga/general-government-spending.htm

Top 5

Luxembourg
Norway
Denmark
Sweden
Belgium

Bottom 5

Ukraine
Colombia
Mexico
Indonesia
India

The United States is 10.

[TRBeck]

Society costs money. You can have a shitty one that's cheap or you can have a good one that costs more. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

This is why I bang my head into a wall. A better society isn't the one that costs the most. It's this kind of attitude that forces us to keep around failing programs like Social Security, Medicare, and our education system even if historically they're abysmal failures. You want to know why trickle down was a sham, it's because we didn't shrink the size of government as a percentage of GDP. That's the real metric.

FFS.
Here's a graph that demonstrates how horribly "failed" the education system is.
http://ourworldindata.org/data/education-knowledge/literacy/#percentage-of-persons-14-years-old-and-over-in-the-us-who-were-illiterate-by-race-1870-1979-max-roserref
Or is it merely coincidence that the steep decline in illiteracy, particularly among African-Americans, occurred after public education began to take hold in the late 1870s?
States passed laws to make schooling compulsory between 1852 (Massachusetts) and 1917 (Mississippi). They also used federal funding designated by the Morrill Land-Grant Colleges Acts of 1862 and 1890 to set up land grant colleges specializing in agriculture and engineering. By 1870, every state had free elementary schools,[13] albeit only in urban centers. - Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_the_United_States

If you want to talk about spending as a percentage of GDP, here's some info:
http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZS
The US spends less than: UK, France, Austria, Canada, Sweden, New Zealand, Finland, Norway...at a whopping 5.2% of GDP.

We can agree that a society that costs the most may not be the best, but being a good society will necessitate a high level of spending. Certainly there are ways to trim the federal budget, even to trim or adjust education spending. On the other hand, there might be lower-hanging fruit that doesn't affect the quality of your daily life on any level the way an undereducated, underemployed, underfed populace would.

Just because you can't think of ways to improve programs doesn't mean they need to be cut.

[Bucksandreds]

Society costs money. You can have a shitty one that's cheap or you can have a good one that costs more. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

This is why I bang my head into a wall. A better society isn't the one that costs the most. It's this kind of attitude that forces us to keep around failing programs like Social Security, Medicare, and our education system even if historically they're abysmal failures. You want to know why trickle down was a sham, it's because we didn't shrink the size of government as a percentage of GDP. That's the real metric.

I do agree that you owe society for a lot of your success, but that's not specific enough. You owe the taxpayers that provide these services for you and more specifically you owe the rich. Society and government are made of individuals, you're stealing from your fellow citizens, and you owe your fellow citizens their money back with interest with what they've invested into you. We need to raise taxes on the poor and middle class, they've gotten more tax cuts than the rich and need to 'pay their fair share'.

I spit out my beer. If I didn't think you actually meant these jokes I'd say you should get your own Netflix special. The last bolded part is really the nail in the coffin. You are a fucking sociopath, man.

[MOD EDIT: Forum Rule #1.]

[Yaeger]

Social Security is by far one of the most successful programs ever.  The fact that you'd call if failing, depsite the fact that it has kept hundreds of millions of elderly fed and off the streets, tells me all I need to know.  You have no idea what you're talking about.  You're simply against government because it's government.

You're right. Let's go back to how it was originally and see how it works. A 2% tax rate vs 12.4% (I wonder if losing 10% of your income affects poverty). Benefits aren't taxable. None of that higher retirement age stuff. Dial back the Ponzi scheme and watch it burn.

Taxes are not theft.

Lies. If they weren't then we wouldn't need to threaten people with violence and jail if they refused to contribute more than their fellow citizen. The worst is when your fellow citizens vote to raise YOUR taxes, and only your taxes, in return of promised benefits that only they will enjoy.

A better society isn't the one that costs the most.

It kind of is.

A better society is one that's freer. That doesn't define itself by how much it takes from its citizens. Curiously, have you been to some of those countries on that list? Nice people, but I'd rather live in the US. Money goes a LOT farther. If only we'd get government out of the other things like healthcare, education, economy we'd improve in the rankings substantially.

http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/topics/income/

[hernandz]

This is why I bang my head into a wall. A better society isn't the one that costs the most. It's this kind of attitude that forces us to keep around failing programs like Social Security, Medicare, and our education system even if historically they're abysmal failures. You want to know why trickle down was a sham, it's because we didn't shrink the size of government as a percentage of GDP. That's the real metric.

Which countries fit your "ideal" ratio of size of government/GDP? Names and numbers please.  Also citations are always helpful. 

[Bucksandreds]

Both sides of this issue have some good points.

I grew up in rural poverty in a low-income family with far too many mouths to feed. Was this my fault? No, I didn't have a choice which family I was going to be born into. I also didn't have a choice that I was given parents who didn't know how to handle money and taught me a lot of bad habits. Luckily, they valued education or I probably would have learned not to try to improve myself at all. (Even if their respect for education was based more on social status than actual self-improvement.)

If it wasn't for WIC, heating oil assistance, subsidized school lunches and other government assistance, I would not have been able to survive. Was that my fault as a child? No, I didn't have any control over it.

