Should US wealth be redistributed?

[VJW]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Nothing substantive to respond with, eh ?

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[brandondrury]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

VJW,

It always amazes me how you will make all sorts of statements as if they are facts, but can only back up a select few of these statements with real deal numbers. You seam to be fairly intelligent, but there is an obvious contradiction to this when you simply write down statements without backing them up.

For example:

You think that the phenomenon is limited to the 400 richest people in the country ? It is not. The percentages would be similar if it were the top 1000, top 5000, top 50,000 and so on. It is representative of the wealthy in America in general.

You wrote the above statement, but have offered no place where we can view these numbers ourselves. It appears to me that you are thinking with emotions more than hard facts. If I'm wrong, simply post your sources.

I'm going to go ahead and assume that you have no rebuttal to my relatively long posts and you have used "Nothing substantive to respond with, eh ?" as a way of copping out.

Please go ahead and answer my question, "Why would a poor person ever give his money to a rich person?". When I'm faced with a problem, I tend to look at the source of the problem. Instead of just putting a band aid on the problem, it may be smarter to actually see what is causing the problem. One possibility in this situation is that most people live above their means. This means that too many minimum wage earners are spending more than they are making and therefor spending a greater portion of their income to pay interest. I'd like to hear other theories of why the poor continue to give their money to the rich. Please don't claim that the rich people are stealing it.

Brandon

[dealsaver]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Brandon, selective use of the ignore function makes this website a much more worthwhile read. In particular, ignoring the poster otherwise known as Monica Lewinsky has the most benefit. There's only so much one can take hearing about how great her ex boyfriend was, even though he was politically castrated by 94 and the Republican Majority set the agenda that spurred the economic boom of the 90's. Also, people with selective memory forget that by the end of Gerge H. W. Bush's term, economic recovery had already begun, only to be setback by the Clinton tax hike. Ironically, Bush's own tax hike which he signed delayed that very same economic recovery and gave us a President with a penchant for finding new and unique uses for cigars.

[retire@50]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Here's a link to an interesting article on Poverty in America from the Heritage Foundation.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/bg1713.cfm

The article contains the following points:

The following are facts about persons defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken from various government reports:

• <LI class=Bulleted>Forty-six percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio. <LI class=Bulleted>Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning. <LI class=Bulleted>Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person. <LI class=Bulleted>The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.) <LI class=Bulleted>Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars. <LI class=Bulleted>Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions. <LI class=Bulleted>Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
• Seventy-three percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher

[MN-Troy]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

In the US CEO pay has become obscene, at the same time many companies are laying off and lowereing the payscales of their workforce. In some countries CEOs or anyone for that matter can only make a certain amount of money anything more than that is taxed at 100%, So there is no incentive to screw their employees to give themselves more than they would ever need. (It seems in the US these guys can never have enough) I wish I knew the answer. I don't know if I can say business names here so I will be vague. A famous Ice Cream business started with the plan that in order for anyone at the top of the company to get a raise everyone all the way down to the bottom got a raise. They have since gone public( I think that is what they call it when you sell stock now) and unfortunately no longer do this. Other companies have had plans where the person at the top couldn't make more than a certain % of what the people at the bottom made. I think this kind of thing is better than simply taking from the rich and giving to the poor. Partially because I think there are already a lot of entitlement programs for the poor and it is always the middle class that gets the short end of the stick.

.

Greetings. This my first post on this forum ( I found it via a search)


The ice-cream business that had a system where the top managers could only earn X amount above the lowest earned employees is Ben & Jerry. Unfortunately when sales slipped at Ben & Jerry, the company had a hard time recruiting top quality managers to help turn around negative sales. Wisely, in my opinion, they scrapped the system.

[brandondrury]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

I don't understand the problem with CEOs making lots of money. However, if you don't like the situation, there is a simple solution.

Walk in to any Fortune 500 company and apply for the job of CEO. Tell them that you only want to make $12 per hour. If you can do the job better than the CEO, I'm sure they'll hire you in a second.

I'm sure if Mr. Pro Bowl quarterback (I've been working Sundays for the past 9 years) agreed to the league minimum, I'm sure the NFL team owner would have no problem with that. If you think he is paid too much, offer to be the quarterback for $30,000 per year.


Brandon

[VJW]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

VJW,

It always amazes me how you will make all sorts of statements as if they are facts

Gee, that’s my EXACT assessment of YOU.

but can only back up a select few of these statements with real deal numbers.

Surely you jest. I document more of my posts than anyone else I’ve seen post here.

You seam to be fairly intelligent, but there is an obvious contradiction to this when you simply write down statements without backing them up.

I’ve yet to see you “back up” hardly ANYTHING you’ve asserted.

You wrote the above statement, but have offered no place where we can view these numbers ourselves.

Au contraire.

If you had read the report and it’s supplement, you would have discovered it represents more than 2,200 millionaires and the organization they belong to is restricted to the top 5% of the wealthiest in America. Just as two examples.

It helps if you actually READ.

It appears to me that you are thinking with emotions more than hard facts.

It appears to me you are operating on beliefs.

