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Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

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Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#71

Post by meagain20000 »

gnaritas wrote: post #15
rayiner wrote: post #10

Mr. Garret quotes Sanders: > The reality is that for the past 40 years, Wall Street and the billionaire class has rigged the rules to redistribute wealth and income to the wealthiest and most powerful people of this country. I am rather puzzled that this idea gets so much traction. Does anyone really believe that if only the rules weren't "rigged" local shops and businesses would be able to compete against Wal-Mart a…

> It's wishful thinking. The rules don't drive rewards to the top. It's intrinsic to the free market. No it isn't, we make the rules of the market, and we could just as easily change those rules to force companies to give more of their earnings to their employees rather than filtering it all up to the top. The market is what we make it, it has no intrinsic nature. The rules are rigged, by and for the wealthy, that is…

Let's agree to disagree. While the current system, at least in the USA, is not perfect, it is still better than other systems tried in other countries. Things that I would fix is decrease corruption as much as possible. What you are advocating is communism.

If you really believe in your system start a company and employ your ideals. I'm sure you will have no lack of talented individuals wanting to work for you for a greater piece of the pie. In no time you should be able to destroy that evil Walmart corporation that practically enslaves its employees. Please try it and prove us all wrong

I don't want to sound harsh but there really are people that deserve what's coming to them. In my high school too many kids wasted their time while trying their best for me to also waste my time. They had all these incredible opportunities to better themselves and still ended up as loosers destined to work minimum wage. And now you are saying that that is unfair and they deserve more. I think not. They deserve what they work for.

The USA will give you rent assistance, medicaid, food coupons, financial aid, student loans and if you still cannot drag yourself to college then it is on you. I know because I come from all the way in the bottom. The only thing that stopped all my friends from following was: nothing.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#72

Post by semi-extrinsic »

natrius wrote: post #58
RodericDay wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zizek phrased it kind of nicely once, in a way that stuck with me. He probably borrowed from somewhere, and I'll continue to lossily reproduce whatever the sentiment was, but it goes something like this. How is it possible that we are completely and utterly optimistic about breaking all sorts of physical barriers, like landing on Mars, and reusing rockets, and communicating worldwide via little handheld microcomputer…

Communism happened. It killed lots of people, and made radical changes in the social order unappealing to most. Now ideas don't just have to sound plausible, but you also have to prove that they won't lead to the deaths of millions.

Have you heard of social democracy, i.e. taking those ideas and not implementing them by being a murderous crazy dictator? It's working out just fine for the countries which are consistently ranked as the best to live in in the world. As opposed to the US, which is closer to third world status when it comes to things like low median wage, little to no maternity leave, expensive and poor healthcare system, school shootings, poor literacy rates, high drug use rates, etc etc.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#73

Post by [deleted] »

natrius wrote: post #58
RodericDay wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zizek phrased it kind of nicely once, in a way that stuck with me. He probably borrowed from somewhere, and I'll continue to lossily reproduce whatever the sentiment was, but it goes something like this. How is it possible that we are completely and utterly optimistic about breaking all sorts of physical barriers, like landing on Mars, and reusing rockets, and communicating worldwide via little handheld microcomputer…

Communism happened. It killed lots of people, and made radical changes in the social order unappealing to most. Now ideas don't just have to sound plausible, but you also have to prove that they won't lead to the deaths of millions.

[deleted]

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#74

Post by gnaritas »

meagain20000 wrote: post #71
gnaritas wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's wishful thinking. The rules don't drive rewards to the top. It's intrinsic to the free market. No it isn't, we make the rules of the market, and we could just as easily change those rules to force companies to give more of their earnings to their employees rather than filtering it all up to the top. The market is what we make it, it has no intrinsic nature. The rules are rigged, by and for the wealthy, that is…

Let's agree to disagree. While the current system, at least in the USA, is not perfect, it is still better than other systems tried in other countries. Things that I would fix is decrease corruption as much as possible. What you are advocating is communism. If you really believe in your system start a company and employ your ideals. I'm sure you will have no lack of talented individuals wanting to work for you for a…

> While the current system, at least in the USA, is not perfect, it is still better than other systems tried in other countries.

No one said it wasn't.

> Things that I would fix is decrease corruption as much as possible.

As would I.

> What you are advocating is communism.

No it isn't, tax reform is not communism, I suggest you bone up on what communism actually is before continuing this conversation, nothing I said is in any way communist.

> I don't want to sound harsh but there really are people that deserve what's coming to them. In my high school too many kids wasted their time while trying their best for me to also waste my time. They had all these incredible opportunities to better themselves and still ended up as losers destined to work minimum wage. And now you are saying that that is unfair and they deserve more. I think not. They deserve what they work for.

