patrick.net

We had a great realtor quote in this thread from Big Brother:

“Any banker, consultant, lawyer, doctor with 10-15 years experience (i.e 30s to late 30’s) can purchase a 2-3 million dollar home. Think about how many of those guys there are…. and these are just the simple workers, not the Venture Capitalists, Internet millionaires etc… but the normal man.”

FAB, I can say with certainty that this is categorically false for lawyers and doctors. Unless this person was talking about using a crazy mortgage product. Who is this blowhard you read about?

- if you redistributed that money it’s tough to say what would happen to securities, credit, and capital investment. Also, what would happen to the motivations of the rich? If wealthy people stop doing what they do would our economy continue to work as well as it does? What is the true value of ‘leadership’?

Honestly, I have enough things to be worried about (health, job, spouse, rent, housing bubble, peak oil, global warming/whining, etc.) without having to worry about how to "motivate" the rich. Based on their astounding success at concentrating even more of the national wealth over the past 35 years, is this really something anyone should be concerned about? And please don't tell me how a greedbag Boomer CEO is really "worth" 268X his least paid employee thanks to his superior "leadership" ability (i.e, inside connections and family legacy) --I'm just not buying it.

As far as redistribution goes, if you were to forcibly redistribute all the wealth among everyone equally (Communist ideal - not mine), you would see a lot of it misspent by drunks, drug addicts & idiots on stupid things, this is true. However, a lot of the money would also go to the working poor and "middle-middle" class and get spent on staples, like better quality housing, healthcare, food and education. Compare this to the "staples" of the super-rich, like mostly empty vacation homes, luxury cars, Learjets, mega-yachts, horses, jewelry, high-stakes gambling, and other various ways for them to try to "out-do" each other.

Obviously, I'm well aware (as we all are) that a lot of people have been recklessly tapping the house ATM to try to achieve a lifestyle they cannot really afford. However, this group does not include 100% of the working and "middle" classes, however you choose to define them. And which group is really more "wasteful" and extravagant overall in their spending habits --the rich or everyone else?

Brand, Malcolm,

I had work to do yesterday (getting those granite countertops & Brazilian cherry floors installed --ha, just kidding), so I missed the exchange here. However, I see two recurring themes common to both of you:

1) When faced with demonstrably rising wealth inequality in our society, you both resort to the "well, we're all better off than: (Sudan, Iraq, Haiti, name your third-world hell-hole), so stop your complaining" fall-back argument.

I don't deny that we are all lucky to be born Americans (or Aussies, Kiwis, W. Europeans, Canadians, for our non-U.S. bloggers). That's beside the point here. The point is that wealth inequality is rising here, and the trend appears to be accelerating --not a good thing for any society, if you happen to favor rule of law and political stability.

2) If that doesn't work, you switch to "Look at all those gluttonous FBs borrowing to buy all this luxury stuff --these people are 'middle class', so all middle class people are spoiled gluttons" canard.

I would never define any of the people with the stuff you describe as "middle class". Maybe upper-upper middle class, or wanna-be upper-class, but these are not people I would have any sympathy for. I am "middle class" by any metric, and yet I have none of those things, nor do I want or "need" them to be happy.

My definition of middle class would be to have a decent job, reliable healthcare and a paid-off modest house sometime before I hit retirement age. Something that USED TO BE easily attainable if you were willing to WORK hard for it. And something that's becoming increasingly UNATTAINABLE for members of my generation, whose names don't end with "Kennedy, Bush, Hilton or Baldwin".

SpeedingBullet, I looked at the article and it seems to just be saying the same thing. The poor seem to be really uneducated about proper nutrition, no one that I have seen questions this. No one seems to be saying that there ever is a stopping point where you say OK it's good enough. My only observations, and more from a probing point because I was really interested in discussing this not winning a point, is that when you look at the levels of disease, hunger, homelessness, fear of violence it historically is a great time to be alive in the United States. With that being said, like everyone else I have my own concerns about bringing people up to the next level where economics/finance is taught in high school, universal health care. Please don't get me wrong there is a lot of room for improvement.

