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It is usually the result of a small number of people adding tremendous value to society which in turn makes everyone better off.
Let's make this tangible for you. Let's take the case of Elisha Graves Otis. Elisha Otis was born in Vermont in 1811, and was a master mechanic, having invented many safety devices and labor saving devices used in bedstead factories in the Northeast US. One such invention was what he named the "Safety Hoist" - it had an ingenious safety device that prevented it from falling if its lifting rope or chain broke. Lives that might be lost were saved.
He went out on his own, setting up shop in Yonkers, NY and sold the world's first Safety Freight Elevator Machine on September 20, 1853. To demonstrate just how safe it was, the following spring he installed a Safety Freight Elevator in NYC, famously riding in it up high and ordering a helper to CUT THE LIFT ROPE. He went on to patent independently controlled steam engines to raise and lower the Safety Elevator, and many more improvements as well.
Elisha Otis became a very wealthy man. So in the parlance of Income Inequality, by inventing what we now think of as modern elevators, Elisha Otis ADDED TO income inequality. After all, he was making money hand over fist while the other millions of Americans were plodding along with their lives as usual (most Americans were directly involved in agriculture at that time).
But although the wealth gap between this man, inventor Elisha Otis, and his customers was higher than it was before the invention, the customers got a product they valued that made their lives both better and easier. In economic terms, the wealth of these customers increased slightly while Otis' wealth increased greatly.
Is that increase in wealth inequality a problem? When I’ve asked not particularly bright high school students this question, most all agree it is not a problem. Ditto for Freshman Econ students. Graduate level Econ students are smart enough that they don't need this example to comprehend the issue.
You can substitute any prominent inventor into the anecdote with the same results. You could recount the story of Robert McCulloch who in the 1940s invented a light one-man chain-saw. Or you could examine Robert Noyce who invented the Integrated Circuit and co-founded Intel Corporation. Or Steve Wozniak & his partner Steve Jobs. Or Jeff Bezos. Etc. And you can substitute in small businesses who similarly add value, and large corporations who do as well - even when their innovation is something as simple-yet-hard as logistics rather than new product creation.
In each case, by virtue of innovation, many inventors (and shareholders of companies) become wealthy - adding to income inequality and its cousin wealth inequality. In each case, customers were better off than they were before the invention.
In each case, despite an increase in "income inequality," everyone is better off.
Even the not-particularly-bright high school students get it.
Do you?
You are confusing the issue. Income inequality is a problem when people have so little money they cannot afford clothing, food, or shelter. That much ought to be clear. Wealth inequality is not a problem because these are not the issues for people with more money. Its not the inequality that is the issue. Its the inability of a segment of the population to be able to take care of the most basic needs.
If the state has to step in because some business will not pay workers enough to meet these minimal expenses than the burden of supporting the employees falls upon the tax payers. It is in the interest of the taxpayers who must pay for medicaid, housing subsidies, food stamps, and TANF that businesses provide employees with enough income to meet their most basic needs.
A final issue for me is that many of us have certain expectations out of America simply because it is a wealthy nation. I believe our nation has enough resources so that no person needs to go hungry, go without shelter, and go without clothing. Its simply a matter of embarrassment to me as an American when I read that any working person cannot meet these most basic needs, particularly that of housing.
I'd prefer we stop using sophistry to justify a situation where working people go without.
Last edited by markg91359; 01-03-2024 at 08:22 AM..
168 hours in a week, if you only spend 40 of them generating income and you're struggling,
I'd suggest spending more time generating income.
No. A Very hard and absolute NO!
The point (yet again) is that anyone spending 40 hours doing ANYTHING should earn enough in RT income
from that ~50hr* a week commitment to be there and productive enough to not be replaced ...
that any additional hours at OT rates can be used for additional life purposes.
You are confusing the issue. Income inequality is a problem when people have so little money they cannot afford clothing, food, or shelter. That much ought to be clear. Wealth inequality is not a problem because these are not the issues for people with more money. Its not the inequality that is the issue. Its the inability of a segment of the population to be able to take care of the most basic needs.
If the state has to step in because some business will not pay workers enough to meet these minimal expenses than the burden of supporting the employees falls upon the tax payers. It is in the interest of the taxpayers who must pay for medicaid, housing subsidies, food stamps, and TANF that businesses provide employees with enough income to meet their most basic needs.
