Welcome to City-Data.com Forum!
U.S. CitiesCity-Data Forum Index
Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Economics
 [Register]
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
View detailed profile (Advanced) or search
site with Google Custom Search

Search Forums  (Advanced)
Reply Start New Thread
 
Old 07-30-2010, 08:15 AM
 
Location: San Diego California
6,795 posts, read 7,256,838 times
Reputation: 5194

Advertisements

Quote:
Originally Posted by plaidmom View Post
This thread kind of died for the time being(which is sad IMO because it's an important topic), but the most interesting thing, to me anyhow, was the difference between the "concrete" thinkers and those who were able to see the bigger, more abstract, picture. Hmmmm.
There seems to be a certain element in CD who have an agenda to sidetrack any thread that is not in line with their philosophy. What really annoys me is the underhanded tactics being used. The most common being attacking the author instead of the argument. Others being cherry picking one piece of an argument, often out of context, and attacking it, while ignoring any valid points. There are also those who constantly steer the discussion off topic. It is a shame people try to stifle open debate of important issues as that debate is what is truly needed at this time in order for the public to fully understand the issues. These topics in particular, because there is a real and growing gap between rich and working class that is threatening the middle class as we know it. It is something we need to look at, discuss the implications, and if this is a positive or negative for our country as a whole.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message

 
Old 07-30-2010, 10:50 AM
 
Location: Sinking in the Great Salt Lake
13,139 posts, read 22,710,554 times
Reputation: 14115
Quote:
Originally Posted by jertheber View Post
There's always the obvious narrow view that humans somehow have evolved to this imbalance of wealth in a kind of natural way, it has served the status quo for a long time. Truth is that we as a species have a much longer history as a sharing animal than what we are today in the industrial paradigm. Some of our best thinkers have characterized the last five thousand years as a social experiment gone wrong, Im inclined to agree.
This is a good point... the whole idea could be as invalid as eugenics, and merely be a tool to enforce the status quo over the centuries....
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-30-2010, 05:23 PM
 
77,713 posts, read 59,858,282 times
Reputation: 49107
Quote:
Originally Posted by RedNC View Post
Before Reagan cut taxes for the rich the US was balanced that's why it worked for 50 years. Now that Reagan and Bush tax cuts have had a chance to remind us of why the great depression happened. e.g. Top 1% have all the money again. We are just repeating the past mistakes.
Reagan also started demonizing the unions this triggered the down waging of the middle class. When that wasn't happening fast enough big business began moving jobs offshore.

Here is a good video telling how it all happened and why we need to stop it.


YouTube - Fall of the Republic HQ full length version
That's some strong kool-aid.

Clinton pounded the unions with Nafta. *crickets*
LMAO "demonizing unions" oh please and the democrats voted in favor of most of Bush's actions so thanks for nothing.

Turning a blind eye to the ones that helped cause all of the harm for political reasons is just slapping the shackles on your wrists while whistling and smiling. There is very little difference between the two political parties.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2010, 01:20 AM
hsw
 
2,144 posts, read 7,134,059 times
Reputation: 1540
Define middle income

Examine upward mobility in US vs Germany or Japan or Chindia

Know lots of wealthy 30-something engineers and financiers...nearly all are guys who grew up in middle-income US suburbia (and some are originally from poor rural India, yet figured out how to enter StanfordEngineering for grad school)....often guys whose parents or grandparents were legal immigrants to US: India-born engineers or Jewish entrepreneurs or academics....or just random white dudes from Midwest or TX

Take some personal responsibility....no employer wants to be forced to hire someone b/c of their skin color or national origin or union membership...most profitable, most valuable employers tend to need employees who can maximize profits (and who in turn often demand maximal pay and equity comp and will leave to highest bidder if treated poorly)

No talented, ambitious kid wants to be forced to live/work in commie, unionized, innovation-free states like MI, OH, NJ, MA, etc and wants to be free to migrate wherever best economic opportunities exist

Any smart consumer wants freedom to buy stuff that offers best value...be it German-made Mercedes...or CA-engineered yet China-made Apple stuff, or fresh organic produce from a local family farm, etc etc

Economic freedom, upward mobility, class warfare/jealousy and xenophobia don't co-exist well; communism and welfare states like EU or MI, etc play better amongst those who are lazy/inept/non-competitive and hope everyone else is as well...or can be guilted into paying for welfare/parasitic existence of others and junk "products" like US/Italian/French/Japanese cars or Chinese food/drywall/other junk
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2010, 06:41 PM
 
5,019 posts, read 14,074,922 times
Reputation: 7090
Quote:
Originally Posted by hsw View Post
Define middle income

Examine upward mobility in US vs Germany or Japan or Chindia

Know lots of wealthy 30-something engineers and financiers...
Let's play "define wealthy" instead!

