The issue of wealth and income inequality

[David_42]

Everything to do with wealth and income inequality. I will post in this thread whenever something relevant to the two appears, or try to.

Let's begin:

America now has more wealth and income inequality than any major developed country on earth, and the gap between the very rich and everyone else is wider than at any time since the 1920s.

The reality is that since the mid-1980s there has been an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the wealthiest people in this country.

There is something profoundly wrong when the top one-tenth of one percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent.

“Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills. How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” – Pope Francis

There is something profoundly wrong when 58 percent of all new income since the Wall Street crash has gone to the top one percent.

Despite huge advancements in technology and productivity, millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages. The real median income of male workers is $783 less than it was 42 years ago; while the real median income of female workers is over $1,300 less than it was in 2007. That is unacceptable and that has got to change.


There is something profoundly wrong when we have a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires at the same time as millions of Americans workl onger hours for lower wages and we have the highest childhood poverty rate of any developed country on earth.

Racial Inequality:

Racial Inequality | Inequality.org

Everything Else:

The wealth share of America’s top 3 percent, Fed researchers calculate, rose from 44.8 percent of the nation’s wealth in 1989 to 51.8 percent in 2007 and 54.4 percent in 2013. The top 3 percent now hold over double the wealth of America’s poorest 90 percent of families.

The vast majority of American families — 94.5 percent, the latest Federal Reserve survey data make clear — hold one sort of financial asset or another, from savings and checking accounts to stocks and cash-value life insurance policies. But the overall ownership of these financial assets has become stunningly concentrated. America’s richest 10 percent now hold nearly 85 percent of these assets. In 1989, the nation’s richest tenth of families held 79 percent of them.

Share of household wealth:

The Forbes 400 paints a disturbing picture:

 

[Rotagilla]

Ferraris cost more than Fiats.
There are valid reasons.

 

[David_42]

1. In 81 percent of American counties, the median income, about $52,000, is less than it was 15 years ago. This is despite the fact that the economy has grown 83 percent in the past quarter-century and corporate profits have doubled. American workers produce twice the amount of goods and services as 25 years ago, but get less of the pie.

2. The amount of money that was given out in bonuses on Wall Street last year is twice the amount all minimum-wage workers earned in the country combined.

3. The wealthiest 85 people on the planet have more money that the poorest 3.5 billion people combined.

4. The average wealth of an American adult is in the range of $250,000-$300,000. But that average number includes incomprehensibly wealthy people like Bill Gates. Imagine 10 people in a bar. When Bill Gates walks in, the average wealth in the bar increases unbelievably, but that number doesn’t make the other 10 people in the bar richer. The median per adult number is only about $39,000, placing the U.S. about 27th among the world’s nations, behind Australia, most of Europe and even small countries like New Zealand, Ireland and Kuwait.

5. Italians, Belgians and Japanese citizens are wealthier than Americans.

6. The poorest half of the Earth’s population owns 1% of the Earth’s wealth. The richest 1% of the Earth’s population owns 46% of the Earth’s wealth.

7. More locally, the poorest half of the US owns 2.5% of the country’s wealth. The top 1% owns 35% of it.

8. Inequality is a worldwide problem. In the UK, doctors no longer occupy a place in the top 1% of income earners, London plays host to the largest congregation of Russian millionaires outside of Moscow, and also houses more ultra-rich people (defined as owning more than $30 million in assets outside of their home) than anywhere else on Earth.

9. The slice of the national income pie going to the wealthiest 1% of Americans has doubled since 1979.



10. The 1% also takes home 20% of the income. This figure is the most since the 1920s era of laissez faire government (under Republicans Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover).

11. The super rich .01% of America, such as Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, take home a whopping 6% of the national income, earning around $23 million a year. Compare that to the average $30,000 a year earned by the bottom 90 percent of America.

12. The top 1% of America owns 50% of investment assets (stocks, bonds, mutual funds). The poorest half of America owns just .5% of the investments.

13. The poorest Americans do come out ahead in one statistic: the bottom 90% of America owns 73% of the debt.

14. Tax rates for the middle class have remained essentially unchanged since 1960. Tax rates on the highest earning Americans have plunged from an almost 70% tax rate in 1945 down to around 35% today. Corporate tax rates have dropped from 30 percent in the 1950s to under 10 percent today.

35 soul-crushing facts about American income inequality - Salon.com
It's crazy.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

1. In 81 percent of American counties, the median income, about $52,000, is less than it was 15 years ago. This is despite the fact that the economy has grown 83 percent in the past quarter-century and corporate profits have doubled. American workers produce twice the amount of goods and services as 25 years ago, but get less of the pie.

2. The amount of money that was given out in bonuses on Wall Street last year is twice the amount all minimum-wage workers earned in the country combined.

