'Fight Inequality' Is a Poor Rallying Cry

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-04-20/-fight-inequality-is-a-poor-rallying-cry

by aaronchall • 9 years ago

52 161 9 years ago

cmdrfred4• 9 years ago

I'd take the calls to "fight inequality" more seriously if they didn't have such a nationalist tone. 71% of the world population lives on less than $10 a day, if inequality was ended on a global scale the majority of the people out there protesting would see a dramatic drop in income. I have a feeling that isn't what they are talking about.

EthanHeilman3• 9 years ago

It depends which form of inequality you are taking about. For instance consider the argument that the criminal justice system does not provide equal justice based on race or income and that it should. If this inequality was fixed this does not imply a net reduction in justice. Instead decreases in this form of inequality would result in a net increase in justice.

Based on your comment I assume you are addressing income inequality.

the majority of the people out there protesting would see a dramatic drop in income. I have a feeling that isn't what they are talking about.

I do know activists that view fairness as such an important virtue that they would be overjoyed to take that bargain even if it hurt their bottom line. However, according to the BBC [0]:

the world's average salary is $1,480 (£928) a month, which is just less than $18,000 (£11,291) a year.

18,000/365 is roughly 50 dollars a day. According the the 2014 US Census [1] about 18-33% of US households make this or less (18% is single earner, 33% is two earner households). So for 18-33% of the US population nothing changes or things improve.

However, no one has a magic income equality wand. Even if someone did have a magic income equality wand is not clear if the second order effects of global radical income redistribution would be positive and almost nothing would prevent the causes of income inequality from reasserting themselves. For this reason most attempts to fix such inequality focus on the root causes, e.g. differences in the quality of education, disease, malnutrition or structural power imbalances (such as unfairness in the justice system, structural racism/sexism, who gets business loans, rent-seeking, etc...). Almost all of these would likely raise the average level of income rather than just flatten it.

[0] http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-17512040

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United...

cmdrfred4• 9 years ago

Global per capita GDP is roughly 10 thousand dollars per year.

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.CD

The median income in the US is 51 thousand dollars and even if you made minimum wage (15k yearly) you'd see a 50% drop in income in a completely equitable system.

mrcactu5• 9 years ago

a lot of these protests such as "Occupy Wall Street" or "Black Lives Matter" have the right idea, but they are not sharp enough to be meaningful. Know your audience.

crystalmeph• 9 years ago

If you want people to fight inequality with you, you have to first prove to them it's actually a problem.

It's a bit of a leap to convince somebody that just because Bill Gates is much richer than the typical person, somebody more deserving must have gone without for him to get so rich.

zepto• 9 years ago

Yeah - especially when the opposite is much more likely to be true.

greggman2• 9 years ago

Random semi-related anecdote

Japanese video game companies pay like 1/3rd or less what USA video game companies pay in salary. AFAIK similar things are true for other industries. Maybe not as bad as 1/3rd but that's not relevant to the point below.

In Japanese school (17 years ago) my teacher brought up the topic that CEOs don't get paid as much in Japan so it's more equal. My response at the time was "why do I care that my USA CEO makes 100x my salary and my Japanese CEO only 10x, the 100x CEO is still managing to pay me 2x to 3x more than the 10x CEO."

How true that is overall I have no idea. I can say that video game programmers in Japan with 15 years experience make less than interns at Google.

Frondo4• 9 years ago

What I don't get is how people can hear "the CEO makes 100x what I make" and not then think "there's a lot of money in this company, I should be paid a heck of a lot more". Cause you know it's not just the CEO that's taking a big chunk of change. Why be content with what you're given, even if it's a lot, when you could be demanding more, cause you know it's there?

TheOtherHobbes2• 9 years ago

It's not a leap at all.

MS lost an anti-trust case. There were good legal and ethical reasons why MS in general and Gates in particular had to admit in a public courtroom that "cutting off the oxygen supply" to their competitors meant destroying other companies and other people's livelihoods.