HARM, to be fair it seemed logical in discussing the growing gap between rich and poor to establish what is poor in America. So far most everyone has been fair about not trying to politicize the homeless or others who by choice fall out of society so we are left trying to define a class of people as poor who often times have more tangible crap in their lives than I do, and I'm not poor.

We've also had the, even though they are fat they are still starving argument. Well, that may be, and like I said that is an education issue, or some tweaking of social policy.

One solution is for the government to actually grow some balls and not worry about the food lobby or defaming food industries by pointing out that certain food is crap. That's where I would start.

Malcolm,

I'll grant you that the American or European definition of "poor" is a far cry from "poor" just about everywhere else. To some extent, the rising tide of technological and economic progress has lifted all boats --and that's a very good thing, and one of the main benefits of capitalism, especially when well regulated in democratic societies.

I don't think we can (or should try to) idiot-proof the world. I don't think we can (or should) prevent people from making bad decisions in their personal lives, or insulate them from the consequences of those bad decisions --quite the contrary. But at the very least, we should seek to better align risk with reward when we design our "free market", so that it tends to favor socially desirable outcomes. Things like safe, propserous neighborhoods for people who are willing to work.

In other words, I would prefer that we NOT rig our banking/mortgage system to be a casino that rewards reckless spendthrifts and speculators, while punishing responsible savers and working class families. Problem is, that's how it's mostly been since I've been an adult, and it looks like the 'rising tide' has only been lifting the yachts.

PS: I agree that government (and AMA) cowtowing to the fast food lobby is a big part of the problem with obesity/poor nutrition. Your average consumer is getting some very poor information, and the results speak for themselves.

HARM, as usual in the end I find that the difference in point of view is quite narrow. I absolutely agree with 99% of what you just said. Since you seem to have given a little ground in conceeding that economic and technical progress has shifted even the bottom a little bit, now we can actually talk about the super rich verses the mediocre, and honestly I have mixed feelings about it.

Do you conceptually have a problem with someone being able to earn unlimited wealth? Do you think society is healthy when you have a situation where many people are barely getting by, and many people have by all accounts an imense amount of wealth? What do you see happening if I have summed up the current situation accurately? If you would be kind enough to share your thoughts I'd ask also to bear in mind standards of living going from 1900 1920 1930 1950 1970 1980 2000 and beyond.

I'm still having a little trouble profiling our poorest.

Is it a minority in a bad area who is obese yet starving, but has a prepaid cell phone? Is it a white single mother? Is it just someone or a family living below the government's definition of poor? All of the above?

Do you conceptually have a problem with someone being able to earn unlimited wealth?

A: "It depends".

If by "able to earn unlimited wealth", you mean there should be no arbitrary limits on what a person can earn in a lifetime by good, productive works, then sure, no problem. If you have the brains and ability to invent a cure for cancer or invent warp drive technology, then you should be --and will be-- handsomely rewarded for that by Mr. Marketplace. As long as you pay your share of taxes like everyone else, the government should keep its mitts off your profits.

However, if by "able to earn unlimited wealth", you mean there should be no limits on what a person can earn through institutional fraud, anti-competitive cartels/monopolies, cronyism, corruption, insider trading, taxpayer pork, subsidies, etc., I take a very dim view of this form of "success".

Do you think society is healthy when you have a situation where many people are barely getting by, and many people have by all accounts an immense amount of wealth?

No I do not, and I believe history shows us what eventually becomes of societies that allows such a situation to continue indefinitely. Whether they have democratic forms of government or not, the people in extremely unequal societies have a habit of "voting" against the ruling class when they're unhappy. And the results are usually not pretty, and ironically usually FAR worse than whatever modest forms of regulation or economic reforms that were proposed prior to the coup d'État/revolution.