3. The wealthiest 85 people on the planet have more money that the poorest 3.5 billion people combined.

4. The average wealth of an American adult is in the range of $250,000-$300,000. But that average number includes incomprehensibly wealthy people like Bill Gates. Imagine 10 people in a bar. When Bill Gates walks in, the average wealth in the bar increases unbelievably, but that number doesn’t make the other 10 people in the bar richer. The median per adult number is only about $39,000, placing the U.S. about 27th among the world’s nations, behind Australia, most of Europe and even small countries like New Zealand, Ireland and Kuwait.

5. Italians, Belgians and Japanese citizens are wealthier than Americans.

6. The poorest half of the Earth’s population owns 1% of the Earth’s wealth. The richest 1% of the Earth’s population owns 46% of the Earth’s wealth.

7. More locally, the poorest half of the US owns 2.5% of the country’s wealth. The top 1% owns 35% of it.

8. Inequality is a worldwide problem. In the UK, doctors no longer occupy a place in the top 1% of income earners, London plays host to the largest congregation of Russian millionaires outside of Moscow, and also houses more ultra-rich people (defined as owning more than $30 million in assets outside of their home) than anywhere else on Earth.

9. The slice of the national income pie going to the wealthiest 1% of Americans has doubled since 1979.



10. The 1% also takes home 20% of the income. This figure is the most since the 1920s era of laissez faire government (under Republicans Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover).

11. The super rich .01% of America, such as Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, take home a whopping 6% of the national income, earning around $23 million a year. Compare that to the average $30,000 a year earned by the bottom 90 percent of America.

12. The top 1% of America owns 50% of investment assets (stocks, bonds, mutual funds). The poorest half of America owns just .5% of the investments.

13. The poorest Americans do come out ahead in one statistic: the bottom 90% of America owns 73% of the debt.

14. Tax rates for the middle class have remained essentially unchanged since 1960. Tax rates on the highest earning Americans have plunged from an almost 70% tax rate in 1945 down to around 35% today. Corporate tax rates have dropped from 30 percent in the 1950s to under 10 percent today.

35 soul-crushing facts about American income inequality - Salon.com
It's crazy.

So. What are YOU doing to increase your income?

 

[David_42]

1. In 81 percent of American counties, the median income, about $52,000, is less than it was 15 years ago. This is despite the fact that the economy has grown 83 percent in the past quarter-century and corporate profits have doubled. American workers produce twice the amount of goods and services as 25 years ago, but get less of the pie.

2. The amount of money that was given out in bonuses on Wall Street last year is twice the amount all minimum-wage workers earned in the country combined.

3. The wealthiest 85 people on the planet have more money that the poorest 3.5 billion people combined.

4. The average wealth of an American adult is in the range of $250,000-$300,000. But that average number includes incomprehensibly wealthy people like Bill Gates. Imagine 10 people in a bar. When Bill Gates walks in, the average wealth in the bar increases unbelievably, but that number doesn’t make the other 10 people in the bar richer. The median per adult number is only about $39,000, placing the U.S. about 27th among the world’s nations, behind Australia, most of Europe and even small countries like New Zealand, Ireland and Kuwait.

5. Italians, Belgians and Japanese citizens are wealthier than Americans.

6. The poorest half of the Earth’s population owns 1% of the Earth’s wealth. The richest 1% of the Earth’s population owns 46% of the Earth’s wealth.

7. More locally, the poorest half of the US owns 2.5% of the country’s wealth. The top 1% owns 35% of it.

8. Inequality is a worldwide problem. In the UK, doctors no longer occupy a place in the top 1% of income earners, London plays host to the largest congregation of Russian millionaires outside of Moscow, and also houses more ultra-rich people (defined as owning more than $30 million in assets outside of their home) than anywhere else on Earth.

9. The slice of the national income pie going to the wealthiest 1% of Americans has doubled since 1979.



10. The 1% also takes home 20% of the income. This figure is the most since the 1920s era of laissez faire government (under Republicans Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover).

11. The super rich .01% of America, such as Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, take home a whopping 6% of the national income, earning around $23 million a year. Compare that to the average $30,000 a year earned by the bottom 90 percent of America.

12. The top 1% of America owns 50% of investment assets (stocks, bonds, mutual funds). The poorest half of America owns just .5% of the investments.

13. The poorest Americans do come out ahead in one statistic: the bottom 90% of America owns 73% of the debt.

14. Tax rates for the middle class have remained essentially unchanged since 1960. Tax rates on the highest earning Americans have plunged from an almost 70% tax rate in 1945 down to around 35% today. Corporate tax rates have dropped from 30 percent in the 1950s to under 10 percent today.

35 soul-crushing facts about American income inequality - Salon.com
It's crazy.

