

Why it's hard to share the wealth - landist
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn7107

======
smanek
"It is well known that wealth is shared out unfairly"

We know no such thing. We know that wealth is distributed unequally (see, for
example, the Gini coefficient). Whether or not an unequal distribution of
wealth is unfair is a decidedly normative question - and beyond the purview of
economists.

One of the many problems that I see is they assume that various attributes are
_independently_ normally distributed - which many studies have shown not to be
the case. An individual's performance in a wide variety of seemingly unrelated
disciplines tends to be highly correlated
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_intelligence_factor>). Simply put, a
person who is a great at one thing is also more likely to be good at other
things.

Furthermore, there is no reason to expect the output elasticity of intellect
to be anywhere near 1. Someone who is just the tiniest bit smarter than me may
see a shortcut that they I don't that saves them a tremendous quantity of
resources.

Study after study has shown that 'overpaid' people (sports stars, actors, etc)
get paid a wage that is almost exactly equal to the marginal revenue they
bring in - that is they are paid perfectly appropriately.

~~~
gamerates
Well of course "fair" is a normative question, but it is one that there are
usually some common themes about.

For example the "equal opportunity" American ideal doesn't match up if the
greatest predictor of your economic success is not your intellect, hard work,
creativity, etc. but rather the income of the family you were rather
arbitrarily born into.

For example: [http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/market-
movers/2009/04/2...](http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/market-
movers/2009/04/21/nature-nurture-trust-funds?tid=true)

"The truly amazing thing to me is that parental income isn't just crucial in
getting to college, and getting through college -- its effects linger on,
basically, in perpetuity. One of the most remarkable findings from the Pew
Charitable Trusts' Economic Mobility Project is that a child from a family in
the top income quintile who does not get a college degree is more likely to
wind up in the top income quintile himself than a child from a family in the
bottom income quintile who does get a college degree"

A large part of this is due to public policy and there are clear examples of
many European countries where changing public policy produces less arbitrary
income inequalities. As the developed world transforms into a more knowledge
based economy which requires large long-term investments in yourself to really
compete, income inequality will only grow between those that can make the
investments and those that can't.

I'd also be careful to consider how the market pays people as necessarily
being "fair" until you look at after-tax income and the institutions that help
determine that price. There are many different ways to setup a distribution of
resources in a society and there are many different ways to setup markets
(property rights, laws, public services, regulation, taxes etc.). As such we
should consider the fairness of our human created rules and institutions; the
particular results they create are just indicators. Of course whatever people
are paid is "appropriate" as long as it follows the system of rules we have
setup.

The "appropriate" results would be very different if we changed how the system
was setup.

~~~
Empact
Your quote claims the effects of the parents' income persist, but in doing so
it claims correlation is causation and neglects to consider other familial
effects, such as genetics and upbringing.

An alternative explanation is that wealth doesn't beget wealth, but rather
those with the characteristics which lead to the acquisition of wealth also
beget offspring with the same properties. This isn't necessarily unjust, as
Yglesias states, but rather an artifact of the reality of genetics, upbringing
and their effects on productivity. If so, to achieve the "equal opportunity"
you seek, you must wipe away these differences in both genetics and
upbringing, in which case, just call me Harrison Bergeron.

~~~
gamerates
For some Harrison Bergeron, for others John Rawls Theory of Justice. Sort of
dystopian/utopian sides of a similar coin. A strong public education system is
suppose to minimize the differences in upbringing (by helping those without a
strong upbringing; not by bringing down those who already have a great
upbringing Harrison Bergeron style).

You wouldn't have to wipe away the differences, but for some a "just" society
should view someone who had poor parents, limited opportunities and an IQ of
70 and someone who had every opportunity, great parents, and an IQ of 130 as
equally important and valuable. Such people view a society where the top 2% of
the world owns over half the wealth and much of the world lives in absolute
poverty as a sign that maybe our institutions are a bit out of wack.

Personally I'm more a fan of smaller "nudge" (nudge.org) like concepts
combined with a progressive tax code and a strong commitment to helping
minimize "brute luck" (being born to poor parents) while holding people fully
accountable for personal decisions or "option luck" (choosing to take a risk,
or making a life decision such as being a teacher vs. an i-banker; or going
out at bars instead of saving). (Sort of in a Dworkin fashion see:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Dworkin#Theory_of_equali...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Dworkin#Theory_of_equality)
/ or <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luck_egalitarianism>).

