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Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

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Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#101

Post by digitaltrees »

FooHentai wrote: post #73
cycrutchfield wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>For one, it contradicts the dogma that more trade is strictly beneficial. It is strictly beneficial, in aggregate. But in any situation, there are winners and there are losers. There are no decisions you can make where everybody wins. If you live in a first world country and your skill set is worse than somebody in the developing world, you’re going to have a bad time.

>If you live in a first world country and your skill set is worse than somebody in the developing world, you’re going to have a bad time. Even if your skill set is greater, your cost of living is higher. So you'd have to be more than marginally better. Also, the logical conclusion of where this seems to be headed is that if you're a low-skill person living in a first-world county, voting for protectionist, isolationi…

Except protectionism makes everyone poorer in the medium term and actually causes international conflict. Who do you think gets drafted to fight war when trade wars turn to real wars?

Perhaps if society used the increased wealth to benefit everyone the value of global interconnected trade could be felt by everyone. This is an easy fix, return to the post World War Two tax policy that built the middle class. Return to a well respected government that drives large scale work like highways, scientific research, the space program. Think about how much technology is a direct result of military research (GPS, the Internet, rocketry, etc) imagine if we mobilized on the same scale for exploring space, basic research and innovation and entrepreneurial activity.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#102

Post by FranzFerdiNaN »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #51
luckydata wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the real world those are called "redistributive policies" and work quite well, especially for the economy as a whole. http://www.levyinstitute.org/publications/can-redistribution...

They work well... until they don't. Anyone from Eastern Europe over the age of about 40 can tell you about it. Like anything else redistribution falls on it's face if you go too crazy with it.

A lot of people over 40 in Eastern Europe would rather go back to the Soviet Union than stay in their new capitalist dreamworld. Things weren't great, but at least they had a job, a roof, food and healthcare.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#103

Post by m12k »

sokoloff wrote: post #82
frankbreetz wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for such a comparison, everything I have seen is all real prices. I know rent and college had gone up about 50% in real prices and some things like food and high end electronics have gone down. Honestly, your comment seems like intentional obfuscation of facts.

Pay attention over the coming 3 months to articles and headlines on inflation and wages on social and mainstream media. I think you'll find that well over half of them omit stating key assumptions/sources, and appear to be authored so as to lead the audience to the wrong (or at least an exaggerated) conclusion.

To be fair, pretty much all articles about literally any subject on social and main stream media fail to state key assumptions/sources - don't see why you'd think this topic is special in that regard. If we're going to debate anything in a sensible manner, we need to use actual publications by experts as the basis for those discussions.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#104

Post by nec4b »

FranzFerdiNaN wrote: post #102
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They work well... until they don't. Anyone from Eastern Europe over the age of about 40 can tell you about it. Like anything else redistribution falls on it's face if you go too crazy with it.

A lot of people over 40 in Eastern Europe would rather go back to the Soviet Union than stay in their new capitalist dreamworld. Things weren't great, but at least they had a job, a roof, food and healthcare.

Yes and the economy collapsed because it wasn't sustainable.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#105

Post by sokoloff »

m12k wrote: post #103
sokoloff wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay attention over the coming 3 months to articles and headlines on inflation and wages on social and mainstream media. I think you'll find that well over half of them omit stating key assumptions/sources, and appear to be authored so as to lead the audience to the wrong (or at least an exaggerated) conclusion.

To be fair, pretty much all articles about literally any subject on social and main stream media fail to state key assumptions/sources - don't see why you'd think this topic is special in that regard. If we're going to debate anything in a sensible manner, we need to use actual publications by experts as the basis for those discussions.

I’m not worried nor do I believe that economists are confused.

I worry that the public / workers / voters / policy makers are being misled/confused/misdirected.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#106

Post by FranzFerdiNaN »

nec4b wrote: post #104
FranzFerdiNaN wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people over 40 in Eastern Europe would rather go back to the Soviet Union than stay in their new capitalist dreamworld. Things weren't great, but at least they had a job, a roof, food and healthcare.

Yes and the economy collapsed because it wasn't sustainable.

if external factors didn’t exist you might be right. But they do so you are wrong. It’s impossible to say if the system was sustainable because America meddled and interfered from the very first day out of fear for their own position. Kinda like how they murdered union leaders all around the works, overthrew governments for being not right wing enough and started wars for false reasons.