So. What are YOU doing to increase your income?

This isn't a discussion about people's personal lives, it's about facts.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

 

[David_42]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

and wealth inequality, in the context of the entire country/world. Not our own personal incomes.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

and wealth inequality, in the context of the entire country/world. Not our own personal incomes.

Please stop whining. No one within this matter owes you or anyone else anything.

 

[David_42]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

and wealth inequality, in the context of the entire country/world. Not our own personal incomes.

Please stop whining. No one within this matter owes you or anyone else anything.

Never claimed that, simply pointing out facts about how bad wealth/income inequality has gotten since the 70's.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

and wealth inequality, in the context of the entire country/world. Not our own personal incomes.

Please stop whining. No one within this matter owes you or anyone else anything.

Never claimed that, simply pointing out facts about how bad wealth/income inequality has gotten since the 70's.

Facts as presented by whiners who expect to be handed the good life for free by their political masters.

Won't happen. Ever.

 

[David_42]

No, it's a discussion of "income inequality".

and wealth inequality, in the context of the entire country/world. Not our own personal incomes.

Please stop whining. No one within this matter owes you or anyone else anything.

Never claimed that, simply pointing out facts about how bad wealth/income inequality has gotten since the 70's.

Facts as presented by whiners who expect to be handed the good life for free by their political masters.

Won't happen. Ever.

Yes, keep throwing out irrelevant points that don't change the facts.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

What facts?

Please enumerate.

 

[David_42]

What facts?

Please enumerate.

The facts in the OP presented and sourced, in regards to declining incomes, etc, etc.. They're all posted.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

What facts?

Please enumerate.

The facts in the OP presented and sourced, in regards to declining incomes, etc, etc.. They're all posted.

Of course they are. And the dish ran away with the spoon.

 

[David_42]

What facts?

Please enumerate.

The facts in the OP presented and sourced, in regards to declining incomes, etc, etc.. They're all posted.

Of course they are. And the dish ran away with the spoon.

Saying they're not there and ignoring them does nothing for you buddy. Shows ignorance.

 

[Porker]

Everything to do with wealth and income inequality. I will post in this thread whenever something relevant to the two appears, or try to.

Let's begin:


The reality is that since the mid-1980s there has been an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the wealthiest people in this country.

Let's end:

The reality is that since the democrats, FDR, HST, JFK and particularly Lyndon Baines Johnson, have occupied the White House, the "poor" have multiplied many times over because it's much easier to just sit on their fat lazy asses and let the working public pay for their sorry existence. Not to mention sending America's jobs to Japan, China, Korea and every other 3rd world country.

example:

I’ll have those ni*gers voting Democratic for the next 200 years.” —Lyndon B. Johnson to two governors on Air Force One -

“These Negroes, they’re getting pretty uppity these days and that’s a problem for us since they’ve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppityness. Now we’ve got to do something about this, we’ve got to give them a little something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference.”—LBJ

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Everything to do with wealth and income inequality. I will post in this thread whenever something relevant to the two appears, or try to.

Let's begin:

America now has more wealth and income inequality than any major developed country on earth, and the gap between the very rich and everyone else is wider than at any time since the 1920s.

The reality is that since the mid-1980s there has been an enormous transfer of wealth from the middle class and the poor to the wealthiest people in this country.

There is something profoundly wrong when the top one-tenth of one percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent.

“Just as the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ sets a clear limit in order to safeguard the value of human life, today we also have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality. Such an economy kills. How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” – Pope Francis

There is something profoundly wrong when 58 percent of all new income since the Wall Street crash has gone to the top one percent.

Despite huge advancements in technology and productivity, millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages. The real median income of male workers is $783 less than it was 42 years ago; while the real median income of female workers is over $1,300 less than it was in 2007. That is unacceptable and that has got to change.


There is something profoundly wrong when we have a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires at the same time as millions of Americans workl onger hours for lower wages and we have the highest childhood poverty rate of any developed country on earth.

Racial Inequality:

Racial Inequality | Inequality.org

Everything Else:

The wealth share of America’s top 3 percent, Fed researchers calculate, rose from 44.8 percent of the nation’s wealth in 1989 to 51.8 percent in 2007 and 54.4 percent in 2013. The top 3 percent now hold over double the wealth of America’s poorest 90 percent of families.

The vast majority of American families — 94.5 percent, the latest Federal Reserve survey data make clear — hold one sort of financial asset or another, from savings and checking accounts to stocks and cash-value life insurance policies. But the overall ownership of these financial assets has become stunningly concentrated. America’s richest 10 percent now hold nearly 85 percent of these assets. In 1989, the nation’s richest tenth of families held 79 percent of them.

