Zone1 What is Wrong with Inequality?

[Man With A Plan]

In the conflict that must exist between emoyer versus employee, I felt a surge of pride. It is that simple. I owed my current e.pliyer el zilch. Not even respect.

You think there is "conflict" between employers and employees? Now I'm SURE that your ex-employers were thrilled when you quit without notice! You're the type of employee that causes conflict.

 

[Man With A Plan]

Taxpayers teach that worker to read, do math, computer skills…..all that help the employer

Corporate America needs to be one of those taxpayers

Again...I hate to break this to you, Winger but far too many young people are joining the workforce who haven't been taught to read or do math by our schools! The inability of graduates to perform at a basic level is an indictment of the education system in this country that spends more money per student than any other industrialized nation yet doesn't teach!

 

[Admiral Rockwell Tory]

Again...I hate to break this to you, Winger but far too many young people are joining the workforce who haven't been taught to read or do math by our schools! The inability of graduates to perform at a basic level is an indictment of the education system in this country that spends more money per student than any other industrialized nation yet doesn't teach!

Oh, they are taught. They simply have no desire to either learn or retain that knowledge. You cannot make chicken salad out of chicken shit!

 

[Man With A Plan]

Oh, they are taught. They simply have no desire to either learn or retain that knowledge. You cannot make chicken salad out of chicken shit!

These are the same kids that Winger expects businesses to pay a $20 an hour minimum wage...when they can't do basic math and read at a 6th grade level!

 

[AZrailwhale]

Cute
More blame the victim

The reality is that we slash taxes on the wealthy while our poor live in tents on the fringe of society.

We can do better

The poor live in tents because people like you voted in intrusive government that mandated all sorts of expensive things that raise the cost of building housing, and invite millions of illegal aliens who raise the price of housing due to scarcity.

 

[AZrailwhale]

Americans are finding out what is wrong with inequality.

China is proving that capitalism that strives for equality, is more successful and productive.

While America, shall we say, is fking around with the lives of the working class.

Fking Demofk socialists and commies are not going to slow down the move to a fascist government, It's too late for that now.

You’re kidding right? China doesn’t practice capitalism, it practices state sponsored oligarchy. The CCP picks the favored members of it’s hierarchy and the military who operate the large businesses. The rich get richer and more powerful and the middle class lives in concrete high rise condos that are disintegrating before the mortgages are paid. The poor are free to starve in poverty. The more China changes, the more it stays the same,

 

[AZrailwhale]

Inequality exists and existed in every society. Things are not equal in nature or life. Quite the opposite. No hand of government can make it equal.

Inequality is not the harbinger of doom. Trying to right it in the name of egalitarianism is.

I disagree, the government can force equality, but it is the equality of misery. Government can’t lift anyone up, but it can push everyone down. Look at the USSR, Venezuela and Cuba for examples.

 

[AZrailwhale]

Yes it has
But it has gotten more extreme

Used to be between the rich and poor
Now it is between the rich and the working class

Standard of living has declined

Declined from when?

 

[Lisa558]

Yes, corporations are capable of paying taxes on the benefits they gain from society.

We cut their taxes 40 percent and they didn’t raise salaries or cut prices. They just kept the money

The free market will decide what you can get for your goods or services

1) They became more valuable companies, which benefits the middle-class retiree (or those working and saving toward retirement) by increasing their portfolio.

2) They DID increase wages. For the first time in decades, the REAL wages of lower earners increased.

 

[Lisa558]

Cute
More blame the victim

The reality is that we slash taxes on the wealthy while our poor live in tents on the fringe of society.

We can do better

The poor I know live in air-conditioned apartments via subsidies, get $1000 a month tax-free in food stamps, get TANF money (also tax-free), have big-screen TVs and iPhones - and they don’t even have to work a job at all.

In fact, when I was first starting out after college, the poor on welfare lived as well or even better than I did.

Let’s stop the imaginary poor living in tents scene, shall we?

 

[forkup]

Speaking of personal wealth as measured in economic Net Worth, there is absolutely no question that "inequality" is increasing beyond any precedent in a free country. The people at the bottom, so to speak, have less than nothing; their Net Worth is below zero, while the wealthiest of us - mainly entrepreneurs and investors - accumulate more and more wealth.

It is axiomatic on the Left that "inequality" is bad. They obviously feel that increasing "inequality" is self-evidently evil, and must be fought. They base whole political campaigns on promises to fight inequality.

What's wrong with inequality? Imagine an entrepreneur who invents a new gadget that millions of people quickly decide that they are willing to pay substantial amounts of money to have, and that entrepreneur is able to accumulate a King's Ransom on the profits from those gadgets.

So what? Why is that a bad thing? Is anyone else made poorer or more wretched by the entrepreneur's accumulation of wealth? Assume he pays millions and millions in all manner of taxes, complying with every relevant tax law.

Depends on what you mean by inequality. I'm European. Belgian to be exact. And we do have inequality. A doctor or a CEO of a company makes much more than somebody working a cash register. In other words there's an incentive to try to do well in live. If you want to afford that 2nd house in Toscana. You can even be a billionaire. The difference lies in to what level you are allowed to sink by society. Here some things are considered basic rights. Housing, food, education for your children, healthcare are more or less guaranteed.

Capitalism as exists in the US, ( a comparison I'm able to make since my wife is American) is more of the variety of every man for himself. This creates conditions that are unheard of here. I have a good life work balance In total guaranteeing at least 30 paid days of per year not counting overtime. Americans are totally dependant on their employers willingness to be off.

There's no concept of sick days either. You sick you stay home. I have healthcare that I can afford and that's guaranteed. My daughter will be able to go to college without taking out loans. Etc.,etc.

