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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

#61

Post by wfo »

jpwagner wrote: post #42
dalbasal wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we want to get into zinger rhetoric I might reply that the 1st is theocracy and the 2nd is a lie, or also socialism. If not, we might say consider all 3 (excluding the one that doesn't exist) relative. We never have absolute equality of opportunity or outcome, but we can have more or less equality.

zinger point taken, but consider: 1 - compared to a rock, all humans are equal (note: this is not a political statement and has no relationship to theocracy) 2 - if a unit of food sits on the ground between two people, they are free to behave however they want, either can choose to pick up the food or not - this is liberty 3 - given that a unit of food when found will be split evenly (by some process out of an indivi…

2 -- since when is "might makes right" == liberty? I find this position odd especially considering the build and gym habits of most tech Libertarians I have met.

Shouldn't, for it to be true liberty, one of those people own that food by virtue of a piece of paper stating a government granted monopoly over it because his ancestors enslaved the ancestors of the other, and be allowed to call an army of police with guns to take it no matter how small and weak he is? And perhaps, if he sees fit and deems the other person worthy, the owner will rent a fraction of it to the other to plant as a seed and keep the yield for himself, divvying out exactly enough food for the other to barely survive and continue working?

This is exactly liberty, no?

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

#62

Post by meheleventyone »

dmix wrote: post #52

Changing the graph from "Share %" to "Average Income or Wealth" shows a much more optimistic looking chart, with every country ramping upwards, almost at an exponentially positive rate. The world as a whole is moving away from poverty and quality of life is improving which IMO is the most important metric here. Far more important to the average person than the relative wealth ratios at the top vs the bottom, which ye…

Depends on which average. In the case of very large wealth inequality the mean is going to make the picture a lot rosier than the median. I’d posit the average person cares more about the median than the mean as well.

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

#63

Post by splintercell »

david-gpu wrote: post #54
dmix wrote: post #52

Changing the graph from "Share %" to "Average Income or Wealth" shows a much more optimistic looking chart, with every country ramping upwards, almost at an exponentially positive rate. The world as a whole is moving away from poverty and quality of life is improving which IMO is the most important metric here. Far more important to the average person than the relative wealth ratios at the top vs the bottom, which ye…

The world would be moving away from poverty a lot faster if there was less inequality.

Or the argument can be made that the world is moving away from poverty at the back of 1%ers. The point being that 1% is getting richer than the average person of their own country, by lifting the poorest person of a poor country upwards.

The only loser here is the middle class of rich countries, not middle or poor class of poor countries.

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

#64

Post by boomboomsubban »

twoodfin wrote: post #43

I think median statistics would enhance the insight available through this tool. Averages are not particularly useful when confounded by the very shifting distributional patterns this is attempting to illuminate. I'm the median Chinese worker. Per-adult national wealth has been exploding since 1987. The bottom 50% share of wealth and income has been plummeting, so inequality has been growing, too. But I'm a lot bette…

Do you feel the growing inequality was necessary for the growth to occur? If that growth slows down or stops, will you continue to be better than your counterpart thirty years ago?

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

#65

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

david-gpu wrote: post #54
dmix wrote: post #52

Changing the graph from "Share %" to "Average Income or Wealth" shows a much more optimistic looking chart, with every country ramping upwards, almost at an exponentially positive rate. The world as a whole is moving away from poverty and quality of life is improving which IMO is the most important metric here. Far more important to the average person than the relative wealth ratios at the top vs the bottom, which ye…

The world would be moving away from poverty a lot faster if there was less inequality.

I really dislike the effects that globalization and growing inequality has had on rural America in particular, but I'm not sure that _global_ poverty would be improving at the rate that it has been without globalization. Much of impoverished eastern Asia has been growing economically because manufacturing jobs have been shipped there from the richest areas in the world. Without that massive injection of capital into those areas, it would have been incredibly tough, if not impossible to get the momentum required to generate such growth.

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

#66

Post by ctdonath »

dalbasal wrote: post #24

The interplay between wealth and income is a hard one to navigate, but I think important. Part of the economic story of the last generation (IMO) is embedded in this interplay. Financialization is largely the process of turning future income into current assets. EG, I buy a house, get a house and a mortgage. My wealth is net 0. One house owned. One house-value owed. Part of my future income is now someone else's curr…

I buy a house, get a house and a mortgage. My wealth is net 0. One house owned. One house-value owed.

Need to consider temporal dimension: a house is owned because I'm already converting my future income into a house.

There's a difference between "net $0 now because I'm borrowing from my substantial cumulative future creation of wealth" vs "net $0 now because I'm not productive and won't be".

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

#67

Post by [deleted] »

dmix wrote: post #52

Changing the graph from "Share %" to "Average Income or Wealth" shows a much more optimistic looking chart, with every country ramping upwards, almost at an exponentially positive rate. The world as a whole is moving away from poverty and quality of life is improving which IMO is the most important metric here. Far more important to the average person than the relative wealth ratios at the top vs the bottom, which ye…

[deleted]

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

#68

Post by TheAdamAndChe »

ctdonath wrote: post #56
nashashmi wrote: post #34

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…

If you want less of something, tax it. If you want more of something, subsidize it. Wealth has been increasingly taxed, poverty increasingly subsidized. For the bottom 50%, this matters.

Are you suggesting that we should tax the poor? Wouldn't that just make it more difficult for them to pay off debts and collect the capital required to escape poverty?

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

#69

Post by twoodfin »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #64
twoodfin wrote: post #43

I think median statistics would enhance the insight available through this tool. Averages are not particularly useful when confounded by the very shifting distributional patterns this is attempting to illuminate. I'm the median Chinese worker. Per-adult national wealth has been exploding since 1987. The bottom 50% share of wealth and income has been plummeting, so inequality has been growing, too. But I'm a lot bette…

Do you feel the growing inequality was necessary for the growth to occur? If that growth slows down or stops, will you continue to be better than your counterpart thirty years ago?

I don't know. I'm certainly in favor of median income growth even if it's concurrent with growing inequality!

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

#70

Post by dmix »

david-gpu wrote: post #54
dmix wrote: post #52

Changing the graph from "Share %" to "Average Income or Wealth" shows a much more optimistic looking chart, with every country ramping upwards, almost at an exponentially positive rate. The world as a whole is moving away from poverty and quality of life is improving which IMO is the most important metric here. Far more important to the average person than the relative wealth ratios at the top vs the bottom, which ye…

The world would be moving away from poverty a lot faster if there was less inequality.

Yes, lowered inequality is a good metric for success but it's very popular these days for it to be sold as a complete solution in itself. The problem with pure redistribution as a model for increasing wealth in developing countries, or stagnant wealthy ones, is that you can only take someones money and give it to another person once. You can't transfer a wealthy persons ability to generate wealth to another person or country.

A long term reduction in poverty and a more balanced relative income ratios has to come through self-sustainable economic development in the middle, and upward mobility from the bottom. Wealth transfer is just a temporary fix, an initial boost - but it is not an adequate endgame... as many pure socialist countries quickly learned after the glow of the early days wore off. Redistribution as a primary policy is also increasingly difficult to pull off via central policy, given global marketplace, technology's impact on finance, and the growth of countries which act as tax havens.

There is plenty of indifference in practice towards legitimately taxing the wealthy but it's been a hot topic globally for a while now and I fear this obsession has been a large distraction from figuring out how to help the middle/bottom develop their own jobs and businesses. To push up their wages and salaries as the primary goal, not just increasing the tax base for better government services and reduced tax burden on the middle.

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