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Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

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Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#91

Post by audunw »

PaulRobinson wrote: post #37
perrick wrote: post #6

Louis Chauvel, a french sociology professor, made a similar argument using a Prey-Predatory model with trade union membership and income inequality over the last 100 years : "This article shows empirically how trade union membership and income inequality are mutually related in twelve countries over more than 100 years. While past research has shown that high income inequality occurs alongside low trade union members…

I think this is really interesting, especially as how it has played out in recent years - right up to the last few months - in the UK. I used to know a guy who worked for a trade union who was bemoaning its demise. In 1997 when Labour came to power in the UK for the first time in nearly 20 years, they strengthened employment laws so well, the need for trade union was perceived as lesser by much of the membership. Thi…

> In 1997 when Labour came to power in the UK for the first time in nearly 20 years, they strengthened employment laws so well, the need for trade union was perceived as lesser by much of the membership.

It's very interesting you point this out. Does the UK have minimum wage now?

I've always pointed this out in discussion with americans about minimum wage. Here in Norway, we don't have it, yet income equality is still very good. Why? Because it is the unions jobs to set a minimum wage per industry. They know best which minimum wage can be sustained within a given business.

I think that's why the unions are still relatively strong here: they have a meaningful job to accomplish. And I get the sense that the unions are very productive in their salary negotiations. They know that they have to strike a balance between getting their members decent salaries, and having the business be sustainable so they keep their job.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#92

Post by ch4s3 »

hueving wrote: post #38
whyileft wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if you are old enough to remember that far leftist ideological organizations were often violent up until the last quarter of the 20th century. This period of peacefulness is a recent phenomenon. One of the big pacifiers of democracy is that people accept the result because the majority voted for it. When you have a situation when 46% of the population is pushing an agenda that at least 48% of the population…

>at least 48% of the population is strongly against Where did you get that number from? Hillary Clinton got 65.8 Million votes. That represents 20.6% of the United states population. >That group often starts to look for alternative ways to flex its majority power. See above. They were the majority of voters but they defintely don't represent the majority of the US.

There are 146.3 million registered voters though, which equated to about 45% of registered voters. The voter turnout was roughly 133 million, so she received about 49-59% of votes among those who bothered to show up. Trump received about 46-47% of votes, losing the popular vote by 3 million and winning electoral votes by about 80 thousand votes spread among several states. He ran on an extremely divisive and (perhaps racist) platform, so it's not hard to see why people are a bit frustrated.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#93

Post by theamk »

Ygg2 wrote: post #19
donquichotte wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's how communism was supposed to work, and the guys in charge of redistribution took the lion's share for themselves.

There are ways to making this work. Sadly, none applies to dollar. One solution. Make dollars worthless, unless they have been stamped with a stamp, for the current month. Basically force people to pay taxes on money. Say you have to pay 10% of the value. Got 2bil, congrats. You are paying $200 million each month.

This would be totally devastating to many people who do not earn that much. Before, you could stash $200 per month to make a nice "rainy day fund" in case you lose job, get sick or your car breaks down. Now you would not be able to do so -- just work work work and don't even think about leaving your job!

And the worst part, it would not even work against rich people. So I got 2bil? Great, I will buy 5 houses and a furniture factory. And move the rest to my shell company in Caribbeans.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#94

Post by rm_-rf_slash »

sigmaprimus wrote: post #80

I love reading the comments on stories like this and consider these comments to be a bellwether as to the current state of inequality in our society. Unfortunately I tend to consider myself one who exists on the lower part of the wealth distribution logarithm within the western world, globally it's a different story. Just as anyone tweeting on their smart phone or tablet claiming to be part of the 99% might want to r…

Islamic-inspired terrorism draws a direct lineage from the writings of Sayyid Qutb (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayyid_Qutb), an Egyptian civil servant who studied in America and was aghast at how consumerism subversed communal and religious virtues, and even more shocked to see the same transformation occurring in the Arab world. He eventually drew the conclusion that consumerism sequestered people away from reality, and so he came to advocate for terrorist attacks on civilians specifically to force people to look at and confront what he perceived as poisonous Western values.