In short people, a few exceptions notwithstanding, mostly in the big cities and being illegals or people whose life fell apart to such an extent that they don't want or can't be in the system. Will have a certain base standard of living.

When I visited my wife's family both in NY and Florida. I was appalled by the struggles of them although they are by no means poor. And even more shocked by the abject poverty I saw in general. A poverty that is much much more rare here.

And before you or anybody else says it. Yes my tax rate is much higher here. On the other hand so is my standard of living IMO. I'm not expected to work from the cradle to the grave here, I can be sick without fearing for my job, my child can have a decent education without indebting herself. And I can do all this and still afford a house, two cars, at least one vacation a year, and peace of mind. Precisely because here, inequality is accepted but also has limitations put on it.

 

[rightwinger]

The poor I know live in air-conditioned apartments via subsidies, get $1000 a month tax-free in food stamps, get TANF money (also tax-free), have big-screen TVs and iPhones - and they don’t even have to work a job at all.

In fact, when I was first starting out after college, the poor on welfare lived as well or even better than I did.

Let’s stop the imaginary poor living in tents scene, shall we?

You left out the Caviar and lobster they order take out

Time to leave the 1960s
Air Conditioning, big screen TVs and IPhones are no longer luxuries

More conservatives ignoring low wages from corporations and blaming the poor

 

[OODA_Loop]

Depends on what you mean by inequality. I'm European. Belgian to be exact. And we do have inequality.

What percentage of your utopian society is able but refuses to work relying instead on Belgian tax dollars to live?

 

[rightwinger]

Depends on what you mean by inequality. I'm European. Belgian to be exact. And we do have inequality. A doctor or a CEO of a company makes much more than somebody working a cash register. In other words there's an incentive to try to do well in live. If you want to afford that 2nd house in Toscana. You can even be a billionaire. The difference lies in to what level you are allowed to sink by society. Here some things are considered basic rights. Housing, food, education for your children, healthcare are more or less guaranteed.

Capitalism as exists in the US, ( a comparison I'm able to make since my wife is American) is more of the variety of every man for himself. This creates conditions that are unheard of here. I have a good life work balance In total guaranteeing at least 30 paid days of per year not counting overtime. Americans are totally dependant on their employers willingness to be off.

There's no concept of sick days either. You sick you stay home. I have healthcare that I can afford and that's guaranteed. My daughter will be able to go to college without taking out loans. Etc.,etc.

In short people, a few exceptions notwithstanding, mostly in the big cities and being illegals or people whose life fell apart to such an extent that they don't want or can't be in the system. Will have a certain base standard of living.

When I visited my wife's family both in NY and Florida. I was appalled by the struggles of them although they are by no means poor. And even more shocked by the abject poverty I saw in general. A poverty that is much much more rare here.

And before you or anybody else says it. Yes my tax rate is much higher here. On the other hand so is my standard of living IMO. I'm not expected to work from the cradle to the grave here, I can be sick without fearing for my job, my child can have a decent education without indebting herself. And I can do all this and still afford a house, two cars, at least one vacation a year, and peace of mind. Precisely because here, inequality is accepted but also has limitations put on it.

America has become indifferent to its working class.
We stand up for corporations and the wealthy while working Americans assume more of the economic burden.
Healthcare is an economic burden, so is a college education. Two weeks vacation is still the norm with sick days taken away. Maternity leave is not available.
Houses are being priced out of the means of many working Americans

 

[frigidweirdo]

The poor live in tents because people like you voted in intrusive government that mandated all sorts of expensive things that raise the cost of building housing, and invite millions of illegal aliens who raise the price of housing due to scarcity.

House prices are often more expensive because of THE LAND.

House prices have gone up because of various factors that have nothing to do with how much it cost to build.

 

[martybegan]

False alternative

Not at all. How much money is wasted on redundant or inefficient government?

 

[rightwinger]

They probably employed more people or invested in their own companies which is something you wouldn't know, now would you?

You guys keep trying to sell that lie

Cut taxes on corporations and it will result in more jobs, higher pay, lower prices

Time after time, the reality is that they make no effort to share the wealth. They pass it out as dividends or buy back stock.

 

[forkup]

What percentage of your utopian society is able but refuses to work relying instead on Belgian tax dollars to live?

Some portion of people certainly take advantage of the system — I’m not denying that, and I wouldn’t claim this is a utopia.

But the fact that you dismiss my description of life here as a “utopia” says a lot about your perspective. It tells me that your experience with your experience is far from utopian.

Here’s my question: Even if some people live off the system, how is it preferable to have no system that benefits everyone? Do you generally reject access to important services simply because some might abuse them?

When viewed as a whole, the standard of living here is undeniably better.

 

[Correll]

Look. I am wealthy but certainly no billionaire. I am in the top 0.5% of earners. I worry zero percent about going broke from taxes. I worry much more about the working class getting pissed about the inequity in this nation and eventually deciding that if the government wont fix it the mob will.

The current imbalance is unsustainable. Karl Marx was right about the inevitability of captialism’s downfall. He was not correct about the fix. It isn’t communism. The answer is regulating capitalism so that enough money gets down to the masses or it falls apart. IMHO.

MAGA is all about helping the working class.

More balanced trade, less third world immigration, legal and illegal, all help the AMERICAN working class.


It is EMPLOYERS that want to outsource and to have cheap third world labor.

 

[Correll]

It depends on how you define a 'healthy' society. If you think ancient Rome is an example of a healthy society, we'll have to disagree. The vast majority of the wealth was held by the elite families, the nobility, from which the rulers were chosen. The vast majority of the people were poor serfs or slaves with very little to their names. There were different laws for the nobility and little sympathy for the poor. How many geniuses never got to go to school and show their genius. Not the world I want to live in.

The left's desire to demonize the rich and paint America as a bad place full of bad people, is worse.