You are suffering from the just world fallacy.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#75

Post by gnaritas »

sokoloff wrote: post #63
gnaritas wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As just one example, tax reform[1], punish companies with high gaps between their highest and lowest paid workers. It's quite easy to force companies to do things, you just change the rules. When a company does better, the benefits of that productivity should not all go to the top; the employees should share in the wealth they created. Companies who share their wealth with their employees would get more favorable tax…

Yes, and these incentives are likely to cause companies to use subsidiaries and contract workers, so that their employee count is lower and the median wage of those employees higher. It's not clear to me that's a win for anyone other than consulting companies, tax prep and CPA firms.

> Yes, and these incentives are likely to cause companies to use subsidiaries and contract workers

Only if the proposed change in rules contains such glaringly obvious loopholes; but I doubt that'll be the case, as the people trying to solve the problem have thought about it for more than 5 minutes.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#76

Post by xacaxulu »

MrTonyD wrote: post #31
codeismightier wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand the hate against Walmart. It only has a profit margin of 3.12% [1] and return on assets of 7.69%. Now I suppose you could argue that all the profits are hidden away somewhere, but that sounds like an unfalsifiable statement. It certainly would be illegal to hide assets from shareholders. [1] https://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=WMT

You're talking to someone who has spent most of his life in the Fortune 50 - working with executives who routinely hide the bulk of their wealth from any accounting. These techniques have been widely discussed in the press (if you look). So I must assume that you have, for philosophical reasons, chosen to disbelieve that the rich hide their wealth. Edit: Not sure why I was downvoted. But I was in the room as we reass…

Whenever I have a chance to learn some of these legal means of avoiding excessive taxation, I do in earnest. I see very wealthy people and it only drives me to emulate their business and investment strategies more. There are more than enough legal means of structuring your businesses, transactions and investments in ways that drastically reduce taxation. I made it about 4 years without paying any state or federal income tax. True it took a lot of work and planning, but the income retained was more than worth the effort.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#77

Post by maxerickson »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #72
natrius wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Communism happened. It killed lots of people, and made radical changes in the social order unappealing to most. Now ideas don't just have to sound plausible, but you also have to prove that they won't lead to the deaths of millions.

Have you heard of social democracy, i.e. taking those ideas and not implementing them by being a murderous crazy dictator? It's working out just fine for the countries which are consistently ranked as the best to live in in the world. As opposed to the US, which is closer to third world status when it comes to things like low median wage, little to no maternity leave, expensive and poor healthcare system, school shoo…

US median wages aren't low compared to Western Europe. Modestly lower than the Nordic countries yes, but modestly higher than France and Germany and so forth.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#78

Post by gnaritas »

Avshalom wrote: post #56
brbsix wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The companies themselves don't really have any capacity to enforce these "rules", they have to petition the government to do so. The end result is regulatory capture. How do you expect to "force companies to give more of their earnings to their employees rather than filtering it all up to the top"? More government, I guess? We've seen how this goes.

You could always dissolve the legal concept of the publicly owned corporation and only allow employee owned corporations. Thats actually less government, because right now we have a government that has to write and enforce laws for both forms of business.

Exactly, simple rule changes like that could radically alter society. Not that I agree or disagree, but that example does support the main point, the rules matter and can be changed.

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#79

Post by natrius »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #72
natrius wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Communism happened. It killed lots of people, and made radical changes in the social order unappealing to most. Now ideas don't just have to sound plausible, but you also have to prove that they won't lead to the deaths of millions.

Have you heard of social democracy, i.e. taking those ideas and not implementing them by being a murderous crazy dictator? It's working out just fine for the countries which are consistently ranked as the best to live in in the world. As opposed to the US, which is closer to third world status when it comes to things like low median wage, little to no maternity leave, expensive and poor healthcare system, school shoo…

I like social democracy. (I was just establishing the burden of proof, not taking a position.)

I'm skeptical that America has enough social cohesion for such a thing to be fully implemented here. Literacy and median wages are fine for the white majority, so we've got most of the trappings of a social democracy for white America. Why would Americans use the state to benefit all people when Americans aren't even willing to put agents of the state on trial when they kill unarmed black people?

Re: Income inequality is not the problem, it's a symptom

#80

Post by gizi »

It can all be reduced to the problem of man-made law. It is wide open to abuse. So, yes, the ultra-rich abuse man-made law to make more money. But then again, machine guns easily overrule money. That is why there are now islamic insurgencies, in 30+ countries, of which the primary purpose is to get rid of man-made law (and to establish their favoured alternative). The problem goes way beyond the distribution of income. At some point, everybody who believes in the legitimacy of man-made law will have to prove that he is willing to risk his life and die for what he believes in.
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