Too often on these nice philosophical threads on CD some one will come along a claim some sort of "hatred of (or envy of) the rich".

Then, this poster will often claim to be rich, or to know "rich people".

They give examples of people who immigrate or pull them selves up through either education or sheer wile and now run successful businesses. They now work hard and earn a decent income. Good for them! That's the way the American Dream is supposed to work.

"Rich" to me, doesn't mean you earn 80K per year. It doesn't mean you earn 800K per year, by working a job or running a business at least.

"Wealthy" means, as I think we are supposedly debating in this thread, that ONE doesn't NEED to work at all even though one may choose to do so.

It means most of the wealth is generated by residual income. A big chunk of it may be inherited. Some of it may even be government supported (tax abatements, agriculture subsidies etc ets etc, the dreaded "welfare for the rich"). Much of it may be offshored.

I don't know if the OP wants to step in here or not, but to me, you are not "wealthy" in the way we are debating on this thread unless you can step up and pay cash for, let's say, this property:

929 Border Ave, Del Mar, CA, 92014 - MLS #071064797 - Single Family Home real estate - REALTOR.com®

(Chosen only because I was surfing my old stomping grounds )


If someone else wants to come up with a better barometer, I am all ears.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2010, 06:57 PM
 
Location: Portland, Oregon
7,084 posts, read 12,013,186 times
Reputation: 4125
It is the natural way of things when one is wealthy. There is never a problem in how the pile ends up with those on top.

However having a largely educated, decently fed/housed, and creative workforce has led to the last century of progress being far in excess of what anyone would have ever thought possible.

We can go back to plodding along as serfs on some ones land if you want, there are countries that still do that in the world. They aren't major players in world politics now though.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2010, 07:24 PM
 
5,764 posts, read 11,593,649 times
Reputation: 3864
Quote:
Examine upward mobility in US vs Germany or Japan or Chindia
Well that's actually an important and interesting issue. What you're talking about is usually measured as "quintile mobility" - the likelihood that you will rise or fall between the five income quintiles marking out the 20th, 40th, 60th, and 80th income percentiles.

Quintile mobility has been declining in America since around the late 1970's. There are a lot of different possible explanations for why this has happened, but income quintiles and classes do seem to be calcifying gradually over time in America. If you are born into the bottom quintile, you will probably die in the bottom quintile, with a decreasing probability of dying in the succeeding quintiles (so, you are more likely to die in the second-to-last quintile than the third-to-last quintile, and least-likely of all to die in the top quintile).

Similarly, if you are born into the top quintile, you have a better shot than people in other quintiles of also dying in the top quintile.

Regardless of why this is the increasingly becoming the case, it certainly will bring along various social effects, many of which are undesirable. For social purposes, it's probably best to maintain the idea that "anyone can make it," but as that notion diverges from reality, a lot of Americans won't be terribly happy about it.

Quote:
Know lots of wealthy 30-something engineers and financiers
By which you mean people who are probably in the top quintile, decile, or even higher in terms of intelligence quotient. Which is great for them, but you can't possibly yell at a well-meaning average guy with a 95 IQ for not going into finance. Remember, only 1 out of 100 people get to be in the top percentile of intelligence. There are lots of folks who - bless their hearts - couldn't possibly learn the math necessary to go into engineering, regardless of how "hard" they work.

That's the crux of the issue - America used to create large numbers of decent-paying, benefits-bearing jobs for people who were willing to work, but who may not have had a great deal of facility for what used to be called "book-learnin'."

I'm not sure what the solution will be, but you can't just yell at people for not being able to pass the Fundamentals of Engineering exam, as though this were some sort of moral failing or a failure of will. You might as well yell at them for not being able to run fast enough to make millions as a running back in the NFL. It'll do the same amount of good and make the same amount of sense.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 07-31-2010, 11:59 PM
 
Location: Marietta, GA
7,887 posts, read 17,120,503 times
Reputation: 3701
Newsflash....we're not all equal. Some people are more intelligent; some people are more ambitious; some people take more risk; some people are more highly educated; some people make better choices; some people work harder; some people have better connections; some people sacrifice family and other things for success.