Aside from that, once a company gets big enough it effectively becomes a kind of proxy mini-government in its market space, and smaller entrepreneurs either work with it and pay tribute for market access, or sometimes simply pay for the right to continue to exist.

And even then there's no guarantee that they really will be allowed to exist.

This is what inequality means. It's not just about poor people having no money and rich people having plenty of money. It's about inequality of power and influence.

ZeroGravitas• 9 years ago

What you say is true, but it's also true that convincing people of this reality is hard. There's a counterfactual world somewhere where everyone is slightly better off because the MSFT monopoly was broken, and tech progressed faster than it did in our world, but people find that kind of thought process tricky, and it involves making enemies of someone rich and powerful in our actual world.

ikeyany5• 9 years ago

Obama used a few phrases that not only sounded pleasing, but accurately addressed what's happening to Americans:

"Everyone, including the rich, need to pay their share."

"Americans from all backgrounds should have a fair shot at a quality education, not just those who happen to grow up in nice neighborhoods."

He tapped into equality of opportunity, while acknowledging that some will be more successful than others. That should be the rallying cry, not the idea of ending inequality outright.

Jabanga33• 9 years ago

I personally disagree that this should be the rallying cry.

Why should someone who invests nothing in their own children get to see their children have equal opportunities to the children of another person who invests everything into their children?

Why should a person who has 10 children get to see each one have the same amount of opportunity as each one of the children of someone who has 2 children, assuming equal total parental investment?

The rallying cry should be equality before the law.

heartsucker• 9 years ago

Because the children have no control over who their parents are, and we shouldn't punish with a lifetime of diminished opportunities because their parents aren't as "good" as others.

ebencooke• 9 years ago

I disagree because I think children should not be punished for the quality of their parent(s).

I also think you are making a big (and incorrect) assumption that children who do not receive "investment" have parents that are neglecting them, rather than have parents who lack the means to make a substantial "investment".

ikeyany5• 9 years ago

Quality schooling, basic health care, and a way to pay for college for academic excellence aren't going to take away all the nice things you can afford to treat your child to. A decent minimum line is as much helping you (a functioning, healthy society lasts much longer) as it is others. Every other first world country has those things I mentioned above for its citizens, and it's embarrassing how apathetic the public/Congress seem to be about it.

Frondo4• 9 years ago

Because they are all human beings living in the richest country on earth. Why shouldn't they?

eastWestMath4• 9 years ago

Jesus fucking christ dude, it's not about giving parents the opportunity to see their children be successful. It's about giving children the chance to be successful.

AnimalMuppet• 9 years ago

Those kids whose parents don't invest anything in them? Some of them start stealing packages off of my front porch. (Yes, that literally happened to me. I know which kid did it, too. His mom caught him - so maybe I shouldn't list him as a kid whose parents weren't investing anything.) Some of them start breaking into houses. (Hasn't happened to me... yet.) Some of them start mugging people. A few of them get frustrated enough that they decide to kill as many people as they can.

At some point there, do you start seeing reasons for us to start caring about what happens to those children? If not for the childrens' benefit, at least for our own?

boona3• 9 years ago

"Americans from all backgrounds should have a fair shot at a quality education, not just those who happen to grow up in nice neighborhoods."

While the rich pay more than their fair share and then some (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KENaWXPmBr0), I would think that quality education is something we could all get behind. It's unfortunate though that the left in large part seem to be opposed to school choice. That means that if you live in a more impoverished neighborhood, you're stuck with whatever school you're assigned to instead of being able to shop around, and for a lot of impoverished neighborhoods, that means schools with bad teachers and administrators, and there is no way out of it. This is a huge problem in black communities, and one area where the right legislation could make a significant impact.

eastWestMath4• 9 years ago

That means that if you live in a more impoverished neighborhood, you're stuck with whatever school you're assigned to instead of being able to shop around, and for a lot of impoverished neighborhoods, that means schools with bad teachers and administrators, and there is no way out of it. This is a huge problem in black communities, and one area where the right legislation could make a significant impact.