~~~
anamax
> concepts combined with a progressive tax code

About half of US workers don't pay income tax. They pay for part of their
retirement (SS for them is a modest deal, because their ROI is subsidized by
folks who pay more).

Our vice president said that paying taxes is patriotic. Shouldn't they be
patriotic?

------
GavinB
So most people in the top 3% have rational, planned investment and management
strategies, and most people in the remaining 97% bounce around in a seemingly
random fashion based on their talents and interests.

That sounds about right. It's not surprising, if that's the case, that the
distance between the top few % and everyone else is increasing so much.

Most people _aren't really trying to get rich._

~~~
tlb
In fact, 3% may be about the number of people who put most of their effort
into making a lot of money rather than, say, doing work they enjoy or having a
life.

The bulge around the average is because you need at least an average income to
have a regular life, raise kids, etc. Many people work just hard enough to
have an average standard of living.

------
anamax
In what sense are the poor poor? (Louis XIV didn't have a single TV. Poor
people in the US typically have two.) Income seems to be a fairly bad way to
measure poverty.

Note that income is an especially bad measure if they didn't account for non-
taxable sources of stuff, as is typically the case in such studies. Since
those sources provide a huge fraction of the "support" for poor people,
failing to account for it makes the results highly suspect. Moreover, since it
is well known that non-taxable sources are significant, failing to account for
them ....

~~~
AlisdairO
I'd imagine that the poor are poor relative to the rich. Individual's
happiness with their economic position tends to be based to a significant
extent on what they are earning relative to other people.

~~~
anamax
Some people feel ugly compared to others. Should we do something about that
too?

~~~
AlisdairO
The disparity between rich and poor is something that society actively decides
upon, and society would be well advised to take into account the ramifications
of its decision. Part of that information being that the _absolute_ value of
an individual's wealth is far from the only important factor - relative values
are important to. Humans judge their wealth relative to other people.

To look at it in a nice, emotive context, which society do you suppose is
happier: the one where the cure for all cancers exists, but is so labour
intensive that only the rich can afford it, or the society where the cure does
not exist at all, and all are in the same boat? I'd caution you not to
underestimate the pain of knowing that your loved one could be saved, if only
you had a bit more money.

Whether someone is ugly or not is not really something that society makes an
active choice about at the moment - I'm not sure it's relevant.

NB: No, I am not a commie, and I am in full favour of some income disparity as
a motivator towards useful output. I just find the assertion that it doesn't
matter if the rich have an ever-increasing share of the pie as long as the pie
keeps growing a touch disingenuous.

edit: formatting

~~~
anamax
> To look at it in a nice, emotive context, which society do you suppose is
> happier: the one where the cure for all cancers exists, but is so labour
> intensive that only the rich can afford it, or the society where the cure
> does not exist at all, and all are in the same boat? I'd caution you not to
> underestimate the pain of knowing that your loved one could be saved, if
> only you had a bit more money.

Spare me the sanctimony.

Now lets look at it in a realistic context. The society where rich people can
afford something today is a society where poor people said something tomorrow.

You're arguing that folks should die "forever" in order to spare the feelings
of people who died "unnecessarily" during a "while". Do you really believe
that people saved later are worth so little?

> I just find the assertion that it doesn't matter if the rich have an ever-
> increasing share of the pie as long as the pie keeps growing a touch
> disingenuous.

Oh really? You find what I say to be "lacking in frankness, candor, or
sincerity; falsely or hypocritically ingenuous; insincere"? On what basis?

It's not that the pie keeps growing. It's that the amount of pie that the poor
get keeps growing.

~~~
AlisdairO
> Now lets look at it in a realistic context. The society where rich people
> can afford something today is a society where poor people said something
> tomorrow.

And where there will be another thing (of some critical importance) that the
poor cannot afford tomorrow that the rich can.

> You're arguing that folks should die "forever" in order to spare the
> feelings of people who died "unnecessarily" during a "while". Do you really
> believe that people saved later are worth so little?

No, I'm arguing that a society where progress is slightly slower (i.e the pie
grows more slowly), but has lesser income disparity will probably be happier
than one with massive income disparity and faster overall progress. I'm not
saying it's 'right' or 'wrong', but I am saying that this is a fact. Happier
societies generally have lower income disparities than those displayed in the
US, and really, what else do you need to justify it?

> Oh really? You find what I say to be "lacking in frankness, candor, or
> sincerity; falsely or hypocritically ingenuous; insincere"? On what basis?

