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Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the way the term is used here, income equality is (the inverse of) income inequality. More equal, less equal... it's a measure, not a state. This is like asking what does wealth look like.
If you have two popsicles, and I have one - we could achieve popsicle equality by throwing one of yours away. We have overall less popsicles but greater equality.
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…
Well I think both of you are right. Inflation starts as a monetary phenomenon but it's net effects are not always monetary. Inflation is a policy choice, not a 'feature of the universe'.
Even in a metal backed currency world, you still have money creation through lending. Money creation is a feature of lending, not just fiat currency printing. But in that world, currency value is fixed via metal redemption. So, the amount of money in an economy will still expand to 5-20 times the amount of metal, with the specific amount varying as lending expand and contracts. IMO, this makes "hard" currency more unstable than fiat currency in developed countries. Bank runs are less of a problem.
In terms of me and Milton… he’s the nobel prize winning economist and I’m a forum commenter. I just defined my own “inflation,” I’m calling it microeconomic inflation until someone who knows a different name for it says otherwise.
I'm basically saying is that money is not just money, it's not as fungible as it seems. Money supply is basically determined by lending. More loans, more money. In practice, lending is earmarked. So, we have multiple money types. Mortgage supply = housing money, student loans = college money. So, we end up with multiple types of money. Money supply can go up in certain markets, so inflation is uneven.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Cambodia > Vietnam Buddy. I've got some news for you.
The Communists were the root problem in that area, obviously they came about due to other forms of ostensible dysfunction, but they were the worst, possibly the worst ever ... and really the core of the problem. And FYI Cambodians were not fleeing bombs dropped near their homes by Americans, they were fleeing Communists who murdered 3 of 8 million, making it one of the worst genocides in history, easily comparable (o…
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.
What does 'Income Equality' look like?
The opposite of income inequality isn’t income equality. It’s less inequality and more integration. My wife grew up in small town Iowa. There were rich people (doctors and some farmers) and poor people, but everyone’s kids went to the same school (there was only one), went to the same cornfield parties (apparently a real thing), etc. The millionaire farmers still worked for a living—they weren’t making passive income…
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…
Median instead of Average would be most illustrative
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…
EDIT:
How about Population C, where 9 people have $10 each and one person has $10,000?
What does 'Income Equality' look like?
The opposite of income inequality isn’t income equality. It’s less inequality and more integration. My wife grew up in small town Iowa. There were rich people (doctors and some farmers) and poor people, but everyone’s kids went to the same school (there was only one), went to the same cornfield parties (apparently a real thing), etc. The millionaire farmers still worked for a living—they weren’t making passive income…
Equality vs Equity.
https://scontent.flas1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/23331456_17...
