Precisely. Just as I was pointing out that if one were to take the demonstration overly-literally, in order to obfuscate the point it is making, that I could do so as well, to restore that point.
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It would then be more realistic then to talk about trends in baking. The specific trend being that the pie is getting more concentrated in the hands of the wealthy, and more people are slipping into the category of pie-billed.
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There is that saying “behind every great fortune there Is a great crime” (attributed sometimes to Balzac, although he didn’t exactly say that. Balzac was a royalist, so he actually liked a skewed distribution of wealth).
Its very telling to listen to the rich boat show guy - he says some of us have gotten rich and others didn’t. As if 1. everybody had a fair shot at that, & 2. as if he believes he arose from the field solely by his own effort, solely responsible for his success. He sees everything he’s earned or made as his own. He sees it as something he has risen above, not a system that he is only a part of.
Notice he talks about it in a binary way - its either the way it is now, or its socialism with everybody has the same. Nobody is talking about the latter. The amount of tax the most progressive candidates want to impose on him won’t spoil a moment of enjoyment in his boat, and possibly make a decent life for millions of others that helped him get so rich.
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Right? It annoyed the crap out of me, frankly. This is stuff we’ve known and has been talked about for years, there’s data…but people are a) ignorant, b) don’t want to talk about it, and if they do, it tends to be c) “well there’s nothing you can do about it anyway”.
I would totaly back that up. Not the overtime but a national holyday for voting where you don’t loose your wages if you bring in your voting receipt. I use to like the idea of mandatory voting but I’m afraid that this might result in large amounts of protest votes and that is not a good plan…
/looks over at Trump
Serious comments on BoingBoing posts are not allowed!!
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One factor that should be taken in account is age. In the US, the net wealth per household can start negative as some recent graduates pay back their student debt, and then eventually goes to zero and then increases as they buy a house, start paying it up, inherit their parents leftover wealth, and save for retirement. The median and average wealth per age group can be very different, lower for younger people and at a maximum at older age. That, of course, explains only part of the wealth distribution disparity, other factors including the disproportionate share hoarded by the wealthiest 1% and all the people struggling to live paycheck-to-paycheck for their whole lifetimes.
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There’s also the false dichotomy: either we continue the current rapacious capitalist status quo, or we “descend” into a socialist hell where everyone gets an equal amount of wealth regardless of talent or work ethic, with nothing in between.
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Look, we all know that the almost unimaginable gulf between the few rich and the many poor exists and is one of the greatest flaws in society, but the real crime here is the choice of pumpkin pie.
Pumpkin pie is ok at best, but pales in comparison to almost any other pie filling. Strawberry, blueberry, cherry, lemon… these tower above pumpkin in taste and texture.
Also, fuck the rich. They will never pay, it must be taken.
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https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Publication%20Files/Norton_Michael_Building%20a%20better%20America%20One%20wealth%20quintile%20at%20a%20time_4c575dff-fe1d-4002-b61a-1227d08b71be.pdf explained this in 2011. I don’t expect it’s any better now.
What the paper explores/explains is how many USAnians would prefer a Swedish-style wealth distribution to what they have but also how little awareness of the actual reality they have. That’s not a criticism of them so much as the way that reality is never discussed or explained.
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I think it’s valuable for the populace to understand the unequal distribution of both income and wealth. It should definitely be part of our school curriculum simply to understand the society in which we live.
However, it’s valuable to understand the distribution both within one’s own country and within the world itself.
I feel that even as we work for greater equality, it’s important not to pretend that we’re amazingly morally superior to those who appear fantastically rich to us, when we appear so very rich to so many.
The reason I’m in the global 1% of income ($~32K), is not because of any virtue on my part, but simply because I’m part of a hereditary aristocracy of holders of Canadian citizenship. Understanding that is key to understanding not just the moral obligations of the Canadian wealthy to other Canadians, but the moral obligations of us globally wealthy Canadians (almost all of us) towards the world as a whole.
And let me be clear, just because I understand my moral obligations, doesn’t mean that I don’t let greed override that. I probably wouldn’t vote for a 90% marginal rate after $35K even if that’s what morality might call for. Luckily the push for more equality doesn’t require a mistaken belief in some huge moral gap between us and those we consider wealthy.
After all, as we we progress further towards national equality, we may actually start considering the real moral obligations we owe to every citizen on the planet and start taxing on that basis. After all, doing good usually leads to doing more good.
I meant the overtime would be paid out if you have to work that day.
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That would be a good plan.
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If the farmer or the landlord in question is in that 1%, I am completely and totally happy with them being taxed 10% (or more) annually on their holdings. Especially since 1.) that will organically eventually move them out of the bracket for such taxation, so it’s not like it will bankrupt them and 2.) fuckers that rich parasitically make that much back doing nothing anyway (which is why allowing the super-rich to avoid taxation for charitable donations is such a racket).
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I suspect you don’t understand how charitable donations work.
Say I make $100. I donate $5 to charity. Say I would have had to pay $20 in taxes. When I deduct that $5, it comes off the $100, so it is $95, and I pay taxes on $95, so I pay $19 in taxes. Giving the charity $5 saved me $1 in taxes. Basically, the idea is we want to encourage charitable giving so we don’t charge taxes on the money that you give to charity.
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Note also that Mr. Genius Ubermensch there couldn’t even articulate the negative to redistribution other than “But Socializums!”
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That actually makes sense. When that older gentleman was born, that was the wealth distribution in the US through about 1970.
While you’re sorta right, you’re also sorta wrong. Don’t let the brainwashing of the GOP get to you. Through the bulk of the 20th century, there was a 90+% highest marginal income tax. The US cared enough about workers then to institute a national holiday to honor those who fought and often died to gain more rights for workers. That also was the time of greatest prosperity for the country. It’s not a coincidence.
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