I'm going to go ahead and assume that you have no rebuttal to my relatively long posts and you have used "Nothing substantive to respond with, eh ?" as a way of copping out.

You "assume" wrong.

I read nothing connected to reality in that post and absolutely nothing you asserted can be substantiated, so what would you have me write instead ?

Please go ahead and answer my question, "Why would a poor person ever give his money to a rich person?".

Sure.

I don’t know of any “poor person” who “gave” his money to a “rich person”.

What does it have to do with the price of eggs in Singapore ?

One possibility in this situation is that most people live above their means. This means that too many minimum wage earners are spending more than they are making and therefor spending a greater portion of their income to pay interest.

You would be wrong again.

There has been no increase in the Federal Minimum Wage since 1996, therefore it has lost purchasing power against the underlying inflation in the national economy. The current Federal Minimum Wage is at a 56-year low relative to the average wage in the national economy. That’s one major reason why wages for the bulk of American workers has declined in inflation-adjusted dollars every year of the last five years, and Poverty has increased nationally every year of the last five years.

You seem to be wildly out-of-touch.

I'd like to hear other theories of why the poor continue to give their money to the rich.

Have fun with that.

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[VJW]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

the Republican Majority set the agenda that spurred the economic boom of the 90's

Sorry, ‘dealsaver’, but your “Republican Majority” could not possibly have “set the agenda that spurred the economic boom of the 90's”, as although they may have taken office in January of 1995, they never actually had any major budget legislation signed into law by President Clinton until February of 1996. Remember how Newtie and the Blowhards shut down the federal government, TWICE, once in January and once in February of 1996 ?

The “economic boom of the 90's” had already been well underway for about three years by then.

Also, people with selective memory forget that by the end of Gerge H. W. Bush's term, economic recovery had already begun

Actually, “people with selective memory forget that” there were LESS American workers employed in the private-sector national workforce at the end of Poppy Bush’s term than there were at the start of his term.

Some “economic recovery”.

only to be setback by the Clinton tax hike.

* There were 22 million net new jobs created, the majority of which paid wages higher than the average wage in the national economy.

* The Unemployment Rate fell to 3.9%.

* Poverty declined every year for eight years.

* Federal deficits declined every year and turned into surpluses.

Some “setback”.

selective use of the ignore function makes this website a much more worthwhile read

Particularly if people “ignore” posters that are ignorant of reality ?

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[VJW]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Here's a link to an interesting article on Poverty in America from the Heritage Foundation.

Instead of a contrived citation from a fake RightWing front group, let’s try something from the ‘United States Department of Agriculture’:

“The USDA estimates that more than 38 million Americans -- including nearly 14 million children -- are living on the BRINK OF HUNGER.”

That’s up 2 MILLION in just one year.

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=58484

Of course, this is in addition to national Poverty having risen every year of the past five years and the wages of the vast majority of Americans having gone BACKWARDS every year of the past five years.

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[VJW]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

I don't understand the problem with CEOs making lots of money

The CEOs of the 365 top American companies raked in 531 times more than the average hourly worker did in 2000. Can you justify that American companies pay their CEOs TWENTY to FIFTY times what their competitors pay CEOs in Japan and Europe ?

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[Bruce Wayne]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

The CEOs of the 365 top American companies raked in 531 times more than the average hourly worker did in 2000. Can you justify that American companies pay their CEOs TWENTY to FIFTY times what their competitors pay CEOs in Japan and Europe ?

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This isn't for you or I to decide though VJW. If you decide what they earn then you can't reasonably refuse them deciding what you should earn either. The pricing mechanism works so well because no one decides other than those buying and those selling. If Japanese companies (or Chinese or anyone else) is getting better efficiency then they'll take market share.

Stop worrying about what other people are getting paid and focus on what you're doing with your life

[dealsaver]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Stop worrying about what other people are getting paid and focus on what you're doing with your life

As a general rule, this cannot be emphasized enough.

[Optsol]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

As I posted, there has been a redistribution of wealth in America since the early 1980s, from the Middle-class and Working Poor up to the wealthy, and I believe that should be undone.

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I don't agree with that, they're independent.

The only redistribution that I see is middle-class/working poor "wealth" heading over seas through the trade deficit, not up the ladder as you suggest.

Meanwhile, the rich getting richer is still true.

[brandondrury]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

Can you justify that American companies pay their CEOs TWENTY to FIFTY times what their competitors pay CEOs in Japan and Europe ?

Just a guess. Maybe there are fewer people capable of doing it in the US?

Why would a company pay any employee more than it has to? The board of directors doesn't want to waste money on nothing. They want the company to make as much money as possible so that they can make as much money as possible.

The CEO situation is probably not all that different than pro athletes. Why do they get paid what they get paid? Because they are worth it. If they weren't worth it, their salaries would have to be cut or pro sports would go out of business.

Brandon

[abowers]

Re: Should US wealth be redistributed?

My understanding is that in Japan, even though they may not get paid as much as similar positions in the US, there is MUCH more job security in Japan, and you are expected to stay at the same job through retirement (disclaimer: obviously this does not explain ALL jobs in Japan, but I have heard this is true of many occupations in japan).