Because I think when people say it that their motivation is not accuracy, it's
just an excuse to justify not caring about the poorer segment of society - a
way to ignore the fact that although the absolute amount of pie they get has
increased, there's still a problem.

~~~
anamax
> And where there will be another thing (of some critical importance) that the
> poor cannot afford tomorrow that the rich can.

Yup. And then that thing will become available to the poor. Do you really want
to argue that it's good to slow down that cycle?

> No, I'm arguing that a society where progress is slightly slower (i.e the
> pie grows more slowly).

Actually, you weren't. You explicitly stated "the society where the cure does
not exist at all, and all are in the same boat". Even if we rewrite that to
"no availability short of universal", we end up with "no progress" because you
can't start with universal. You have to start with expensive and rare and grow
from there.

Me - I'm glad that rich people are willing to pay to be alpha testers.

> I am saying that this is a fact.

Actually, it's largely a construct of an envy campaign. Telling people that
they have it bad has consequences.

> Happier societies generally have lower income disparities than those
> displayed in the US, and really, what else do you need to justify it?

Do you really think that "happy, brutish, short" needs no justification? (Not
to mention that "happy" is overstated.)

>> Oh really? You find what I say to be "lacking in frankness, candor, or
sincerity; falsely or hypocritically ingenuous; insincere"? On what basis?

> Because I think when people say it that their motivation is not accuracy,
> it's just an excuse to justify not caring about the poorer segment of
> society - a way to ignore the fact that although the absolute amount of pie
> they get has increased, there's still a problem.

Look. You've accused ME of lying. How about some actual evidence.

As far as "caring" goes, you've conceded that my way results in faster
delivery of essential goods to poor people. That leaves us with I'm evil and
your way kills people.

~~~
AlisdairO
> Yup. And then that thing will become available to the poor. Do you really
> want to argue that it's good to slow down that cycle?

To an extent, yes - we've gone over this already. As mentioned, the very fact
of this imbalance can cause a society that is overall less happy.

> Actually, you weren't. You explicitly stated "the society where the cure
> does not exist at all, and all are in the same boat". Even if we rewrite
> that to "no availability short of universal", we end up with "no progress"
> because you can't start with universal. You have to start with expensive and
> rare and grow from there.

Whew, way to quote out of context. Yes, I stated that the society where such a
cure was unknown is likely to be happier. This is not the same as advocating
zero advancement. There is a suffering generated by partial availability of
such a cure, and a suffering generated by the total unavailability of such a
thing - and my point is that in the US and UK the latter is neglected.

quoth me: "No, I am not a commie, and I am in full favour of some income
disparity as a motivator towards useful output".

You've set up a straw man. I could do the same to you - I could imply that you
favour a society where the richest 1% have 99% of the wealth, can afford
genetic manipulations that make them vastly physically and intellectually
superior to the rest of society, while the rest have little more than they do
now. Really, though, in the end we're talking about a matter of degree, not
absolutes.

> Me - I'm glad that rich people are willing to pay to be alpha testers.

Poor analogy, implies that there's some kind of cost/downside to the rich in
this role.

> Actually, it's largely a construct of an envy campaign. Telling people that
> they have it bad has consequences.

So the fact that people know they're massively less well off than another
segment of society (despite working 63 jobs and getting hardly any time off)
makes them unhappy? Sounds, well, kind of like what I've been saying.

> Do you really think that "happy, brutish, short" needs no justification?
> (Not to mention that "happy" is overstated.)

You're right, the lives of western european nations are happy, brutish, and
short, thanks to their smaller income disparity. Have you ever visited? They
tend to be happier, have longer lives, and experience less suffering. Class
mobility is vastly higher than in the US. It would probably be a stretch to
call them brutish, although those who spend much time driving in Paris may
disagree ;).

> Look. You've accused ME of lying. How about some actual evidence.

