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Income inequality in America has been growing rapidly, and is expected to increase [PDF]. While the widening wealth gap is a hot topic in the media and on the campaign trail, there's quite a disconnect between the perceptions of economists and those of the general public.
For instance, surveys show people tend to underestimate the income disparity between the top and bottom 20% of Americans, and overestimate the opportunity for poor individuals to climb the social ladder. Additionally, a majority of adults believe that corporations conduct business fairly despite evidence to the contrary and that the government should not act to reduce income inequality.
Even though inequality is increasing, Americans seem to believe that our social and economic systems work exactly as they should. This perspective has intrigued social scientists for decades. My colleague Andrei Cimpian and I have demonstrated in our recent research that these beliefs that our society is fair and just may take root in the first years of life, stemming from our fundamental desire to explain the world around us.
http://theconversation.com/lifes-not-fair-so-why-do-we-assume-it-is-45981
(Score: 2, Interesting) by purpleland on Friday September 11 2015, @01:34AM
Inequality for All [imdb.com] is an excellent primer explaining the gap.
It is mind boggling that the top 400 rich people in America has as much wealth as half the country (2013), and the sort of problems it entails. Gist of it is simple: the extremely rich spends/invests *considerably* less in proportion to their wealth compared to the middle class, and that expenditure is important to the health of the economy.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday September 11 2015, @10:23AM
I like the idea of a 1% tax per year, with a $10 million threshold. If you have less than ten million you can ignore it. If you have more you can pay it out of interest/investment earnings.
The catch is, it is 1% of total assets, not 1% of income.
Given that a one-time wealth tax of 14% would suposedly pay off the US national debt*, it would at least let you balance your budget and pay down some of the debt.
*well, according to Trump http://edition.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/11/09/trump.rich/index.html?_s=PM:ALLPOLITICS [cnn.com]
(ps. as an aside, this sort of thing is why I would not be at all surprised to find he is the next Prez)
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday September 11 2015, @10:26AM
Whoah !! Just noticed the date on that. I still like the idea, but by now the figures are probably massively wrong.
Does anybody know if Trump still supports that idea?
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.