@DS,

Re: images. Usually I just use Google Images search engine, and keep trying out different word/phrase combos until I hit something good.

Harm...
most of the news stories are BS, or the only story that ever gets out is one about a bomb that happened to explode somewhere. During the re-elections for Uribe, I was out in Parque Tayrona near Santa Marta. Going into town one day for supplies, we saw 3 burned out buses. The news story that made it to CNN was that guerillas had stepped out into the road, gotten all the people off, robbed them and burned the buses. The truth? The owner of the buses burned them for insurance because they were old and paid everyone off to be witnesses to say it was guerillas who burned them so he could collect his money! So much for the news media. It's kinda like the CPI reporting.

annie,

Just curious, how long have you lived in Colombia? Are you in Bogota? I don't doubt the reporting here is flawed and biased. Part of the problem may be that the media is still reporting on the basis of Colombia's past (vivid memories of the bombings & kidnappings by FARC, ELN and M-19, and violence by Medellin & Cali drug cartels) and they've simply missed the fact that life and the political situation there has begun to improve in recent years.

AMERICANS BECOME WEALTHY BY WORKING. It is our ingenuity, cooperation, and work ethic that traditionally built this country. Nowadays we rely more and more on the hard work of others. In a sense, the US has become CEO to the world and currently benefits by taking excess profits of labor from poor countries, just as a CEO ‘takes’ the excess profits of labor from his employees.

An excellent point, skellington. I think this concept deserves its own thread.

skellington,

I don't think that reinstituting a 1950's era top tax rate of 91% on the rich (yes, it once went that high) will solve all our problems. Personally, as time goes on, I lean more and more towards a simple flat tax, no loopholes/deductions, and strictly enforcing it on everyone. Should save everyone tons of time and money and result in a much "fairer" system than the Byzantine, lawyered-up, loophole-ridden, over-engineered mess have today.

Main thing is, we need to go back to system that rewards productive, socially beneficial work. People who push toxic loans, overborrow, commit fraud, and recklessly speculate should not be rewarded or bailed out. Exactly HOW we get back there is the big "if".

HARM,
OK, now I can see some differences to throw around. You have to understand that I see wealth as a good thing. Yes, it is not a good thing when people suffer because of unethical ways of earning it, but in general I like real wealth. I believe it does create opportunities, and I think overall the free market is a great place to redistribute it. Having lots of wealthy and super wealthy people creates opportunities because the wealthy do buy nice houses, cars, boats, and planes. The wealthy hire all sorts of service providers. The wealthy are demanding on their surroundings so areas of concentration of wealth are nicer. It may be a sore topic here, but the wealthy do put money in financial institutions which then lend and that creates many more opportunitites.

I further believe that setting minimalist goals for a society ~everyone should have food, clothing, shelter~ gets minimalist results. It can be government driven, or privately driven, you still get a large group of really poor people. On the otherhand in our society, people are considered poor even when they have the basics, I think that is a good thing.

I further believe that setting minimalist goals for a society ~everyone should have food, clothing, shelter~ gets minimalist results. It can be government driven, or privately driven, you still get a large group of really poor people. On the otherhand in our society, people are considered poor even when they have the basics, I think that is a good thing.

Malcolm,

I support a limited form of minimum threshold/aka "safety net" for how far people can fall for a number of reasons:

1. On a purely rational self-interest basis, social stability benefits everyone (even the rich).

All it takes is a quick trip down memory lane (Depression/Grapes of Wrath) or a peek at a modern-day kleptocracy (Zimbabwe, Sudan, Myanmar) to see what societal "benefits" are produced by pure anarchic, laissez-faire style capitalism. Even if I'm the richest guy on the planet, being surrounded by hordes of impoverished, hungry, angry people who want to kill me does not make me "feel" very rich.