So, that's why I'm in favor of government programs to help the needy, because there are a lot of people out there who won't survive without it and it's not because of any fault of their own (especially children.) And you can't depend on the generosity of private donors, because let's face it. How many people out there skip sticking a dollar in the can at the supermarket? I know I do.

On the other hand, though, being in poverty and subsisting on those programs did give me a sense of "learned helplessness" that led to abusive relationships, lack of motivation for self-improvement in employment, lack of willingness to take risks, and other problems I had as an adult. I didn't even try to improve my financial situation until I was 29. I really needed that "kick in the pants" to get me in gear and motivate myself to improve my life.

There has to be some kind of balance in the USA of helping people who need it, but teaching them to embrace self-sufficiency. I had to learn a lot of hard lessons on my own, because this stuff is only taught for a price in our country and poor people don't really have access to this kind of information. Conservatives scoff because this stuff is so easy for them, basically because they are privileged, but it's really hard to even know that you are supposed to do things differently, when you have never known any other way to live.

It's called instituting a living wage, raising the earned income tax credit and anything else that makes one have a significantly better lifestyle by working hard. Basic guarantees for all (even the lazy) but a comfortable lifestyle for anyone willing to go out and bust their ass. Right now you can go out and bust your ass 40 hours per week and 52 weeks per year and barely get more or the same as those who do nothing. It's inhumane to deny food and safe housing to those who don't work but when working gets you no further, what is the motivation?

[Northwestie]

Interestingly though, while the top-top is doing quite well, here in the US, where we have much less government "intrusion" than other countries, we fail miserably on any number of human condition scales - you name it, poverty, incarceration rates, income equity, health, medical costs, infant mortality - it's quite shocking given how much wealth there is in the country.

We should be doing better.

[mathlete]

A better society is one that's freer. That doesn't define itself by how much it takes from its citizens. Curiously, have you been to some of those countries on that list? Nice people, but I'd rather live in the US. Money goes a LOT farther. If only we'd get government out of the other things like healthcare, education, economy we'd improve in the rankings substantially.

Is there a first principles justification for why the government should not be involved in healthcare and education, but (presumably) should be involved in other things like transportation, commerce, or national defense?

[Yaeger]

We can agree that a society that costs the most may not be the best, but being a good society will necessitate a high level of spending. Certainly there are ways to trim the federal budget, even to trim or adjust education spending. On the other hand, there might be lower-hanging fruit that doesn't affect the quality of your daily life on any level the way an undereducated, underemployed, underfed populace would.

Just because you can't think of ways to improve programs doesn't mean they need to be cut.

Please don't misunderstand me. I think the government has a good role to play - the state government, the local government. Not the federal government. We need competition in education. We need innovation instead of this bloated bureaucracy. We need to be able to tailor education to the needs of the communities and have communities become involved and active. With federal funds comes a price-tag, in order to receive the funds you do what the federal government wants. You start paying more attention to metrics and test scores than you do the children or the needs of the community.

Please remember, the government can't give without first taking. Every dollar the government takes, it gives less. There's an inefficiency in government action. So when you say government spending should be high, please consider that as government grows, the economy shrinks. We'll be more 'fair' (whoever decides what that is), but we'll be more poor as well. If the government promises to create 100 jobs, it's costing the private sector 110 jobs for example.

[Northwestie]

Lies. If they weren't then we wouldn't need to threaten people with violence and jail if they refused to contribute more than their fellow citizen. The worst is when your fellow citizens vote to raise YOUR taxes, and only your taxes, in return of promised benefits that only they will enjoy.

This is pretty funny.   It's called a democracy.  People decide how they want a working society and the level of services - sewer, water, police, libraries, fire control - ya know - the basics.  Now how one would pay for all this without taxes would be very interesting.

Regarding Social Security - since they haven't raised the lid on income in like forever, just get rid of the upper income threshold and BOOM - problem solved.  Oh - I forgot - the rich want to pay less than their secretaries.

[Bucksandreds]

Yeager,  what is your response to the ample evidence that supply side economics increases deficits and economic inequality? I need a scientific response and not a sociopathic rant, please.

[Inaya]

My experience living in NC (not to single out that great state, but to use as an example), is that many of the people who complained about government taxes actually paid very little federal income tax; the majority of their taxes were state (income & sales) and Social Security & Medicare. Based on their savings rate I'm sure they will need the latter two. Based on the state they lived in, they didn't have to worry about money being "wasted" on social services and education.

Now I live in Chicago, and still hear people complaining about taxes. They then also complain about lack of government spending on education, pensions, and whatever thing about living in a big city annoys them this week.

Also Chicago. Yeah, the taxes are high, but those parks, beaches, libraries, cheap transportation, concerts, cultural programs, resident museum days, etc. aren't put there by magical money faeries. My complaint is maybe we should spend less of those tax dollars on tourists (and affluent locals--myself included, even though I'm not particularly affluent) and more on the locals who truly need it (schools, social services, etc.). And pothole repairs. (I don't even have a car and the potholes bother me!) And while we're at it, stop holding the neediest people of Illinois hostage and pass a budget so said schools and social services can actually get said taxes. I'm absolutely against paying taxes if they just sit there accruing inflation.


Holy new posts, Batman. Are we just feeding a troll by contributing to this thread further?