Income Inequality Doesn’t Matter, Study Finds — Here’s What Does

Investor's Business Daily ^ | 3/25/2016 | John Merline

[IBD editorial writer]

For Democrats, few issues rank as high as “income inequality.” Reducing it is a priority of both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

But a new study finds that we are measuring inequality all wrong, and that as a result, imposing still more wealth-transfer laws probably won’t do anything to help.

[SMARTY]

I'm kind’a sick of it myself. At this point, if I go out to eat and the server has that crap on her/him, I just leave.

It's grotesque and I am really tired of it.

Before my mom passed, she spent time in the hospital and I was appalled at the nurses who were attending her. Most of them had themselves covered with that s&^% and of course, they made sure it was visible. You couldn't avoid seeing it. That's over and above the wrinkled, dirty uniforms and dirty sneakers they wore.

If I was going to hire anyone, I'd make it plain that they couldn't work for me looking like that.

[DungeonMaster]

If I was going to hire anyone, I'd make it plain that they couldn't work for me looking like that.

The work ethic is so bad out there that employees have given up on being picky. If people will show up and actually do some work that's almost a miracle.

[PapaBear3625]

By "both parties" I'm certain you mean the Democrats and Socialists, right? Conservatives & even Republicans have always espoused a very different vision.

Republican rank-and-file have espoused a very different vision.

Most of the Republican leadership (politicians, media, and the "donor class"), as well as Democrat leadership, are elitists who view the voters with contempt.

[SMARTY]

Right.

Young folks who put their ugly and disgusting tattoos in my face are sort of like: “I DARE you to say something”

As I said, I am REALLLLY tired of it... I did NOT like any of them touching my mother and I am sure she didn’t approve either.

[Perchant]

The Republicans’ main goal is to put citizen workers in head-to-head competition with third-world workers making pennies a day and poverty-stricken immigrants who are willing to work for pennies a day. What they “espouse” after that is irrelevant because the math is clear-cut.

[oh8eleven]

Income inequality cannot be solved by any government action
Sure it can. Just look at the great results (and trillions of dollars spent) of LBJ's Great Society scheme.
Oh wait ...

[aquila48]

“There is in fact a manly and legitimate passion for equality that spurs all men to wish to be strong and esteemed. This passion tends to elevate the lesser to the rank of the greater. But one also finds in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to want to bring the strong down to their level, and which reduces men to preferring equality in servitude to inequality in freedom.”

De Tocqueville

[alexander_busek]

At this point, if I go out to eat and the server has that crap on her/him, I just leave.

But what if all the kitchen personnel look like that?

Regards,

[Sir Napsalot]

It is of no interests to those who propose yet more wealth redistribution what has worked or not.

The question should have been asked is WHY ‘income equality’ holds such sway amongst huge swash of people in every generation.

[tbw2]

For the lower class, the deterioration of marriage also traps people.
If your biological parents are not married and thus demonstrating commitment reinforced by the state, the odds of bad life outcomes go up 2-3 times, from committing suicide to drug addiction to failing a grade to joining a gang to having a baby as a teenager.
These rates are similar whether the parents are living together at birth as if married, because when you’re married, 75% are there to age 18, but only living together has a 75% chance of leaving by age 18. (Most divorces don’t include children or only a single one.)
For blacks, the illegitimacy rate is 80%. For whites, it is 30%, but for poor whites, it is a majority.

And making the commitment of marriage causes a number of other changes in outlook. If only living together, even for 20 years, they are less likely to save for retirement or the kids’ college. If married, the odds that she has subsequent children by another man are reduced after divorce, which adds chaos to the children’s lives.

So the biggest reason for kids in the lower class today being stuck in the lower class like their parents is the breakdown of marriage and rise of living together.

[BroJoeK]

kearnyirish2: "Republicans too often have failed to address the open border..."

You may remember in 1986 President Reagan signed Simpson-Mazzoli which gave amnesty to about 3-million illegal immigrants in exchange for promises of better border controls.
It didn't happen, and instead 11 million new illegals flooded across our "open borders".
However, illegal immigration was not an issue in the presidential campaigns of 1988, 2000 or 2004, when Republicans won, or in any others when Democrats won.

kearnyirish2: "affirmative action"

Abolishing affirmative action was David Duke's issue in 1988.
It has never been a Republican issue, and is not something mentioned at any time by Donald Trump.

kearnyirish2: "Trump is doing well because many Republicans have finally realized this."

You may remember, in 1992 Trump the Elder (Ross Perot) won 18% of the vote and helped elect a Clinton president.
Yes, at the time people said Perot took as many votes from Democrats as Republicans, but even if that's true, they were surely the Reagan Democrats Perot took, and so cannot be counted as solid Dems.

Today we have Trump the Younger running on the old Perot "giant sucking sound" from NAFTA, and related issues like border control.
So, if Trump the Younger helps elect another Clinton president, I'd say the billionaires deserve whatever punishments she dishes out to them.

[BroJoeK]

PapaBear3625: "Most of the Republican leadership (politicians, media, and the "donor class"), as well as Democrat leadership, are elitists who view the voters with contempt."

It's certainly not fair to say that any politician views his or her own voters with contempt.
Especially newly elected officials are acutely aware of how their voters feel on many subjects.
Of course, over time, certainly that can change.
When voters become too loyal to any given personality, it frees the officials to put their own imaginations ahead of their electorate's best interests.