2. Shit happens --I've been there.

When I graduated into the early 90's recession (much more severe than the Dot.com recession, btw), I was basically SOL. Thanks to bad timing, I was caught out in the cold with my diploma in one hand and dick in the other. And neither one was particularly useful to me at the time. Sometimes people end up in harsh situations THROUGH NO FAULT OF THEIR OWN. I know this is a hard concept for you to believe, perhaps because you've been fortunate all your life and success has come easy. But there are cases where people get unlucky, or have to struggle thanks to choosing their parents unwisely or simple bad timing.

3. Helping those who need a temporary hand up is not only morally right, it helps grow the economy.

I am not so naive to think there are no lazy f**cked up people living on the dole by choice. I personally know two of them. For these people, I say "three hots and a cot" --that's it. And only for citizens. If you don't want to work and contribute, that should be all you get, no more. For the rest of the people, a welfare-to-workfare type system represents the best solution. It doubly benefits society by removing people from poverty/welfare rolls and growing the economy & consumer base.

4. Some people are beyond helping, but that doesn't mean I want them roaming my street.

You'll always have a certain % of non-functioning mentally ill/alcoholic/druggie people in any society. I don't think letting them wander the streets, peeing defecating anywhere and committing crimes to survive reflects very well on our society. And frankly, a lot of my motivation is purely selfish, not moral: I don't want some stinky ass bum peeing in front of my house and I'm willing to pay a little more in taxes so I don't *have* to see him.

good posts, HARM. nice bookends to your thread ;)

HARM says:
Honestly, I have enough things to be worried about (health, job, spouse, rent, housing bubble, peak oil, global warming/whining, etc.) without having to worry about how to “motivate” the rich. Based on their astounding success at concentrating even more of the national wealth over the past 35 years, is this really something anyone should be concerned about? And please don’t tell me how a greedbag Boomer CEO is really “worth” 268X his least paid employee thanks to his superior “leadership” ability (i.e, inside connections and family legacy) –I’m just not buying it.

ha, my reverse conversion is working...

If you have the brains and ability to invent a cure for cancer or invent warp drive technology, then you should be –and will be– handsomely rewarded for that by Mr. Marketplace. As long as you pay your share of taxes like everyone else, the government should keep its mitts off your profits.

even that ain't necessarily so -- think about the discoveries by biochemists working in giant pharmaceutical companies -- these guys don't own their own IP, they get a salary, and for their genius and brainpower, the profits flow to executives and shareholders. (big pharma makes most of its profits from manufacturing simple tried and true compounds like aspirin over and over again, and then from patents held on 'breakthrough' drugs, which they use as a hobbyhorse to moan about the high cost of R&D and say they are entitled to their super-profits.)

However, if by “able to earn unlimited wealth”, you mean there should be no limits on what a person can earn through institutional fraud, anti-competitive cartels/monopolies, cronyism, corruption, insider trading, taxpayer pork, subsidies, etc., I take a very dim view of this form of “success”.

hmm, such as Dick Cheney recasting the books at Halliburton on taking the helm, instantly creating $245 million extra paper profit by sheeting home all potential profit as actual profit, without taking into account unforeseen expenses, adjustments and cost blowouts, etc. and for his many (5) years service as a great business leader (stepping momentarily out of govt), they rewarded him a $20M payout, as he went back into govt, this time as the VP. however, on public complaint, he only took $14M, thus guaranteeing the impartiality of his contract allocation decisions as VP. plus a $200K p.a. 'pension' from Halliburton.

Oh no, I've gone and pleased Different Sean TWICE in one post! What am I doing wrong?? ;-)

Actually my friend you'd be surprised. I started from nothing myself.

You'd also be surprised that while I'm speaking conceptually, I have the same need to help those around me as you describe. Like you, I judge a society by how it treats its most pathetic citizens. I believe you need wealth first, then you can put up the safety nets. Wealth is beautiful because it is the means for compassion, charity, assistance, and giving.

