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Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

wid.world

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Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#31

Post by danharaj »

thriftwy wrote: post #15
danharaj wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abolition of class. Democratic control over the means of production.

These days I don't see much production around. It's probably somewhere in the industrial zones on the outskirts of cities, but it's not something many people do. As a software developer I produce code. How would you exert democratic control over means of such production? Will it involve lots of tin foil?

> As a software developer I produce code. How would you exert democratic control over means of such production?

Open source software is already a model that approximates such democratic production. If us developers didn't have to make a wage to survive, how would we develop software?

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#32

Post by danharaj »

ptaipale wrote: post #25
danharaj wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Abolition of class. Democratic control over the means of production.

Class is much more than income (or wealth), and enforcing income equality won't get rid of classes.

No, but income equality with a class system would cause the system to destabilize. The long-term behavior of such a system would have to resolve the contradictions of capitalism.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#33

Post by danharaj »

jpwagner wrote: post #20
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #3

What does 'Income Equality' look like?

Milton Friedman's three categories for human equality: equality before God, equality of opportunity and equality of outcome - the second is compatible with liberty, and the third is socialism.

You shouldn't get your philosophy from economists.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#34

Post by nashashmi »

Ok. So I looked into it and I had my "OHHH!!" moment.

It seems income/wealth inequality got magnified because of the number of opportunities went exponentially higher. Those who were able, took advantage of those opportunities if they had education, business acumen, surplus income, liquid wealth, or were fortunate enough to have ownership in an industry that was not valued very highly before and became very valuable later.

Everybody else got left behind. The numbers everyone seems to be talking about day in and day out is the top 1%. What we should really be looking at is the bottom 50%. How did the bottom 50% end up from owning 20% of the wealth in 1980 and going to 5% of the wealth today?

They never had anything (like a door or opportunity or a donation box) that could collect some of that wealth flowing from A to B. And that has stifled opportunities for the middle class of the population.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#35

Post by dalbasal »

danharaj wrote: post #33
jpwagner wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Milton Friedman's three categories for human equality: equality before God, equality of opportunity and equality of outcome - the second is compatible with liberty, and the third is socialism.

You shouldn't get your philosophy from economists.

nonsense. I don't agree with Milton's political positions, but he's entitled to them and they are valuable. He was a sharp thinker. As were Adam Smith, John Locke, Robert Malthus, Karl Marx.... Philosopher-economists isn't a new phenomenon. In fact, a lot of the best economists were both.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#36

Post by danharaj »

dalbasal wrote: post #35
danharaj wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You shouldn't get your philosophy from economists.

nonsense. I don't agree with Milton's political positions, but he's entitled to them and they are valuable. He was a sharp thinker. As were Adam Smith, John Locke, Robert Malthus, Karl Marx.... Philosopher-economists isn't a new phenomenon. In fact, a lot of the best economists were both.

Ok, that's fair :) My pre-coffee take was a bit too spicy.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#39

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

vijayr wrote: post #37

http://wid.world/world/#shweal_p0p50_z/US/last/eu/k/p/yearly... Does this mean the bottom 50% in the US are in the red?

Yes. Student loans, car loans, credit cards, payday loans, and mortgages make it incredibly tough to get a positive net worth nowadays.

Combine the expectation a better tomorrow(the American Dream) with a declining middle class, and massive amounts of debt is what results.

Re: Explore Wealth and Income Inequality in the World Wealth and Income Database

#40

Post by ericd »

danharaj wrote: post #5
11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #3

What does 'Income Equality' look like?

Abolition of class. Democratic control over the means of production.

Collective ownership of all MacBook Pros? Or of my efforts with the one I use? I suppose I wouldn't get to choose the terms with which I distribute my software, at the very least?
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