To say that all those poor misguided young men just need jobs and money misses the point entirely. The problem is with society itself. They yearn for an alternative, but we in the West are too much a part of the system to imagine life outside of it.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#95

Post by shuntress »

daemin wrote: post #47
PaulRobinson wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is really interesting, especially as how it has played out in recent years - right up to the last few months - in the UK. I used to know a guy who worked for a trade union who was bemoaning its demise. In 1997 when Labour came to power in the UK for the first time in nearly 20 years, they strengthened employment laws so well, the need for trade union was perceived as lesser by much of the membership. Thi…

Most likely what will happen, and I believe this is the case already in most businesses, that the cleaning functions will be outsourced to a separate company. Therefore the limit won't be the cleaner earning 10k/y, but some office admin person earning 30k/y (just guessing that one). Now then a CEO might want to outsource those jobs as well, so the company would officially only employ the highest income people. Either…

This is essentially a loophole and there must be a way to close it.

Maybe it's naive to think its as simple as being slightly more verbose: "Salary tied to lowest paid employee or contractor"

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#96

Post by skadamou »

snappyTertle wrote: post #46

Inequality is not inherently a bad thing. People should be compensated for the value they produce. Profits are a signal of how much people value what is produced. For example, people love iPhones, it no surprise that Apple is the most valuable company in the world. What causes resentment between classes is lack of mobility. This, IMO, is caused by government regulations and a banking system that hurts the middle clas…

>“People should be compensated for the value they produce. Profits are a signal of how much people value what is produced."

I’m hoping you might expand on this a little. I’ve never quite understood this line of reasoning mostly because it seems like there is a lot of money to be made in finance and yet I’m not sure how hedge funds “produce” anything. I really do mean this earnestly, I don’t know a whole lot about economics so from my laymen’s perspective it is unclear how fund managers are compensated for the value they produce if they are just buying a selling stocks.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#97

Post by sigmaprimus »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #83
sigmaprimus wrote: post #80

I love reading the comments on stories like this and consider these comments to be a bellwether as to the current state of inequality in our society. Unfortunately I tend to consider myself one who exists on the lower part of the wealth distribution logarithm within the western world, globally it's a different story. Just as anyone tweeting on their smart phone or tablet claiming to be part of the 99% might want to r…

Maybe not - globally, the 1% own just over half of everything. The 99% includes almost everybody everywhere. Even working-class Americans.

Fair enough maybe not 1% but the metric you are using does not exclude us from the 1%, keep in mind that 2.7 billion people are trying to survive on less than 2 dollars a day. Eg, there are 1000 people in a group, one of which has 1 million dollars, 9 others have 100 dollars each and the rest only have 1 dollar each there are still 10 people in the top 1%.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#98

Post by ch4s3 »

germinalphrase wrote: post #34
golemotron wrote: post #4

In the past few weeks the idea of 'legitimatizing violence' has been circulating heavily. On my Facebook feed most of it has centered on the idea that it is "okay" to punch neo-nazis now. The people saying this are people I'd never expect to. Twitter is similar. I wish I had stats on whether the legitimatization meme is really rising. To me, it looks like the fake news meme. Suddenly it's everywhere.

Culturally, Americans have chosen "Nazis" and zombies as default groups on which we can assert violence without questioning our moral values or their expression. While Richard Spencer is even saying in that clip that he isn't a Neo Nazi (before getting punched) - a great deal of the American population don't draw the lines as finely as he might. He's certainly said some things that put him in that world of thought. I…

> saying in that clip that he isn't a Neo Nazi

To be fair, he says that it's an "antiquated term" and that it's "unfortunately tarnished" and that he prefers to be associated with ethno-nationalism... So it may be a distinction without a difference.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#99

Post by fpig »

Ygg2 wrote: post #68
fpig wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inequality isn't there because the rich hoard actual dollar bills in their basement. What you suggest would affect the poor and middle class more than the rich.

True, there would need to be other methods to deal with super rich, although they'd just escape jurisdiction into other states. I don't think poor/middle class would be that badly affected. With money taxed, you have a lot of incentive to give that money away, to avoid paying cost.

You have an incentive to exchange dollar bills for some other form of assets. This is easier for the rich, and richer people tend to hold a lower percentage of their wealth in cash. So the system you propose is regressive; it is actually less redistributive than some kind of flat tax. The idea is just incredibly stupid as a way to redistribute wealth.

Re: Stanford historian uncovers a grim correlation between violence and inequality

#100

Post by xyzzy4 »

tanto wrote: post #8

How about we take away everything down to 10^6$ from the 0.0001% richest and redistribute it to everyone. We repeat this with the 0.0001% of the richest every year from there on. Every time someone is chosen for this honour they get a medal.

They could buy gold or Bitcoins which are impossible to take away if they use the proper precautions.
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