I have actually shifted on some concepts. I actually favor minimum wage increases, not so much to aide in stratifying a class but because I do see the disparity in wages that you talk about. I used to be against mandated health care, now I brainstorm all the time about universal healthcare. I believe that businesses should be heavily incentivized to provide it, and furthermore I believe in a catchall program to take care of the unemployed. This should be a system which the free market can openly compete with to maintain quality of service.

Malcolm,

Wow, I guess we're not quite as far apart as I thought. Ironically, I used to be a strong supporter of the minimum wage, but now I doubt it does much good. I've seen some convincing arguments that, if raised high enough, it may even price some marginal labor (student labor, poorest of the poor, etc.) out of the market. Personally, I think a combination of flat tax, enforcing immigration laws, and more shareholder activism could take care of the lion's share of the wages gap.

I also support a minimum level of healthcare coverage for all citizens & legal residents. Not sure how to structure it to avoid the Fannie Mae/Sallie Mae trap of "anything the government subsidizes eventually grows bigger, more bureaucratic and more expensive" problem though.

I actually favor minimum wage increases, not so much to aide in stratifying a class but because I do see the disparity in wages that you talk about. I used to be against mandated health care, now I brainstorm all the time about universal healthcare.

Malcolm, EPI has some interesting research on these subjects (epionline.org).

Mandated healthcare is not the same as universal healthcare. The first one punishes employers and will lead to mass unemployment.

I still think the optimal minimum wage is $0.00/hr. I am under the strong impression that increasing minimum wage will cause business closures while destroying the currency.

HARM, on minimum wage I agree with you about the high end, I just don't see how paying $8/hr really makes that big a difference as opposed to $5.75. I almost think the idea of paying someone $6/hr to do anything is exploitation, but I always err on the conservative side. Like I said, I used to be against it for all the reasons you and Peter say, now I am for it, for all the reasons you outlined.

Mandated, Universal, I don't care how we name it, like HARM, I recognize that things happen, and no one should have to face a debt of $100,000 for some unforeseen illness or accident, there HAS to be a safety net in there.

@Malcolm,

100% agree. It's nuts that in the richest country on earth, you can be bankrupted for getting sick or injured.

Health care system broken, Clinton says

BAP, I favor medical savings accounts with insurance just for the catastrophic stuff. That to me strikes some sort of balance, and it forces people to shop and save.

I favor medical savings accounts with insurance just for the catastrophic stuff.

I agree. That is a good balance. But as usual, the avocates will cry foul because they think the system is a "regressive tax."

I do not oppose universal health care but:

1. Employers should not have to bear all the costs. This will put a lot of small/medium companies out of business.

2. There needs to be dramatic welfare reforms.

The city of Tijuana Mexico had over 300 murders last year. That’s an unsafe city, picking out the projects of Compton to try to draw a parallel is intellectually dishonest.

Sorry, you are just wrong. What percentage of the murders in San Francisco last year happened in the Hunter' Point/Bayview neighborhood? Bayview-Hunters Point has an infant mortality rate comparable to Bulgaria or Jamaica.

"A lot of these kids don't get to go out of their houses at all when they get home after school because of the danger," said Tareyton Russ, principal of Willie Brown Academy elementary school, which draws children from the area with the greatest child population increase. "And that's the best thing for them in a lot of cases."

Overall San Francisco had 96 murder in 2005 and 25 of them were in Bayview. 25 out of a population of 10,000 residents is a murder rate of around .25%. This has been constant for the last few years. And Bayview is not even as rough as many other poor neighborhoods. The Tijuana population is 1.6M and if it had 300 murders as you state, then the murder rate is .018%, less than 1/10th that of Bayview!

25M Americans used soup kitchens or food banks last year. This is hardly a nation that is feeding its poor well. And people starve in America all the time, granted most of them (all of them?) are mentally ill, but 38M Americans are "food insecure" meaning they one paycheck away from standing in the soup kitchen line.

