Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer

Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by lotusleaf1987 on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @04:26PM (#2093584)

I like PG but that doesn't mean he's infallible. Income inequality to a degree isn't a problem when and if the tide does float all boats, so to speak, but the problem is the tide doesn't seem to be raising all boats and that the middle class has all but vanished in America and what's left are the upwardly mobile upper-middle class and the working poor. Kudos to them they can now DVR a show and have broadband internet available at an affordable rate, but when you're essentially a wage slave, it means very little. When the top 20% have 85% of the wealth in America, the other 80% are left to fight over the crumbs. That is a terrible foundation for a supposedly democratic nation.

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Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by vladk on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @04:35PM (#2093632)

"but the problem is that the middle class has all but vanished in America and what's left are the upwardly mobile upper-middle class and the working poor. When the top 20% have 85% of the wealth in America, the other 80% are left to fight over the crumbs."

Can you link to some evidence showing a slowdown in mobility? Also, I would assume a key metric to showing whether income inequality increase is a problem is to see whether the speed of improvement of standard of living is slowing or not. I'd like to see figures on this as well.

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Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by hnal943 on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @04:37PM (#2093639)

The startup world demonstrates there's nothing systemically restricting people from being upwardly mobile. The formula for wealth in America is simple; create a product that people want.

The fact that creating something people want is difficult is a universal truth, not an indictment of our democracy.

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Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by JanezStupar on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @04:45PM (#2093677)

What you're missing is that nowadays to make it you have to corner a market - thats how internets works.

Not many mom and pops type business opportunities on the net.

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Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by hnal943 on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @05:00PM (#2093742)

I disagree that the only type of business on the internet is a google or a facebook. However, assuming they are, they were still started as the brain child of a few people who were not rich when they started.

Also, both google and facebook cornered markets that didn't exist 20 years ago. Where did that market come from? No one else got wealthy because of search or social networking?

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Re:Why the (US) Rich Are Getting Richer by JanezStupar on Tuesday January 11, 2011 @05:49PM (#2093939)

I just implied that to really make it (in context of this thread mind you), to get into top 5% of income you have to corner a market (existing or new).

That means risk. East German swimmer or Chinese gymnast kind of risk. For each billionaire there are such and such number of people who "got to grow as people".

In my humble opinion the swing towards egalitarianism was an anomaly in human history. Can we make this anomaly into a new status quo? Recent developments show that very unlikely.

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