But in this particular election, so far, no single candidate has expressed the views of the majority of Republican voters.

[usconservative]

The lack of class mobility is the real problem, and that is caused by tampering with the free market and big government.

DING DING DING DING!!!!! WINNER!!!

[central_va]

But in this particular election, so far, no single candidate has expressed the views of the majority of Republican voters.

Ridiculous comment.

Currently neither party represents the blue collar or lower management white collar working Americans that make up the majority of the population. Neither party is courting that vote either because the gloBULList Cheap Labor Cabal that runs the uniparty hates the middle class. Their is simply no labor party. Think about it neither party represents labor. Astounding. IMO Trump comes closest to that. He is the majority candidate by far.

[central_va]

The best thing that could happen to the dying middle class would be to return to our protectionist roots that created the USA industrial might on the first place.

[BroJoeK]

Perchant: "The Republicans’ main goal is to put citizen workers in head-to-head competition with third-world workers making pennies a day and poverty-stricken immigrants who are willing to work for pennies a day."

Again, I'll refer back to Trump the Elder (Perot) in 1992, running against "that giant sucking sound" from NAFTA.
Perot got 18% of the vote that year, and helped elect a Clinton president.
That means (do the math) over 80% of the US electorate voted for candidates who supported NAFTA.
Why?

Well, for one thing, because 24 years ago there were still living many who remembered how Smoot-Hawley drove the Great Depression deeper and longer than it may otherwise have been.
They believed in 1992 that "free trade" was a necessary ingredient for long-term economic growth and prosperity.
Very few then (only 18%) considered that "free trade" would be inherently "unfair trade", with massive trade deficits going to countries which figured out how to effectively game our system.

But in 1992 Trump the Elder (Perot) went a little nuts in the end, dropping from a high of 39% in the polls in June to just 18% of votes on election day, in November.
So, if Trump the Younger this year does some of that same crazy-*ssed stuff, I think it'll be the end of billionaire politicians as we now know them.

1992 Trump the Elder, and 2016 Trump the Younger:

[central_va]

Well, for one thing, because 24 years ago there were still living many who remembered how Smoot-Hawley drove the Great Depression deeper and longer than it may otherwise have been. They believed in 1992 that "free trade" was a necessary ingredient for long-term economic growth and prosperity.

The Smoot-Hawley lie.

A vapid attempt at rewriting history. Look at contemporary accounts of the Great Depression an trade isn't even much of an after thought as to the cause of the depression. What a joke. Pathetic. Re writing history is what Communist and Free Traitors™ like you do.

You lie about the Civil War and about the Great Depression. Is their anything you get right?

My grandparents talked about the depression a lot . Trade never came up as a subject-ever. Buying stocks with borrowed money came up all the time.

[BroJoeK]

central_va: "Ridiculous comment."

I think your follow-up paragraph expressed pretty well what I intended to mean.
I would only reinforce the fact that no single candidate has yet expressed the views of a majority of Republican voters.
I say this because even though Trump has 53% of delegates elected so far, he has never scored above 50% of Republicans in national polls.
Today polls show Trump at 31% in Wisconsin, 33% in Pennsylvania, 38% in California and 41% nationally among Republicans.

So right now Trump seems our best bet, but it's far from a cake-walk.

[Perchant]

Have you paid attention to China for the last 20 years? They’ve been Smoot-Hawleying us to the hilt. China’s economic miracle can be described in two words: Smoot and Hawley. Why does it work for them so magnificently?

[BroJoeK]

central_va: "The Smoot-Hawley lie.
A vapid attempt at rewriting history.
Look at contemporary accounts of the Great Depression an trade isn't even much of an after thought as to the cause of the depression."

Now, now, get a grip on yourself, FRiend.
Remember your history.
The Great Depression began with a stock-market crash in October 1929.
In response, Smoot-Hawley was passed in June 1930, raising tariffs back near levels of the 1830 "Tariff of Abominations" -- which some blame for Civil War.
So, from 1929 to 1934, US imports fell $2.9 billion, while exports fell $3.3 billion, and US GDP fell 54%.
Overall world-trade fell 66% in those years, and US unemployment rose from 8% to 25%.

Is Smoot-Hawley to blame for all that?
Some say "yes", others say "no".
But here's what I know for certain: we were taught as children, and my parents believed, that Smoot-Hawley was largely responsible for making the Great Depression deeper and longer than it would otherwise have been.
That's the reason in 1992 they supported (82%) NAFTA, despite Trump the Elder's (Perot's) warnings of a "giant sucking sound" of US jobs going down the drain to Mexico.

So, now Trump the Younger promises to negotiate better deals for Americans, and bring jobs back.
Nobody should oppose that, and let's just hope Trump doesn't pull a Ross Perot on us.

Do you disagree?

central_va: "You lie about the Civil War and about the Great Depression.
Is their anything you get right? "

Of course I lie about nothing, zero, nada.
But obviously the truth hurts some people so badly they prefer more comfortable lies, and refuse to acknowledge what they so heartily dislike.

central_va: "My grandparents talked about the depression a lot .
Trade never came up as a subject-ever.
Buying stocks with borrowed money came up all the time."

Sure, for one reason, because FDR repealed Smoot-Hawley in 1934, after which the US economy began to recover, so trade was not an issue.
Today historians assign several causes for the length & depth of the Great Depression, with no single reason predominating.
I personally blame the Roosevelt administration's socialistic policies more than anything else, but still think Smoot-Hawley contributed something.