Fuck us for wanting to fix those impoverished schools, right?

ikeyany5• 9 years ago

While the rich pay more than their fair share and then some

Do you honestly think every tax bracket pays the same effective rate as the middle class? I think you will learn a lot in this thread.

eric_b5• 9 years ago

Midway down the author mentions a study that showed most Americans object to "unfairness" rather than "inequality". I've found this to be the case for me personally. If someone tries hard, works diligently, and makes smart decisions, but are still living in poverty, I want to help them. No hardworking, disciplined, motivated person should live in poverty, or have trouble making ends meet, in my opinion.

Unfortunately the lower income people I know do not fall in to this camp. I have a fair number of friends and relatives who make very little money and struggle to keep their heads above water. They make routinely bad decisions or fail to do the barest minimum to be proactive about things. They have watched every show on netflix, or played every video game possible (at $60/pop). They spend money on frivolous things and fail to plan in any way for the future. Their impulse control leaves much to be desired.

But the weird thing is - they mostly realize this. They don't get too fired up about inequality. Whether it's consciously or subconsciously, they seem to realize they are not really giving it their all, and that other people work harder and are more disciplined. They appear to prefer their current situation to the stresses of "succeeding" at life.

Granted, this is all anecdotal, so take with healthy dose of salt.

JBReefer• 9 years ago

Remember the speaker when it comes to inequality - sometimes, it looks to me more about upper middle class/the professional class assuaging internal guilt than a movement from the lower class.

I agree honest, a bunch of my friends from home don't do shit, don't want to do shit, and are perfectly happy with life. Honestly, probably happier than my wealthy friends. Low cost of living takes a lot of stress off your back.

The above only applies to people in that exact situation - there are of course huge structural problems with poverty in America w/r/t/ race, immigration status, etc. that are 100% not semi-idyllic image I'm describing.

Rapzid5• 9 years ago

I don't find that very weird. But then, as a currently successful person, I believe way less in the concept of "free will" than most.

gph2• 9 years ago

I think there's a bit of a squeeze area where people who work hard at jobs that pay between 30k and 50k (or even higher depending on the area) can find themselves basically paycheck to paycheck. And it's not all down to making bad decisions.

On top of that it's hard to hold every to a standard of making perfect decisions all the time. For example I know a couple people who bought houses right before the bubble burst in '08. Sure you can say that was a bad decision, but it's awfully heartless to expect everyone to be supremely wise to the real estate market.

There's people who probably don't have the ability to land a higher paying job yet still work hard at absolutely necessary jobs they have. And I think they deserve to have the comfort and safety, though perhaps not quite the luxury, as those who rise above them.

djrogers3• 9 years ago

For example I know a couple people who bought houses right before the bubble burst in '08.

And? Unless they lost their jobs in the mean time, or made some very very bad decisions with their mortgages, they are in all likelihood no longer upside down.

A drop in the value of your home doesn't take money out of your pocket - you're still making the same payments, you just feel worse about it.

eric_b5• 9 years ago

I don't disagree that there is a group of folks who are working hard and still struggling. I also agree that there should be some wiggle room for a few bad decisions not to sink you completely (depending on the severity of the decision).

But, in my experience this is not a large group of people. And, for the most part, this group isn't the one I see complaining in the news media.

And in any event, none of the policies the government currently has are meant for this group. They are somewhat lost in the shuffle. Should we do more for this group? Absolutely! But, I don't have a lot of hope much will get done.

thomasmeeks• 9 years ago

It is a fair point and I know plenty of people like that as well.

However, to give another perspective on it. When I think of changing an unequal situation, I look at the situations you described like this: "Did something happen early on in that person's life that just kind of made them give up?" I've known people like that, and although it is _also_ true that they _could_ lift themselves out of that situation, when you take it in aggregate over a large population, it becomes a problem (at least to me it does).

Why is it a problem? Well, to me it is for two main reasons. First, it gives an indication that there may be a systemic problem that could be corrected (overzealous police, poor education, a political issue, etc.). Frankly, we're far along enough as a species that there's no reason to tolerate that. Second, it means a meaningful portion of the population isn't contributing to humanity/earth/however you want to think of it in a way they otherwise could, which holds all of us back.