Share of household wealth:

The Forbes 400 paints a disturbing picture:

dear, we are not concerned about the issue of inequality but rather the causes if inequality which are listed below:

1) liberal war on family and schools
2) liberals taxes, unions, and deficits that drive our businesses off shore.
3) 30 million illegals that take our jobs and drive our wages down
4) liberal health care that costs 5 times what capitalist health care would cost.

Do you have the IQ to understand??

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - it's a sin how rich folks hoggin' too much o' the pie...

Wealth of top 1% 'equal to other 99%'
Mon, 18 Jan 2016 - The richest 1% now has as much wealth as the rest of the world combined, according to Oxfam.

It uses data from Credit Suisse from October for the report, which urges leaders meeting in Davos this week to take action on inequality. Oxfam also calculated that the richest 62 people in the world had as much wealth as the poorest half of the global population. It criticised the work of lobbyists and the amount of money kept in tax havens. Oxfam predicted that the 1% would overtake the rest of the world this time last year. It takes cash and assets worth $68,800 (£48,300) to get into the top 10%, and $760,000 (£533,000) to be in the 1%. That means that if you own an average house in London without a mortgage, you are probably in the 1%.

The figures carry various caveats, for example, information about the wealth of the super-rich is hard to come by, which Credit Suisse says means its estimates of the proportion of wealth held by the 10% and the 1% is "likely to err on the low side". As a global report, the figures also necessarily include some estimates of levels of wealth in countries from which accurate statistics are not available. Oxfam said that the 62 richest people having as much wealth as the poorest 50% of the population is a remarkable concentration of wealth, given that it would have taken 388 individuals to have the same wealth as the bottom 50% in 2010. "Instead of an economy that works for the prosperity of all, for future generations, and for the planet, we have instead created an economy for the 1%," Oxfam's report says.

The trend over the period that Credit Suisse has been carrying out this research has been that the proportion of wealth held by the top 1% fell gradually from 2000 to 2009 and has risen every year since then. In fact, it is only in the 2015 figures that the proportion held by the top 1% overtakes the share taken by them in the first report in 2000. Oxfam calls on governments to take action to reverse this trend. It wants workers paid a living wage and the gap with executive rewards to be narrowed. It calls for an end to the gender pay gap, compensation for unpaid care and the promotion of equal land and inheritance rights for women. And it wants governments to take action on lobbying, reducing the price of medicines, taxing wealth rather than consumption and using progressive public spending to tackle inequality.

Wealth of richest 1% 'equal to other 99%' - BBC News

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Granny says, "Dat's right - it's a sin how rich folks hoggin' too much o' the pie...

Wealth of top 1% 'equal to other 99%'
Mon, 18 Jan 2016 - The richest 1% now has as much wealth as the rest of the world combined, according to Oxfam.

It uses data from Credit Suisse from October for the report, which urges leaders meeting in Davos this week to take action on inequality. Oxfam also calculated that the richest 62 people in the world had as much wealth as the poorest half of the global population. It criticised the work of lobbyists and the amount of money kept in tax havens. Oxfam predicted that the 1% would overtake the rest of the world this time last year. It takes cash and assets worth $68,800 (£48,300) to get into the top 10%, and $760,000 (£533,000) to be in the 1%. That means that if you own an average house in London without a mortgage, you are probably in the 1%.

The figures carry various caveats, for example, information about the wealth of the super-rich is hard to come by, which Credit Suisse says means its estimates of the proportion of wealth held by the 10% and the 1% is "likely to err on the low side". As a global report, the figures also necessarily include some estimates of levels of wealth in countries from which accurate statistics are not available. Oxfam said that the 62 richest people having as much wealth as the poorest 50% of the population is a remarkable concentration of wealth, given that it would have taken 388 individuals to have the same wealth as the bottom 50% in 2010. "Instead of an economy that works for the prosperity of all, for future generations, and for the planet, we have instead created an economy for the 1%," Oxfam's report says.

The trend over the period that Credit Suisse has been carrying out this research has been that the proportion of wealth held by the top 1% fell gradually from 2000 to 2009 and has risen every year since then. In fact, it is only in the 2015 figures that the proportion held by the top 1% overtakes the share taken by them in the first report in 2000. Oxfam calls on governments to take action to reverse this trend. It wants workers paid a living wage and the gap with executive rewards to be narrowed. It calls for an end to the gender pay gap, compensation for unpaid care and the promotion of equal land and inheritance rights for women. And it wants governments to take action on lobbying, reducing the price of medicines, taxing wealth rather than consumption and using progressive public spending to tackle inequality.

Wealth of richest 1% 'equal to other 99%' - BBC News

the question is do would put Nazi liberals in govt to steal money, at the point of a gun, from the top 1% or do we simply stop buying from the top 1% so they won't have so much of our money?