But sure, the problem was the system because that’s easy to believe, as it requires just accepting the standard American narrative.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#107

Post by frankbreetz »

sokoloff wrote: post #105
m12k wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, pretty much all articles about literally any subject on social and main stream media fail to state key assumptions/sources - don't see why you'd think this topic is special in that regard. If we're going to debate anything in a sensible manner, we need to use actual publications by experts as the basis for those discussions.

I’m not worried nor do I believe that economists are confused. I worry that the public / workers / voters / policy makers are being misled/confused/misdirected.

You sound like a conspiracy theorist if you have no sources, the first couple google searches are not doing this[0],[1].

The public is being misled, by whenever someone complains about stagnant wages the response is "you have smartphones now", but we can't afford houses or healthcare how is this okay? So your argument seems to be that all economists are in on this together to do what?

And your thankful your favorite youtube news personality has cracked the case (without publishing any research and has an opportunity to make money from getting views). Good thing he /she is looking out for you.

The bottom line is you sound incredibly foolish to me if you can't supply any sources of people trying to do this trick. Even if you do find one or two examples, there are plenty of sound statistics that say people have it harder now finicailly then 50 years ago.

[0] https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/101314/what-does-cu...

[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us...

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#108

Post by zxcmx »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #53

A large portion of what reduced inequality was the destruction of wealth during World War II and the fact that the U.S. benefited afterward from being the last standing industrial economy. I seriously doubt that. We shipped essentially all able-bodied men off to war, so much so that we filled a lot of jobs with women. Birth rates were low because the men were physically absent. People were encouraged to grow Victory…

One aspect I haven’t seen much discussion about is that WWII may have acted as a kind of giant social mixer.

I mean this in the sense that people who might hardly meet each today were thrown together often more or less as equals. At least within the (ok, very limited) bounds of the race and gender norms of the day.

Today a programmer, middle manager or radiographer say can get to middle age without ever really “meeting” a labourer, truck driver or meat packer. I think that has pretty deep implications for labour solidarity.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#109

Post by rayiner »

frankbreetz wrote: post #107
sokoloff wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not worried nor do I believe that economists are confused. I worry that the public / workers / voters / policy makers are being misled/confused/misdirected.

You sound like a conspiracy theorist if you have no sources, the first couple google searches are not doing this[0],[1]. The public is being misled, by whenever someone complains about stagnant wages the response is "you have smartphones now", but we can't afford houses or healthcare how is this okay? So your argument seems to be that all economists are in on this together to do what? And your thankful your favorite…

It’s not conspiracy theory, but rather the fact that data analysis is hard when you’re trying to account for confounding factors, and the media has incentives to report figures that make things seem more significant than they are.

Even things that are true are often reported in a way that obscures causal factors. For example, wages are stagnating, but total compensation (wages plus benefits) is not. Now, from an employee’s perspective, they might not care that their total compensation is growing because health insurance premiums are increasing but paychecks are staying the same size. But the employer has the exact opposite perspective: the employee is costing more money whether that money is going to to paychecks or benefits. Failure to articulate that distinction moreover leads you to the wrong conclusions. When you’re told about wage stagnation but growing corporate profits, you’re supposed to think employees are getting a smaller piece of the pie. That’s not true: https://www.nber.org/digest/oct08/w13953.html

> Total employee compensation was 66 percent of national income in 1970 and 64 percent in 2006. This measure of the labor compensation share has been remarkably stable since the 1970s. It rose from an average of 62 percent in the 1960s to 66 percent in the 1970s and 1980s, and then declined to 65 percent in the 1990s where it has remained from 2000 until the end of 2007.

Re: Rising US Inequality: How We Got Here, Where We're Going

#110

Post by sokoloff »

frankbreetz wrote: post #107
sokoloff wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not worried nor do I believe that economists are confused. I worry that the public / workers / voters / policy makers are being misled/confused/misdirected.

You sound like a conspiracy theorist if you have no sources, the first couple google searches are not doing this[0],[1]. The public is being misled, by whenever someone complains about stagnant wages the response is "you have smartphones now", but we can't afford houses or healthcare how is this okay? So your argument seems to be that all economists are in on this together to do what? And your thankful your favorite…

I'll give you one source: Read the headline on this NYT article "Why Wages Are Finally Rising, 10 Years After the Recession"

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/02/business/economy/wage-gro...

Then look at the article: nominal wages rose every year (as indicated in the chart), but the breathless headline suggests the opposite to the average American. Do you believe that the omission of the word "real" in the headline was purely accidental or intended to drive outrage clicks?

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