One of the things that makes it complex is that the answer, I think, changes a lot depending on the population.

eric_b5• 9 years ago

I totally agree with you. I've thought about this as well. Most of the folks I know in bad situations had some early stumbles and they sort of just gave up, as you say. The thing is - and where I struggle - is that the early stumbles weren't insurmountable. It's like they had no fire, no tenacity, no will power.

humanrebar• 9 years ago

Did something happen early on in that person's life that just kind of made them give up?

That is a retrospective way to address fairness. Another is, "Given where they are, can they start doing better and end up in a better place?"

A systemic problem that can (or used to) shove people down economically could be different than a systemic problem that doesn't allow a (reasonable) way to advance once they're at the bottom.

Point being, maybe people gave up. Maybe it's their fault. Maybe there was nothing they could do about it. But it's imperative that they have credible ways to undo that decision going forward.

Relevant issues (different people will add and/or subtract from the list):

1. permanent felony records and difficulty in getting records expunged after a history of good citizenship

2. hard cut-offs in government benefit programs

2a. getting a raise should not be a personal net loss

2b. getting married should not be a personal net loss

2c. getting more hours should not be a personal net loss, for you or your employer (the ACA really messed up here)

2d. moving to a better situation should not put your benefits at risk

3. Age discrimination needs to be taken more seriously

3a. 50-year-old college grads should have the same shots as anyone else. Otherwise, retraining from failed industries will be prohibitively difficult.

3b. New grads can't afford to wait 5-10 years for their first shot... this causes delayed marriages, delayed savings for retirement, an aging workforce, etc.

4. Home addresses are tied to wealth. Public schools are tied to home addresses. So public educational opportunity for kids is tied to how much wealth their parents have. Something has to be done about this.

eli_gottlieb13• 9 years ago

Counter-anecdote: my wife has a Master's degree and works 60 hours a week, trying to transition from biotech to teaching. She has to cobble together multiple jobs, some of which are in the "low-wage sectors". She works 60 hours a week because, well, budgets have been cut to school districts. She'll be earning $16k/year next year as a teaching fellow, albeit earning her education Master's while doing it.

We have a friend who scarcely makes $11.50/hour working in foodservice. Sure, the woman doesn't have the discipline or ambition to be a high-powered professional, but she never wanted to be a high-powered professional. She's working-class in the proper sense of the word: born to blue-collar workers, grew up in a blue-collar town, wants to just do a fair day's work for a day's livable pay. She doesn't get that choice, because everything outside the professional class has been gutted of livable wages and opportunities.

Nonetheless, how many jobs are professional jobs? 20%? 10% of new jobs inside this past decade? If your proposal is simply that inequality isn't a problem because everyone should be a professional, how are 100% of the people supposed to squeeze themselves into 10% of the jobs?

And if 90% of the people end up in the bottom 90% of the jobs, why should those jobs exploit them by paying unliveably low wages? After all, if there wasn't profit to be made employing those workers, nobody would do it, and minimum-wage rises at the municipal level have "destroyed" nowhere near as many jobs as predicted.

It looks to me like "inequality" really means "exploitation", a word Americans should start saying more often.

aaronchall• 9 years ago

Your wife is being paid to go to school and she'll make better money as a teacher when she completes?

Brilliant, welcome to the middle class.

If you're unambitious and living on 20k a year (like your friend in foodservice), you can get a roommate, a beater car, and still have a fun life. That's not exploitation, that's her choice.

If she wants the responsibility of providing for a family, she should probably take on more responsibility in her career, and make way for our unemployed youths who need their first jobs so future employers will take them seriously for real ones.

tropo• 9 years ago

If you wife counts the cost of commuting, dress clothing, supplies/materials, paying others to cook/clean/care, taxes... does this even make a profit? What is the point?

