Why I am leaving the US...

[HappySqurriel]

mrstickball said:

Rath said:

TheRealMafoo said:

M.U.G.E.N said:

Dunno if I agree with his numbers BUT I can see where he is coming from..over the past 10 years the gap between the compensation of an employee and the executives of the company has risen by a great margin, even when the recession was going on. Has it stopped now? nope it still as bad or worse...don't really care much for communism, socialism or even democracy, the spread of wealth can and should be better than this in the USA

The issue is are the rich getting rich at the expense of the poor? No. If you look at the times in the US where the growth of the rich getting richer was the fastest, the quality of life for the poor at that time was growing the fastest as well.

They poor's quality of life was improving because the rich were getting richer, not in spite of it. Yes, the rich were improving at a faster rate, but who cares? If they help everyone why they get rich, what's the problem?

This is the issue I take with the current US mindset (as apposed to 100 years ago). People today look at someone else and say "that's not fair" instead of just looking at yourself and saying "what can I do to make my life better".

When I was a kid, you heard of other people in the world being envious of the US because it was a place you could go and make your fortune. Today if you make a fortune, you're somehow evil, or something to be ashamed of. You become a target because you just don't diserve what you have.

It's a horrible mindset we as a country have become.

The nature of a capitalist economy is cyclical, the fact that the poor and the rich get richer at the same time doesn't prove that the poor are getting richer because the rich are. My interpretation would be the poor and the rich are both getting richer during an economic 'bubble'.  You seem to be misinterpreting the difference between correlation and causation.

Also you are building a strawman argument in my opinion, you are making out that because people believe it is fair to tax the rich more they somehow hate the rich. Progressives generally don't hate the rich or think they should be ashamed, they just think they have more and as such can afford to give more.

Ah, but your statement is mis-guided.

The truth is that the rich and poor can get richer, or poorer. A study of people in poverty in the 1970's showed that an incredible 95% of those in poverty in the 1970's had improved their standing from poverty level (lowest quintile) to a better quintile. Over 40% had improved their position to the highest quintile (top 20%). Likewise, for those who were in the top 1% in 1990...50% were no longer in the top 1%.

So in the American capitalistic system, you can deride the distribution of wealth, but the truth is that those in poverty have been proven (to the tune of 95%) to have the means to change their situation, and improve. So why are people in poverty? Stupid choices.

Maybe its me, but if 95% of people in poverty today are due not to birth, but decisions...Would that not tell you the system works, as it doesn't seek to keep the rich, rich, or the poor, poor?

One of the main things people don’t account for when they complain about income inequality is how a person’s earnings potential grows as they age. The reason for this is obvious being that (with a few exceptions) an individual is likely going to develop valuable education and experience over their life, are going to become more mature, and are generally worth more money. What I would expect to see (and I believe was demonstrated in an economics course I took in university) if you control for age, incomes for the young are generally fairly low and uniform, and over time the incomes increase and the distribution spreads out. More often than not, the top quintile of income earners are also in the top age quintile; and the top earners of those are generally the individuals who built their own business, or developed rare and valuable skills over their life.