
Why Income Inequality Matters - bpeters
http://www.economist.com/node/17929075
======
gnosis
_"The second, and more important, way is that to become rich in the first
place, they typically have to do something extraordinary. Some inherit their
money, of course, but most build a better mousetrap, finance someone else’s
good idea or at least run a chain of hairdressers in a way that keeps
customers coming back."_

Or they might have just been more successful at screwing over their
competitors; could have lied, bribed, cheated, stolen, slept, or killed their
way to riches; could have managed to convince a whole lot of suckers to buy
crap that they didn't need or that was even harmful to them.. etc. All tried
and true ways of getting rich.

~~~
smanek
It is amazingly arrogant to say that someone could be convinced to " _buy crap
that they didn't need or that was even harmful to them_."

What possibly makes you think you have a better idea of what goods and
services I need than you do? By what right do you claim to be better equipped
to weight utility, risk, short/long term benefits to a consumer, than they
themselves are?

Sleeping your way to riches I view as legitimate. The person sleeping is, in
some sense, simply trading their services for payment.

As for 'lied, bribed, cheated, stolen, or killed' - those are all already
illegal and prosecuted. Would you disagree with my hypothesis that in, say the
last 30 years, less than 10% of millionaires are minted through those means?
(I'm not sure if that's true - but I strongly suspect it is. If you disagree,
I may do the research ...)

~~~
gnosis
_"It is amazingly arrogant to say that someone could be convinced to 'buy crap
that they didn't need or that was even harmful to them.'

What possibly makes you think you have a better idea of what goods and
services I need than you do?"_

You've never heard anyone complain about buying crap that they didn't need?
You never seen someone's house chock full of crap that they never use
(sometimes never even taken out of the box)? You don't know anyone with a
shopping (or eating) addiction?

Or perhaps you're not aware that corporations spend billions on trying to
figure out people's psychology so that products could be marketed more
effectively (by, say, doing something so important to utility of the product
as changing the color of the box its sold in or the font on the front of the
box, or the music played in stores as people shop, not to mention slimy
marketing techniques such as getting paid stooges to pretend to be consumers
while singing praises of the product and company).

Of course, maybe the consumer really does need to be, say, poisoned by
cigarettes, or have a burning need to enlarge their male member, and the
valiant marketers are just providing a valuable service by making the consumer
aware of this great, hitherto unknown need.

 _"As for 'lied, bribed, cheated, stolen, or killed' - those are all already
illegal and prosecuted."_

I'm not sure what your point is there. So these means are (sometimes) illegal.
And (sometimes) prosecuted. Many people still continue to use them (just open
any newspaper on any day of the year).

 _"Would you disagree with my hypothesis that in, say the last 30 years, less
than 10% of millionaires are minted through those means?"_

Unless they were caught (or you were personally involved), how would you know?
That's not to say that some haven't been caught. But, like roaches, you can
bet that the ones that you see are just a tiny minority compared to the ones
you don't see.

------
john_shanks
The bigger question is whether, given that real wages in the US have stagnated
for the last 20-30 years, the outsize compensation given to elites is a
function of productivity gains increasingly depending on them or just an
increase in relative bargaining power.

~~~
kongqiu
Re: Bargaining power - how can "average joes" increase their bargaining power?
Especially as unions have a pretty bad name...

~~~
MaysonL
And why do unions have a pretty bad name?[in the USA] I would argue that it is
in large part due to ceaseless anti-union propaganda by the rich and their
minions.

~~~
amock
I've heard more anti-union sentiment from people who had to be in unions to to
get a particular job and then were forced to go on strike for a settlement
that really only benefited the union leaders or from people who lost their
jobs because going on strike caused the company go out of business. Maybe
unions do some good, but it's not just the rich who don't like unions.

------
lionhearted
> Rich folk affect the rest of us in two big ways. First, the way they spend
> their money has all kinds of ripple effects. Their hunches move markets.
> Their consumption supports a whole sub-economy of hoteliers, watchmakers and
> financial advisers. And their philanthropy funds schools, pressure groups
> and research into tropical diseases.

Article misses that inventions start as only affordable by wealthy people, but
that follows into commoditization and everyone gets to benefit from them.
People get so envious of what they don't have, failing to notice the asinine
amounts of prosperity around us, things the kings of old could have only
dreamed of.

Anyways, I am coming to terms with the fact that human nature doesn't like
anyone having more... I'll do what I reasonably can to not participate in
various redistributions and confiscations, but I'm starting to accept that
there'll always be people wanting to do it and attempting it.

~~~
khafra
Is the nigh-universal human characteristic of greater unhappiness with visible
wealth disparity than with lower absolute wealth a sign that we need to
engineer better humans, or that governments should reduce inequality even at
the cost of average wealth?

ISTM either or both could be the case, in parallel or in sequence.

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bryanlarsen
tl;dr: The article says that usually rising inequality is a sign of a broken
system somewhere, and that governments should fix the brokenness rather than
attacking the rich directly. In the US, they blame the banking system. In
China, the problem is the laws that prevent migration between countryside and
city.

------
GrooveStomp
I think it's funny that they use the term "Propagandists" when refering to Al-
Queda, but "Think Tank" when referring to the USA. Maybe there's actually a
difference between a think tank and a propagandist. Can someone elucidate me?