Meanwhile, there is an impact on family life. There are only 168 hours in a week. Take out 56 for sleeping, 60 for work... now down to 52, which is 7.43 hours per day. In those 7.43 hours you must cook, eat, bathe, poop, shop, make love, commute, exercise, and more. I don't think that really fits. Something is not getting the time required.

Is there a good reason she persists? Would she feel unvalued as a stay-at-home mom? Does she fear that she might be inadequate? Does she somehow think she'd be a failure if she chose a traditional role? I hope you would still respect and value her if she did that, and that she knows it. (don't just assume she knows it -- and she may hesitate to believe you if you say it, due to upbringing or peers)

artursapek• 9 years ago

I've noticed an alarming lack of financial intelligence among people my age (I'm 24). People have no concept of saving money or investing, and consume as much as they possibly can. Lots of people are within a month of running out of cash, and have credit card debt.

Looking back on my public school education in the US, I'm kind of shocked that there was never a required course on personal finance. We had to spend weeks studying every major war in history, something that will never matter to us in our day-to-day lives, but we're left on our own to figure out how to stay out of debt and build a future for ourselves as working people. This directly impacts our lives every single day.

You pretty much have to read niche blogs and subreddits to even be exposed to it in our culture. It worries me a lot.

drabiega2• 9 years ago

Why is stress management / relaxation a bad decision? As far as they go, Netflix and video games are some of the best time/value propositions for these aspects of life.

Being poor is a constant juggling act between physical/mental/financial health. I don't think it makes sense to look at trade-offs between them as bad decisions.

CocaKoala2• 9 years ago

What about people who tried hard, worked diligently, made smart decisions, got bogged down in poverty, and decided that there's no point in trying hard, working diligently, and making smart decisions if they're just going to get bogged down in poverty?

Frondo4• 9 years ago

This is something I think gets lost, poor people in low-paying jobs have a pretty tenuous existence. They'll set aside their $10 a month for savings (and end up with $120 at the end of a year) and the first emergency wipes out their savings. So they start saving again--$10 a month or whatever--and a few more years, another emergency wipes it out.

It always gets me how people talk about how you can just live frugally, on poverty wages, and you'll slowly be less poor. That might work, if you have no emergencies in life, literally never make a mistake or display bad judgment in any way (remember, one emergency will wipe out years of saving and mistake-free life choices), and don't even think of having a family or raising children.

But positing that as "the way things ought to be for everyone" in the richest country on earth? That's fucked up.

ForHackernews• 9 years ago

What about 'unfairness' in the other direction? Anecdotally, I know plenty of people born into upper (or at least middle) class families who have made impulsive or bad decisions: not working hard in university or at their jobs, abusing drugs, getting DUIs, etc.. Almost all of them are "succeeding" despite their bad choices.

Lack of social mobility can mean it's difficult for poor people to rise above their station, but it also means it's hard for the rich to screw up badly enough that they suffer real consequences for their mistakes.

You say no hardworking, disciplined, motivated person should live in poverty, but what of the lazy, undisciplined wastrel offspring of the upper classes? Should they live in [relative] luxury?

psyc• 9 years ago

I also know a lot of poor people, and none that work hard or work on themselves. The only poor person I know who works hard is me, but that's because every time I have money I use it to attempt a business. I don't consider that unfair at all, just the definition of 'risk'

taeric• 9 years ago

It is all anecdotal, and completely misses a couple of things.

Firstly, that the direction of causality is not established. Nor is it likely to be an arrow, but rather merely a connection that has a feedback loop.

What I mean by feedback is that poor decisions often beget other poor decisions. Consider in a completely deterministic world such as chess. A poor move often leaves you only with other poor moves to make. The later into the game where you have played poorly, the more amazing you have to be playing at the end to still have a shot. (Any other sport shows this, too. You can always win with time on the clock. But it is harder the more you are behind.)

Secondly, don't neglect that your attitude and interactions will also lead to some of the outcomes you are seeing in discussions. You may think "they mostly realize this." It could just as likely be that they dont' get fired up about it with you.

dewyatt• 9 years ago

I think blaming this on impulse control is self-serving.