Just because you don't know any poor people doesn't mean that it isn't dangerous and difficult to be poor in America.

Oh, by the way, the figures for Baghdad are 1800 civilian deaths a month, according to the Baghdad government. That works out to 22k a year, in a population of 9M, that is .25%, the same as Bayview-Hunter's Point.

Before you put up a bunch of poop DS, you may want to visit any emergency clinic or ward in Mexifornia and take a head-count of three main things: “Of those of you without proper insurance…. 1) Who’s an illegal invader?, 2) Who is on some form of state aid?, 3) Who has illegal drugs in their system?.” Ask them three questions and 90% of the “uninsured” will be counted in any Mexifornia medical place.

well, your health care system is currently ranked 37th in the world for quality, based on the insurance system. the reason is probably that enough lame-brained americans like bap think enough crazy thoughts that it will never be reformed in line with the preceding 36 countries to improve the quality. the HMOs and big pharma need lots of people like bap to keep the current system chugging along nicely, thank you very much....

why not visit some other country and see how it works, bap -- hilary clinton did... it costs half as much in some countries to deliver better quality care with better universal outcomes than in the US through a tax-based citizenship guarantee system... and bap wants to make it *more* regressive... maybe slip to 100th or so, in line with sierra leone...

MEDICAL EMERGENCY / Neglected for a decade, health care is metastasizing into a new crisis / Live sicker, die younger: The plight of the uninsured

you should also read the bible more to help you get away from those commie-lib notions like 'love thy neighbor' -- tough love obviously works best... and the tougher the better... hanging, drawing and quartering is the toughest love of all...

well, your health care system is currently ranked 37th in the world for quality, based on the insurance system.

That is way better than median! I think there are more than 150 countries in the world. :)

I definitely think we need to reform the cost structure in the health care system. At the present level, there is no hope of universal health care getting political acceptance.

Sean, unlike in other countries, many liberals (not all, I know many good-hearted liberals too) here just want to use other people's many to pay for what they think should be free. They will cry for more welfare but they will refuse to pay an extra dime.

Answering the original thought about income disparity, I figure there's no possible way that anyone, regardless of what you do for society (the measure I use for salary calculation), is worth a hundred-plus times more than anyone else. I figure at most a scaling factor of three to five. Whether that means minimum and maximum wage (or other) systemic legislation or genetically engineering greed out of the race, I'm not sure.

I figure there’s no possible way that anyone, regardless of what you do for society (the measure I use for salary calculation), is worth a hundred-plus times more than anyone else. I figure at most a scaling factor of three to five.

Again, "worth" is not a meaningful word. The only question: whether having the disparity is good for the society as a whole.

How about this, then. There is no contribution that an individual can make that would cause such an impact on society that their compensation should be astronomically larger than anyone else.

And no, the disparity is not "good" (if that word has any meaning) for society. It breeds hatred, envy, lust and pride. If those mean anything.

Agreed Tesh.

I'm reminded of the disenfranchised young men in polygamous communities. There we see the results of economic disparity, artificially forced by polygamy. These young men can never have even one wife, and of course, no children. They are left to live on the outskirts of town without any means for or access to economic growth. They are ripe for terrorists groups, looking for young men who have nothing to live for, nothing to lose.

It's a dire example of how disparity can play out. I'd prefer a society where the rungs of the ladder are maintained, so that anyone can climb (or fall) freely. Knock out the middle rungs and we create a subculture of throw aways.

Hi Jimbo,
Your points are very well taken, and at least paint a picture of the very worst in this country. Your stats are good, I would point out again, that yes you can go to the very worst neighborhoods and get a stat equal to a war torn country's overall rate. Iraq has some safe, and some very unsafe areas as compared to a gang infested neighborhood. As a society it should be a goal to have no areas left like this, but you have to eventually conceed that these situations are so small that statistically they aren't significant, and perpetuate an exageration when these small hot spots are held up as the example of what a typical poor neighborhood in America is like.