A final issue for me is that many of us have certain expectations out of America simply because it is a wealthy nation. I believe our nation has enough resources so that no person needs to go hungry, go without shelter, and go without clothing. Its simply a matter of embarrassment to me as an American when I read that any working person cannot meet these most basic needs, particularly that of housing.
I'd prefer we stop using sophistry to justify a situation where working people go without.
Your thesis here is incorrect as some of the most income equal countries on Earth suffer staggering poverty, the likes of which does not exist in the US.
No large society EVER has been able to end poverty. And frankly most poverty in the US is ID'd by relative deprivation not absolute deprivation. Virtually no one in the US starves to death, we have almost zero stunted growth and height potential loses due to real malnutrition etc. These are very real concerns in Asian and parts of South America.
If high taxes and endless .gov programs ended poverty and lower rung socioeconomic stress France would have ended these problems years ago.
Your thesis here is incorrect as some of the most income equal countries on Earth suffer staggering poverty, the likes of which does not exist in the US.
No large society EVER has been able to end poverty. And frankly most poverty in the US is ID'd by relative deprivation not absolute deprivation. Virtually no one in the US starves to death, we have almost zero stunted growth and height potential loses due to real malnutrition etc. These are very real concerns in Asian and parts of South America.
If high taxes and endless .gov programs ended poverty and lower rung socioeconomic stress France would have ended these problems years ago.
We'd have fairly widespread destitution in this country if we didn't have a series of things that prevent it. I include: Social Security; Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps; unemployment compensation; and direct financial assistance to the poor and needy.
I'm not saying without these programs that we would be on the level of a third world country, but that is exactly the point. America is a wealthy country and frankly it would be a national embarrassment to many of us to permit widespread destitution of our population. There are also issues such as a reduction in purchasing power among the poor would have deleterious effects on many businesses. Finally, poverty breeds crime. I'm glad we have the policies that we do.
168 hours in a week, if you only spend 40 of them generating income and you're struggling, I'd suggest spending more time generating income.
Large numbers of people do that but it isn't usually very successful in the long run, fast food & retail stores usually have odd and perpetually changing schedules so it is very hard to get 40 hours from any of them because most can avoid paying benefits if you work 25 hours or less, and shifts change frequently. It's quite a balancing act to work at two jobs for 25 hours each without encountering conflicts in the schedules, and I'm sure it's depressing to spend most of your waking hours going from one job to another and ending up with $365 gross if you live in a state that uses the federal minimum wage
We'd have fairly widespread destitution in this country if we didn't have a series of things that prevent it. I include: Social Security; Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps; unemployment compensation; and direct financial assistance to the poor and needy.
I'm not saying without these programs that we would be on the level of a third world country, but that is exactly the point. America is a wealthy country and frankly it would be a national embarrassment to many of us to permit widespread destitution of our population. There are also issues such as a reduction in purchasing power among the poor would have deleterious effects on many businesses. Finally, poverty breeds crime. I'm glad we have the policies that we do.
We simply do not have widespread destitution. As I mentioned above almost no Americans face poverty so dire their life is significantly threatened.
I'm not for eliminating all social welfare programs but after several decades and tens of trillions spent the war on poverty has done a better job locking millions into poverty than lifting them out of poverty.
Minimum wage is useless for most jobs but it means more companies will switch to kiosks and automation to get rid of low level work. Government should stay out of messing with the economy, they are already trillions in debt and trying to use inflation to wipe away debt will not work and it amounts to another huge tax increase on the poor.
Inflation hurts the poor and middle class earners. Each time min wages goes up inflation wipes away the gains by double digits.
I don't think the word "giving" means what you seem to think it means. That is the root cause of your misunderstanding of how an economy works. I recommend you watch a few episodes of Shark Tank to see how entrepreneurs come up with an idea, build & sell a product, and build a company -- or fail while trying.
In a first course in marketing, students learn about the 4 Ps and the 3 Cs, sometimes called "The Marketing Mix. Products, in order to be successful, have to have the right Product attributes, Price, Promotion, and Place (where to buy) - the variables under your control. The 3 Cs are Company, Customers & Competition - semi-fixed environmental factors in the marketplace around which you don't have that much control.
I think you may have mistyped the above sentence. Ask again more completely.
I seem to have a vague recollection about something having to with casting pearls, and, well, I don’t remember, but I you just might.
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