I expect those with lower incomes tend to feel more oppressed and unhappy. They work hard every week but it's always paycheck to paycheck, and they always feel beholden to their employer. They don't have the financial freedom to _really_ control their lives in any significant way.

So perhaps they compensate by seeking fulfillment and distraction with netflix and video games. There has to be some outlet for all of their frustration, some way of mitigating that feeling of helplessness.

I live with a guy that has worked at Walmart for 13 years. He comes home absolutely exhausted. I don't know how he keeps going, but I have to think that indulging in movie theater visits and other forms of entertainment/distraction may actually be vital to maintaining his mental health.

ramblenode• 9 years ago

I share some of your observations but I disagree with your implication that these people are poor primarily because they are lazy.

The alternative is that they lack motivation because their lives are exhausting and debilitating. Maybe that sounds paradoxical, but there are at least a handful of studies (with a quick Googling, e.g. [0] [1]) which suggest being poor is a massive stressor that has an impact on mental and physical health. When someone has no money and no clear path for advancement in life, it's not hard to see why they might want to escape with games or movies or drugs. That won't make their long term situation better, but its something small they can control and feel good about in an otherwise bleak and chaotic world.

It's also the case that people who've experienced success from working hard will have more motivation than those who haven't succeeded. To the latter group, the formula for success is theoretical rather than a lived experience--they haven't had positive reinforcement for past efforts so they're less motivated to try again in the future, even if that's suboptimal in their abstract model of the world.

So ultimately, yes, a lot of poverty is the result of bad decisions, but that's an incomplete picture of the death spiral of poverty where a lack of money and options creates a mindset that encourages those decisions.

[0] https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/am-i-right/201210/the-e...

[1] http://www.urban.org/urban-wire/povertys-toll-mental-health

chrismealy• 9 years ago

The author has been on the payroll of the Koch brothers for most of his career.

tnorthcutt• 9 years ago

Source?

TSiege• 9 years ago

I was skeptical as well, but it's true.

Cowen is the director of the Mercatus Center, which is heavily funded by the brothers. see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center

And here's an article on that connection https://www.lewrockwell.com/2014/06/gary-north/the-koch-brot...

lacker• 9 years ago

Not really. The author has been a professor at George Mason for most of his career, and it's quite a stretch to refer to the whole faculty of George Mason as "on the payroll of the Koch brothers".

jeffdavis• 9 years ago

"Inequality" is a bad rallying cry because no two people are equal, and few would like to be equal to someone else. So what people mean by "inequality" is always something else, and varies in meaning from person to person. Even if you choose something concrete, like "equality of income", few really mean that an 18 year old should have the same income as a 45 year old.

Ordinarily a meaningless word is great for a rallying cry, but things like "equal" and "fair" are just too meaningless.

djrogers3• 9 years ago

few really mean that an 18 year old should have the same income as a 45 year old.

Pretty sure a lot of the 22 year olds I saw at occupy rallies thought exactly that. I am a bad person for working for 20 years to get where I am without giving most of my money to people that haven't.

parenthephobia• 9 years ago

few really mean that an 18 year old should have the same income as a 45 year old

Surely people don't believe that an 18 year-old shouldn't have the same income as a 45 year-old?

A 45 year-old shouldn't have higher income just because they're older. In the UK, at least, we have laws about that sort of thing.

Avshalom• 9 years ago

This is why 'Eat The Rich' is my rallying cry.

lolsal• 9 years ago

What does 'eat the rich' mean?

dahart• 9 years ago

I can agree with a lot of this opinion piece; fairness is more important than equality, and it's hard to rally around anything that's abstract. Yes. People rally around things that affect them directly and have an obvious course of action. Despite the inequality in the US, the majority of Americans have a comfortable standard of living. And I've frequently heard the idea that poor people vote republican because they expect to be rich some day.

But anyway the closer seems really weird to me.

I also find it striking how frequently anti-inequality messages come from academia, which in reality has a remarkably inegalitarian system of allocating rewards. For instance, consider the differences in pay, security and working conditions for tenured professors versus adjuncts; citation inequality is very high too.