 _shrugs_ I have none. After all, I can't see inside your head. That's why I
said 'I think'. It's not so much of a stretch, though - it's in the interest
of the wealthy to advance justifications to support their position, whether
they're reasonable or not.

~~~
anamax
> Yes, I stated that the society where such a cure was unknown is likely to be
> happier. This is not the same as advocating zero advancement.

It is if you think that happy is the only relevant criteria, which you've
written above.

> I could do the same to you - I could imply that you favour

Yes, you could attribute something to me that has no actual basis, again. It's
unclear why you think that refraining from doing so is some sort of virtue.

> Poor analogy, implies that there's some kind of cost/downside to the rich in
> this role.

There is a downside. They pay 90% of the NRE. If they're not 90% of the
relevant population, they've paid much of the NRE for the rest of us. Yes,
they get a benefit, early access, but denying them won't speed up our access.

Yes, they clearly think that the benefit that they receive is greater than the
cost that they pay, but that doesn't mean that there isn't a cost or that
they're not subsidizing the rest of us.

>> Actually, it's largely a construct of an envy campaign. Telling people that
they have it bad has consequences.

> So the fact that people know they're massively less well off than another
> segment of society (despite working 63 jobs and getting hardly any time off)
> makes them unhappy? Sounds, well, kind of like what I've been saying.

Reread what I actually wrote. Telling them that it's bad that that someone
else has it better has consequences.

> Have you ever visited? They tend to be happier, have longer lives, and
> experience less suffering.

Smug much? Yes, I have. I've also lived outside the US, in US ghettos, and
done "poor people" work. You're comparing different populations and the
difference that you're fixated on isn't particularly relevant to that
difference between the populations. If you look at comparable populations, the
difference that you're fixated on disappears.

Or, in stat-speak - averages can be deceptive.

> it's in the interest of the wealthy to advance justifications to support
> their position, whether they're reasonable or not.

And what's my interest?

Note that everyone has "interest", yet only interests attributed to the
wealthy rate a mention. And, you're assuming that the fact that they have
"interest" means that they're wrong.

~~~
AlisdairO
> It is if you think that happy is the only relevant criteria, which you've
> written above

Overly simplistic. You ignored the rest of this paragraph, which explained my
position. Please have the decency to debate fairly - this is HN, not Digg.

> Yes, you could attribute something to me that has no actual basis, again.
> It's unclear why you think that refraining from doing so is some sort of
> virtue.

My point being that you've attributed something to me with no actual basis. If
you read my posts it's quite clear that I don't favour a society with zero
advancement - merely that I think the balance we have struck between
advancement and relative prosperity is out of whack, yet you insist that this
is my position.

> There is a downside. They pay 90% of the NRE. If they're not 90% of the
> relevant population, they've paid much of the NRE for the rest of us. Yes,
> they get a benefit, early access, but denying them won't speed up our
> access. > Yes, they clearly think that the benefit that they receive is
> greater than the cost that they pay, but that doesn't mean that there isn't
> a cost or that they're not subsidizing the rest of us.

The rich benefit vastly more from society than the rest of us - they benefit
for every worker they have that society has educated, for every worker that
can drive to work thanks to good roads, etc etc. Looking at taxation purely in
terms of direct benefits like Medicare or social security is simplistic.

> Telling them that it's bad that that someone else has it better has
> consequences.

You don't think it's bad position to be in, to be in the poorest segments of
society? To be unable to finance care for your chronic illness if you lose
your job? Frankly, I think I'd loathe that situation.

> Smug much?

Not really. I live in the UK, where we have a pretty similar issue to the US,
if slightly less pronounced. I simply admire the basic civility of the
economic situation in these other countries.

> You're comparing different populations and the difference that you're
> fixated on isn't particularly relevant to that difference between the
> populations. If you look at comparable populations, the difference that
> you're fixated on disappears.

Care to elaborate?

Please don't mistake my distaste for severe income inequality as jealousy. I
live comfortably, and I can honestly say that I have little use for a great
deal more cash than I have now. Honestly, though, I think we're going round in
circles here. If you have something new to say I'll be more than happy to
continue the debate, but I don't think we're going anywhere.

~~~
anamax
> My point being that you've attributed something to me with no actual basis.

An accurate quote is an actual basis.

> The rich benefit vastly more from society than the rest of us - they benefit
> for every worker they have that society has educated, for every worker that
> can drive to work thanks to good roads, etc etc.

Rubbish. The educated worker benefits more from the education than the
employer, absent some actual coercion. (Read "threatened or actual force", not
"Google refused to hire me.")

> You don't think it's bad position to be in, to be in the poorest segments of
> society?

No.

The goodness/badness of my position does not depend on whether someone else
can jet to Aruba. The goodness/badness of my position depends only on my
position. Telling people otherwise is both wrong and harmful.

For example, I'd much rather be poor in much of the US than middle class in
Mexico. I'd much rather be poor in the US than upper class in some of the
post-colonial countries in modern Africa. I'd much rather be middle class in
Mexico than upper-class/rich in the middle ages.

Do you really think that I'm not choosing better even though in each case I'm
picking relative poverty?

Now, you could argue that rich and poor used to have it bad but now we've
advanced so that only poor have it bad....

> To be unable to finance care for your chronic illness if you lose your job?
> Frankly, I think I'd loathe that situation.

That's irrelevant to this discussion unless you'd be happy if you were rich
and had some incurable illness. (Hint: the real problem is your situation, not
that someone else has it better.)

> I simply admire the basic civility

I like civility too, but given a choice between progress and civility, I'll
take progress every time because progress makes people's lives better.

> Care to elaborate?

Not much beyond you don't know much about the US or you don't understand what
averages obscure.

------
dkokelley
_The analogy also holds because money is like energy, in that it has to be
conserved. "It's like a fluid that flows in interactions, it's not created or
destroyed, only redistributed," says Yakovenko._

Do I misunderstand, or does this model hinge on the assumption that money
(wealth, value, etc) can't be created? Assuming that wealth building is a zero
sum game seems fundamentally flawed. It might look good in models as snapshots
of the current situation, but as net wealth increases I'm sure it would throw
things off.

