Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

scientificamerican.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 104 posts

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#21

Post by oblio »

wolfgke wrote: post #6
oblio wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So your solution is basically: "kill the poor".

No, quarantine the further spread of poverty.

You're either a wonderful troll, and then: kudos! or you have a very misguided idea of poverty.

Poverty is not a disease, as Quarrelsome pointed out.

Poverty isn't even a constant, it's dynamic. People go in and out of poverty all the time.

We also don't know the correlation and the causation between poverty and various indicators such as IQ, achievements, etc. (are you poor because you have a low IQ or do you have a low IQ because you're poor? etc.)

On top of that, where do you draw the line for poverty? Is it the lowest 10%? 20%? 40%? What if the statistics change next year, and I go from 40% to 30%, am I allowed to have children this year? Are my children taken away from me?

Etc., etc.

You haven't thought this through, or as I said, you're a wonderful troll! :)

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#22

Post by golergka »

Quarrelsome wrote: post #8
wolfgke wrote: post #3

To me the worse problem is: While I can understand that it is an inconvenient situation to be poor (and I have some kind of compassion for them), I really cannot understand how one could even come to the idea to give rise to children if one is not in a high quantile of earning. If people applied this reproduction strategy consequently, poverty would simply die out.

jesus. Pick from: alcohol, depression, boredom, dynasty building, genetic programming. I apologise for being rude but it sounds like you have limited compassion if you haven't been able to think this one through. What do you want to do, sterilise the poor? I would remind you that despite a poor background children can and do still excel and even if they don't these children are often the backbone of our industry. You…

> What do you want to do, sterilise the poor?

Reversible sterilization for everyone by default, temporary reversal for a fee. Make people pay for externalities.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#23

Post by wolfgke »

robertk wrote: post #14
wolfgke wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, quarantine the further spread of poverty.

That sounds like killing the poor but with extra steps. Or the South Side of Chicago.

> That sounds like killing the poor but with extra steps.

Doing quarantine does not kill the disease agent. That is not what quarantine is for. Quarantine is for preventing the further spread of the disease agent.

For killing the disease (agent) there is the immune system or drugs such as antibiotics or virostatic agents.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#24

Post by geoka9 »

awptimus wrote: post #10
geoka9 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Context matters. If we're talking about a first world country, income inequality is a meaningful metric.

Because...

... with low inequality there are more middle class members of the society.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#25

Post by arethuza »

awptimus wrote: post #10
geoka9 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Context matters. If we're talking about a first world country, income inequality is a meaningful metric.

Because...

Well, one possible reason is that we may have an inbuilt sense of "fairness" - capachin monkeys have been demonstrated in experiments to get angry if they get unfairly rewarded. So might not people feel angry in the same circumstances?

A valid criticism of socialism for running societies (rather than institutions) is that it doesn't align well with "human nature" - but it might also be the case where the "winner takes all" aspects of capitalism also have similar problems.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/09/0917_030917_...

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#26

Post by eeZah7Ux »

wolfgke wrote: post #3

To me the worse problem is: While I can understand that it is an inconvenient situation to be poor (and I have some kind of compassion for them), I really cannot understand how one could even come to the idea to give rise to children if one is not in a high quantile of earning. If people applied this reproduction strategy consequently, poverty would simply die out.

> poverty would simply die out

Not at all. An economy based on competition and inequality automatically generates as many poor as needed to balance out the super rich. It's really basic math.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#27

Post by wolfgke »

forinti wrote: post #16
wolfgke wrote: post #3

To me the worse problem is: While I can understand that it is an inconvenient situation to be poor (and I have some kind of compassion for them), I really cannot understand how one could even come to the idea to give rise to children if one is not in a high quantile of earning. If people applied this reproduction strategy consequently, poverty would simply die out.

So we should have only got Kings out of the middle ages?

If there is a sparsity of people doing other jobs, the wages of people doing them will increase (leading to the situation that the condition for "better not reproduce" disappears). That's how economy works.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#28

Post by golergka »

delerio wrote: post #12
wolfgke wrote: post #3

To me the worse problem is: While I can understand that it is an inconvenient situation to be poor (and I have some kind of compassion for them), I really cannot understand how one could even come to the idea to give rise to children if one is not in a high quantile of earning. If people applied this reproduction strategy consequently, poverty would simply die out.

So only rich people deserve to have a family? Only the rich deserve to find joy in nurturing and raising others? A lot of people, even though they don't have much, they find fulfillment in their family. If you think they shouldn't have children, that means taking away the only joy in some people's lives. Weird sentiment you have there.

'Deserve' is a weird word; what do you mean by it and think that it's relevant?

Raising children is a very resource and labour-heavy endeavour. Rich people have more resources and labour. It's only logical that they can afford the children while poor people don't.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#29

Post by DarkKomunalec »

trentnix wrote: post #5

I've never understood using income inequality as a measure of the health of a society. As Milton Friedman said, the only place where people are equal is in a prison and in the grave. Milton Friedman on greed and income inequality: https://youtu.be/RWsx1X8PV_A

That is a strawman - total equality (prison, grave) is not being advocated, merely reducing the current extreme inequality.

And inequality is a good measure because the benefit of an extra N dollars is greater, the less money one already has. So, all else being equal, smaller inequality leads to greater average quality of life.

Inequality is also a measure of for whose benefit a society is working - the benefit of the ones accruing the most wealth. So the more concentrated that wealth, the more the rest of society is being ignored in favour of the richest few.

A common counterargument is saying that as long as the wealth of the lower classes also rises, then why worry about inequality. But it has been stagnant for several decades in the US, the poor have to work long hours, all while more and more wealth flows to the top. So it becomes clear that merely improving the economy won't help, as the benefits are captured by those already rich.

Re: Economic Inequality Is Worse Than We Think (2015)

#30

Post by ngrilly »

golergka wrote: post #22
Quarrelsome wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

jesus. Pick from: alcohol, depression, boredom, dynasty building, genetic programming. I apologise for being rude but it sounds like you have limited compassion if you haven't been able to think this one through. What do you want to do, sterilise the poor? I would remind you that despite a poor background children can and do still excel and even if they don't these children are often the backbone of our industry. You…

> What do you want to do, sterilise the poor? Reversible sterilization for everyone by default, temporary reversal for a fee. Make people pay for externalities.

Are you serious?
Post reply on HN