This seems to be suggesting that we should discount academics because they're hypocrites because their house has inequality too. Very specious.

Why is it surprising that the only people asking whether we have equality and taking the time to find out are the ones reporting that we don't?

There are many things wrong in academia and with tenure, but why exactly is it unfair for adjuncts to have less pay & security? Tenure is harder to get, and adjuncts are non tenure track.

Citation inequality? What does this have to do with global economic inequality? I'm sure there is citation inequality but the paper cited doesn't really demonstrate it. It catalogues where citations are concentrated, which doesn't prove inequality. To show inequality you'd have to compare submissions and rejection rates, not acceptance rates alone.

cryoshon• 9 years ago

yeah, "fight inequality" is ineffective at rallying the benefactors of inequality-- boomers and the rich. big surprise.

bernie sanders is the most popular politician in america. is it because his fundamental message of needing to reduce inequality is falling flat? no.

garbage article, ignores objective realities in favor of babbling in circles...

charles-salvia• 9 years ago

After running a mental Principal Components Analysis over the whole liberal/conservative ideological spectrum, I'm increasingly inclined to reduce the entire divide between conservatives and liberals to whether any given individual is more irritated by the prospect of (A) poor people being lazy and abusing handouts or (B) rich people abusing poor people.

Zak2• 9 years ago

I think most people aren't terribly concerned about income/wealth inequality. The logical inverse would be that everyone should get the same share of resources regardless of their contribution to society or wealth created. I think even most on the political left would reject that idea.

Rather than inequality, I think people are more concerned about some combination of:

* Poverty - that some people don't have enough resources to meet their basic needs

* Lack of opportunity - that for too many people, working hard and making reasonable decisions is unlikely to result in a proportional gain in wealth

* Corruption - that wealth results in undue influence over the political process and control over the lives of others

* Unjust rewards - that some activities which arguably, or definitely cause a net harm to society or a reduction in total wealth are rewarded, and that some beneficial activities are not rewarded, or rewarded insufficiently

drabiega2• 9 years ago

The logical inverse would be that everyone should get the same share of resources regardless of their contribution to society or wealth created. I think even most on the political left would reject that idea.

Yeah, pretty much everyone of the left would reject that extreme. The progressive viewpoint here is simply that the economic system is tilted too far in favor of money accumulating upwards and needs to be pushed back somewhat. Other than that, there is a lot of variety in how far and what the method of doing so should look like.

Zak2• 9 years ago

The author of the article makes a passing reference to "radical egalitarianism", which Wikipedia doesn't say much about, but associates with equality of outcome and communism. It's possible that something along those lines is, in fact the author's position.

I'd be interested in seeing if there are a significant number of people who are fundamentally concerned with wealth inequality per se rather than poverty, lack of opportunity, corruption and unjust rewards.

Brendinooo• 9 years ago

It's funny what you remember from the grade school days. In hindsight, one of the most influential stories I had to read was "Harrison Bergeron"[0], which I always come back to whenever I see people talk about equality. Danilov's last lines in "Enemy at the Gates"[1] have stuck with me as well.

"Equality" is a bit of a fraught term - it can mean lots of things in lots of different contexts. But "Harrison Bergeron" depicted an equal society, and it wasn't pretty.

Perhaps fights against inequality that cut down tall poppies are just inherently more difficult to sell. Debates about racial inequality have arguably made better headway over time in US politics because they tend to focus on elevating an oppressed group; granting them rights they lacked to make them equals with those who already had those rights. With income inequality, however, the solutions are often perceived (rightly or wrongly) as bringing people down; beating up on those who have had success.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron

[1]: "Man will always be a man. There is no new man. We tried so hard to create a society that was equal, where there'd be nothing to envy your neighbour. But there's always something to envy. A smile, a friendship, something you don't have and want to appropriate. In this world, even a Soviet one, there will always be rich and poor. Rich in gifts, poor in gifts. Rich in love, poor in love."

'Fight Inequality' Is a Poor Rallying Cry

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