~~~
apsec112
Money can't be created (except for the Feds printing it, which is explicitly
factored out), but wealth can; they are not the same thing. $100K today and
$100K a hundred years ago are the same amount of money, but the $100K today
will get you a lot more wealth.

~~~
dkokelley
I'm sure you mean $100k inflation adjusted. Otherwise $100k 1oo years ago
would purchase a lot more wealth, you just wouldn't have access to modern
technology.

Still, the Feds do print money, and wealth is added (not necessarily related),
which goes against the article's premise, regardless of how you define money.

~~~
anamax
> I'm sure you mean $100k inflation adjusted. Otherwise $100k 1oo years ago
> would purchase a lot more wealth, you just wouldn't have access to modern
> technology.

Huh? In what sense is modern technology not wealth?

Moreover, much of what passed for "wealth" in the past is common place today.

~~~
dkokelley
Correct, but to compare equivalent goods, $100k would get you much more land
100 years ago than now. The point of my comment was to say that while yes, the
standard of living has gone up considerably in the past century, $1 in 1909
was 'worth' more to 1909 citizens than $1 today.

I didn't mean to imply technology isn't wealth, just that you had to factor it
out for my point to be made.

------
kiba
To be honest, to compare wealth of a person to another is immaterial ethically
wise. It is better to compare how people got their money and decide on that.

For example, a percentage of the poor make their living by stealing, we can
conclude that the little wealth they earned is illegimitative.

However, if a rich man make his living by providing excellent services to the
poor, we cannot conclude that he is exploiting the poor.

If wealth are forcefully taken away in the name of aiding the poor, it is also
illegimiative because you took wealth from somebody who did not consent.

There are many unfair circumstances for which the poor are forced to deal
with. However, keep in mind that the poor and rich is relative to time and
places. Indeed, the poor working classses are indeed richer than kings in some
respect.

The middle class for example, have access to the world's largest media library
via cheap broadband connections. It is also very probable that even the poor
have TVs.

Part of the reason why they are poor may be lack of education, but it may also
be attributed to lack of saving plan. If the poor don't save, than it is not
possible to accumlate wealth over generations. If they have money to buy a TV,
than it is possible for them to save.

In short, equality in circumstances cannot be considered the basic of an
ethical society. We can only hope for equality in the right of men.

So how can we improve our society?

Part of our lives are indeed shaped by memes, ideas, as well concept of what
is legimitative. These forces are the limitations which determine how well we
struggle against mother nature and our unlimited wants and needs. While unjust
insitutions like the government and laws like copyright persists, they only
have the power to exists by the masses.

If the masses simply do not believe in them, than no forces of corecision and
violence that was previously entrusted to these institution can force them to
do otherwise.

By no mean that beliefs shape reality itself but if we do not understand
reality itself, than we cannot take the full advantage of our power or use
them correctly.

------
tritchey
I think I can paraphrase:

"Through careful academic research, we've decided what constitutes a smart,
well-adjusted individual, but society is not rewarding us, err, I mean them,
with material wealth—this unequivocally exposes inequities in the system."

------
TomOfTTB
_They found that while the income distribution among the super-wealthy - about
3% of the population - does follow Pareto's law, incomes for the remaining 97%
fitted a different curve - one that also describes the spread of energies of
atoms in a gas (see graphic)._

For the record, it's this type of thing that makes me a religious person. I
know there are a lot of atheists around here and I respect that. But when I
see two completely unrelated processes that seem to follow the same underlying
structure it makes me think our world is working off some kind of plan.

I'm not suggesting anyone jump on a religous bandwagon and become a Christian,
Jew, Muslim or whatever. I'm simply saying a higher power of some kind is
worth consideration when faced with this evidence.