Like a funnel or a pyramid, those willing to put in the work and sacrifice, and to take the risk to be "rich" will always be fewer than the vast majority of people who make up the wider part of the pyramid.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-01-2010, 01:52 PM
 
1,960 posts, read 4,641,917 times
Reputation: 5416
Quote:
Originally Posted by neil0311 View Post
Newsflash....we're not all equal. Some people are more intelligent; some people are more ambitious; some people take more risk; some people are more highly educated; some people make better choices; some people work harder; some people have better connections; some people sacrifice family and other things for success.

Like a funnel or a pyramid, those willing to put in the work and sacrifice, and to take the risk to be "rich" will always be fewer than the vast majority of people who make up the wider part of the pyramid.
Once again, you're morally adjudicating the very inequality you are pointing out to be a mere happenstance of life. Inequity can't be a happenstance of life AND a moral character flaw on the part of the losers at the same time. You can't have the cake and eat it too. You're simply advocating for the moral absolution of the "aggressives" in capitalizing over the dispossessed and then subjecting the losers to the moral condemnation that their lot in life is righteous not because of happenstance but because they "didn't work hard enough". Enough already. You're anti-egalitarian, noted. I won't weep when the disparity in income and opportunity becomes so great in this country that it turns into present day Colombia. Watch the movie "Man on Fire" (2004 rendition, though the 1987 rendition does have its parallels) for the logical mathematical limit to your advocacy of "it is what it is" will bring to your own cul-de-sac. Man is not an island. You have to feed your neighbor, or he becomes your enemy. A law of words written on a piece of paper won't save your life.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
 
Old 08-01-2010, 02:10 PM
 
2,414 posts, read 5,380,162 times
Reputation: 654
Quote:
Originally Posted by tablemtn View Post
Well that's actually an important and interesting issue. What you're talking about is usually measured as "quintile mobility" - the likelihood that you will rise or fall between the five income quintiles marking out the 20th, 40th, 60th, and 80th income percentiles.

Quintile mobility has been declining in America since around the late 1970's. There are a lot of different possible explanations for why this has happened, but income quintiles and classes do seem to be calcifying gradually over time in America. If you are born into the bottom quintile, you will probably die in the bottom quintile, with a decreasing probability of dying in the succeeding quintiles (so, you are more likely to die in the second-to-last quintile than the third-to-last quintile, and least-likely of all to die in the top quintile).

Similarly, if you are born into the top quintile, you have a better shot than people in other quintiles of also dying in the top quintile.

Regardless of why this is the increasingly becoming the case, it certainly will bring along various social effects, many of which are undesirable. For social purposes, it's probably best to maintain the idea that "anyone can make it," but as that notion diverges from reality, a lot of Americans won't be terribly happy about it.



By which you mean people who are probably in the top quintile, decile, or even higher in terms of intelligence quotient. Which is great for them, but you can't possibly yell at a well-meaning average guy with a 95 IQ for not going into finance. Remember, only 1 out of 100 people get to be in the top percentile of intelligence. There are lots of folks who - bless their hearts - couldn't possibly learn the math necessary to go into engineering, regardless of how "hard" they work.

That's the crux of the issue - America used to create large numbers of decent-paying, benefits-bearing jobs for people who were willing to work, but who may not have had a great deal of facility for what used to be called "book-learnin'."

I'm not sure what the solution will be, but you can't just yell at people for not being able to pass the Fundamentals of Engineering exam, as though this were some sort of moral failing or a failure of will. You might as well yell at them for not being able to run fast enough to make millions as a running back in the NFL. It'll do the same amount of good and make the same amount of sense.
I didn't know you needed to be in the top percentile to be an engineer.
Reply With Quote Quick reply to this message
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.

Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.


Reply
Please update this thread with any new information or opinions. This open thread is still read by thousands of people, so we encourage all additional points of view.

Quick Reply
Message:


Over $104,000 in prizes was already given out to active posters on our forum and additional giveaways are planned!

Go Back   City-Data Forum > General Forums > Economics

All times are GMT -6.

© 2005-2024, Advameg, Inc. · Please obey Forum Rules · Terms of Use and Privacy Policy · Bug Bounty

City-Data.com - Contact Us - Archive 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 - Top