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The median wage would go to a new level and prices of goods and services would rise accordingly.
or
The economy would crash around our feet, taking the rest of the world down with it until some other country's currency became the new standard.
or
The money eventually ends up back in the hands of people who understand investing and saving - which most Americans suck at.
It would depend on the intelligence of the American people how it could play out. Considering the 2016 contestants for the POTUS popularity contest were Trump and Hillary, my vote is for the second or third option. Americans, as a group, are becoming dumber and dumber.
Go ahead and do the math on their actual income. Let's use the CEO of WalMart as an extreme example.
CEO compensation total = $22.8 million.
Average Walmart salary for 2.2 million workers = $19,177.
Let's say 70% of that 2.2 million employee base make less than $50k. That's 1.54 million workers.
Now take half of the WalMart CEO's total compensation and spread that among the "poor" of just WalMart employees who make less than $50k annually:
$11,400,000/1,540,000 employees = $7.40 per employee ANNUALLY.
Broken down by the standard 2080 hour work year, that is a lofty 1/3rd of a cent per hour pay raise.
So what impact would it have on "the poor" to skin every millionaire and billionaire in America for half their "income?" Not much, assuming the WalMart case is an extreme example of salary ratio disparity.
Here's a mathematical fact about big numbers - if divided by other big numbers, the results are small numbers.
Example - seize half the combined wealth (not just income but every last penny they "own") of every billionaire in the country and spread it around to the people in America with less than the median household income. Forbes list the combined net worth of all America's billionaires at just under $3 trillion. And there are 127 million households in the US. Since we will distribute half to half, we can just use the whole numbers to calculate the ratio:
$3,000,000,000,000 / 127,000,000 = $23k per household under the median household income.
A nice chunk of change to most people, but not life changing by any means. Here's the thing - you can do that once. Not only is the next pool of money you rob going to be smaller because you already stole half of it, you also encouraged anyone dumb enough to amass a fortune to hide it, redirect it or get rid of it.
So when all those under-performing households get through their $23k windfall, then what? Oh, and understand that since a ton of these people's wealth is in the market, and your theft required a huge liquidation sale, the entire market will tank...hard, meaning the remaining wealth of "the rich" will end up being worth about 9-12 cents on the dollar next year when you need to give money to all those outstretched hands that now feel entitled to that same windfall every year.
Thanks for taking the time to do this. I was going to post that the end result would have a greater (negative) impact on the employees whose salaries would be reduced than it would on the employees getting someone else's money. Your post says it perfectly.
Here is an idea: Everyone who works for an organization who makes more than one million dollars in income, stock options, and bonuses would agree to give up one half of their income to the staff who make under $50K a year. What impact would that have?
This is not a discussion of the merits of fairness or inequity. This is not a discussion of the merits of a higher minimum wage or how much people should make. INSTEAD, it is a simple question of mathematics.
IF the rich in all kinds of organizations gave half of the money they made in all forms of compensation to the poor or lower middle class how much more money would the poor and lower-middle-class workers at their organization make? For example, if everyone who worked as executives at Walmart gave up half of their compensation and put it in a pot to distribute to the rank and files retail and clerical workers at that company, how much extra money would it be for the regular employees? Would it solve the problem?
Highly paid jocks and movie stars would also participate too! Your thoughts.
Why are you pretending we haven’t tried this in many countries across many geographical areas and cultures?
That ended up with millions people being slaughtered and tens of millions starved to death, mostly the poor.
Some lucky countries Venezuela and NK are still trying this godly idea; other countries like US are eager to join.
If all employed Millionaires and Billionaires gave up half of their income, what impact would that have on the poor?
The same result that doubling the income of the poor would have:
The poor would remain poor. Give each of them $100,000 and they would rapidly go right back to being poor. It's the damnedest thing I have ever seen. "Poor" cannot be fixed. "Broke", you can fix. But not "Poor".
Here is an idea: Everyone who works for an organization who makes more than one million dollars in income, stock options, and bonuses would agree to give up one half of their income to the staff who make under $50K a year. What impact would that have?
This is not a discussion of the merits of fairness or inequity. This is not a discussion of the merits of a higher minimum wage or how much people should make. INSTEAD, it is a simple question of mathematics.
IF the rich in all kinds of organizations gave half of the money they made in all forms of compensation to the poor or lower middle class how much more money would the poor and lower-middle-class workers at their organization make? For example, if everyone who worked as executives at Walmart gave up half of their compensation and put it in a pot to distribute to the rank and files retail and clerical workers at that company, how much extra money would it be for the regular employees? Would it solve the problem?
Highly paid jocks and movie stars would also participate too! Your thoughts.
Ask Mark Zuckerberg now after he gave $100 MILLION DOLLARS to Newark NJ and it all got vaporized.
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