~~~
kiba
We have a word for that and it is called spontaneous order.

That's harmony in a seemly chaostic system. The free market can be seen as a
perfect example of that. It allocate resources effortlessly using price
signals and billion of indiviual decisions on what to buy, sell, and conserve.

~~~
TomOfTTB
The fact that there's a defined term for something isn't in any way relevant
to that thing's cause.

Random events, by their nature, should not follow a pattern. But we find time
and time again that not only do they form a pattern but that they form the
same pattern as otherwise seemingly random events.

Put it this way. If you can see gas particles following the same pattern as
wealth distribution among people and not at least question your views about a
higher power than it's you who is being irrational (Note: I didn't say change
your view I said question)

~~~
falsestprophet
_Random events, by their nature, should not follow a pattern._

Just because you intuitively feel some concept is true, doesn't make it so.
For example, the idea that heavy objects fall faster than light objects is
very intuitive and was Aristotelian common sense until Galileo had the good
sense to actually test the idea. Of course, it turns out that idea is not
correct.

It is sometimes difficult to understand new abstractions like spontaneous
order. But, I think it is worth trying.

Here are some articles to use as a starting point:

    
    
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spontaneous_order
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_automata

~~~
TomOfTTB
Again saying something exists is not a rebuttal to why it exists. Also, any
intuitive feeling I have that something is random is irrelevant when
discussing how something is not random.

Put it this way. Ask any atheist why we have religion in the world and they'll
generally give you the same answer. Humans have a need to put order to the
universe so they invent benevolent deitys to give them that sense of order.

But if we discover, as we gain more and more knowledge through science, that
there in fact is an order to the universe doesn't that least SUGGEST that
MAYBE there is a higher power?

~~~
gambling8nt
As a theist I have to disagree with your final point. The presence of order in
our universe is very clearly necessary in order for us to be able to question
the existence of order. That the weak anthropic principle is and always will
be a sufficient explanation of the presence of order does not undermine my
personal sense of faith, but nothing about the presence of order supports it.

------
DougBTX
Interesting take on it. Presumably even if people are rational within the
bounds of their knowledge, they may well gain knowledge at random (over hear a
random conversation about X, learn it is a good product then make the rational
descision to buy it) such that, overall, people could be modeled as acting
randomly.

The question then: what differentiates those above the gas, and how do you get
there?

~~~
anigbrowl
... if we conceive of a being whose faculties are so sharpened that he can
follow every molecule in its course, such a being, whose attributes are as
essentially finite as our own, would be able to do what is impossible to us.

------
ambition
Fallacy in the first paragraph.

"Rich are getting richer while the poor remain poor" is not supported by the
stated evidence of the growing income gap _ratio_. The ratio can increase even
if the poor are becoming richer, so long as the rich are becoming richer
faster.

~~~
swift
I understood that statement to be talking about class mobility. Obviously
'poor' and 'rich' are relative terms, not necessarily pegged to a specific
amount of income or wealth.

~~~
anamax
> I understood that statement to be talking about class mobility.

Why? None of the data addressed class mobility.

------
dasil003
They studied 18 years of US data and then make statments like:

_It suggests that any kind of policy will be very inefficient," says
Yakovenko. It would be very difficult to impose a policy to redistribute
wealth "short of getting Stalin", says Yakovenko, who will talk in Kolkata
next week._

As if the research wasn't abstract enough, this level of generalization and
political inference makes him sounds like a crackpot.

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physcab
Does anyone know when they say "the rich are getting richer" does that mean
between generations of wealthy families, or within the same generation?

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jerf
Generally people mean "the top 1% of society at the moment in time we are
discussing".

IIRC, there is actually quite a bit of circulation in that set, but I can't
seem to google up the studies on that I saw (I can't come up with non-generic
search terms). This mollifies some people and others consider it irrelevant.

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dan_the_welder
How about switching the word "wealth" with the word "power" and looking at how
power guarantees access to wealth.

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gambling8nt
How do you propose we measure "power"?

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dan_the_welder
Tough metric to measure, but talking about the top 3% of wealth without
looking at their power and/or influence is meaningless.

