Wealth! How much is enough?

[Birdjaguar]

Downward redistribution is a virtuous circle. I wouldn't take for granted the idea that the American middle class needs to be tapped into. Just getting the US to end imperial practices which suppress growth rates in the "developing" world alone would be more than enough to substantially improve the lot of the global poor.

Globalization has moved economic growth from western nations to third world nations. Many developing nations have seen economic progress over the past 20 years even if that growth is tied to cheaper labor there than in the US. If all those manufacturing jobs had stayed in the US, that growth would not have happened. Of course China is the clearest example.

 

[Lexicus]

It's this weird moral zeitgeist, where people absolve themselves of responsibility towards others, because they insist that other people have greater responsibility. It doesn't work that way.

I don't believe anyone's absolving themselves of responsibility here. Just objecting to a perceived shifting of responsibility away from those most well-equipped to bear it.

 

[El_Machinae]

BJ literally did

This is entirely beside the point, now maybe there is some correlation with foreign aid generosity and the gini coefficient. And maybe there is some type of causal effect there. I'm happy to be wrong. I just don't see a mechanism by which a wealth cap helps the bottom 50%

 

[Birdjaguar]

BJ literally did

This is entirely beside the point, now maybe there is some correlation with foreign aid generosity and the gini coefficient. And maybe there is some type of causal effect there. I'm happy to be wrong. I just don't see a mechanism by which a wealth cap helps the bottom 50%

A cap all by itself doesn't, but if a cap comes with pathways to divert excess wealth into needy places, then it will. A cap on the richest doesn't keep any middle class person from being generous.

 

[El_Machinae]

Conversely, it might not cause them to be generous. Look, I recognize that the middle class might become more generous with a wealth cap, just don't see the mechanism by which the bottom 50% would benefit with a wealth cap. I don't see a causal factor, merely a hopeful one.

Compare that to, say, how a wealth cap would help the working poor within the country. A causal relationship there would be pretty easy to sketch out.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Conversely, it might not cause them to be generous. Look, I recognize that the middle class might become more generous with a wealth cap, just don't see the mechanism by which the bottom 50% would benefit with a wealth cap. I don't see a causal factor, merely a hopeful one.

Compare that to, say, how a wealth cap would help the working poor within the country. A causal relationship there would be pretty easy to sketch out.

I have no problem with restrictions narrowing the scope of how money is used to within a country. One has to begin somewhere and low hanging fruit is often best.

 

[stinkubus]

Conversely, it might not cause them to be generous. Look, I recognize that the middle class might become more generous with a wealth cap, just don't see the mechanism by which the bottom 50% would benefit with a wealth cap. I don't see a causal factor, merely a hopeful one.

Compare that to, say, how a wealth cap would help the working poor within the country. A causal relationship there would be pretty easy to sketch out.

A wealth cap would need to be implemented by eventually imposing a 100% marginal tax rate. You then use the funds raised from these taxes to pay for programs which benefit the poor directly.

 

[Birdjaguar]

A wealth cap would need to be implemented by eventually imposing a 100% marginal tax rate. You then use the funds raised from these taxes to pay for programs which benefit the poor directly.

A 100% marginal tax rate doesn't reduce assets; it just takes away any income produced by those assets. Depending upon the point at which the 100% marginal rate kicks in, it will be manipulated by careful selling of assets. If you want to go the taxation route to reduce assets, you will have to have an ongoing tax on things people own. Asset taxes get tricky regarding valuations. Keep in mind that the number of very very rich people who own so much of the nation's wealth is a small number. A blunt tool will be hard to use. If the goal is to improve the lives and welfare of the bottom segment of the population, you want to create a mindset like MacKenzie Scott has. A smart plan will be nuanced enough to account for the severity of the change and the time needed to make it all work smoothly.

 

[stinkubus]

A 100% marginal tax rate doesn't reduce assets; it just takes away any income produced by those assets. Depending upon the point at which the 100% marginal rate kicks in, it will be manipulated by careful selling of assets. If you want to go the taxation route to reduce assets, you will have to have an ongoing tax on things people own. Asset taxes get tricky regarding valuations. Keep in mind that the number of very very rich people who own so much of the nation's wealth is a small number. A blunt tool will be hard to use. If the goal is to improve the lives and welfare of the bottom segment of the population, you want to create a mindset like MacKenzie Scott has. A smart plan will be nuanced enough to account for the severity of the change and the time needed to make it all work smoothly.

If we are to have any hope of a sustainable future eventually most, if not all, of our largest industries will need to be nationalized, imo. Productive assets will need to be seized.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

If we are to have any hope of a sustainable future eventually most, if not all, of our largest industries will need to be nationalized, imo. Productive assets will need to be seized.

preach. shame it won't work though because as soon as any country anywhere even mentions "nationalization", especially in regards with "oil" a fascist dictator just pops out of nowhere and overthrows the democratically elected government in a coup aided by the CIA. truly weird how that works, innit?

 

[El_Machinae]

A wealth cap would need to be implemented by eventually imposing a 100% marginal tax rate. You then use the funds raised from these taxes to pay for programs which benefit the poor directly.

Thank you. I've realized after asking my question multiple times that there isn't an answer to the question I am asking. I was asking how the wealth cap would benefit the bottom 50%, the majority of which exist outside of the wealthy nations. The answer is "it doesn't". What you've done here is reiterate a mechanism by which the wealth cap would benefit the bottom 50% within the wealthy nation. I think there's a more direct mechanism, since 'wealth cap' doesn't presume how the taxes are spent. So 'pay for programs' is something done after the wealth cap. The OP doesn't presume how the increased taxes would be spent.

The immediate effect of a wealth cap would be higher wages among the working class, because it would increase the ability to save. Whether they then allowed themselves to be taxed at a higher rate or not would be step 2. Whether or not they cared about conditions outside of their borders would be step 2. But even a wealthier working class would have knock on benefits to those who're truly needy (within the country), since the average person would have greater income with which to take care of loved ones.

 

[stinkubus]

preach. shame it won't work though because as soon as any country anywhere even mentions "nationalization", especially in regards with "oil" a fascist dictator just pops out of nowhere and overthrows the democratically elected government in a coup aided by the CIA. truly weird how that works, innit?

The only thing that really gives me any hope is the fact that the US government was kind enough to create a hegemonic economic order and military apparatus which are just begging to be co-opted.

 

[stinkubus]

Thank you. I've realized after asking my question multiple times that there isn't an answer to the question I am asking. I was asking how the wealth cap would benefit the bottom 50%, the majority of which exist outside of the wealthy nations. The answer is "it doesn't". What you've done here is reiterate a mechanism by which the wealth cap would benefit the bottom 50% within the wealthy nation. I think there's a more direct mechanism, since 'wealth cap' doesn't presume how the taxes are spent. So 'pay for programs' is something done after the wealth cap. The OP doesn't presume how the increased taxes would be spent.

The immediate effect of a wealth cap would be higher wages among the working class, because it would increase the ability to save. Whether they then allowed themselves to be taxed at a higher rate or not would be step 2. Whether or not they cared about conditions outside of their borders would be step 2. But even a wealthier working class would have knock on benefits to those who're truly needy (within the country), since the average person would have greater income with which to take care of loved ones.

If leftists ever seize the US government you can convert the CIA into a coup-machine for socialism.

 

[Birdjaguar]

If we are to have any hope of a sustainable future eventually most, if not all, of our largest industries will need to be nationalized, imo. Productive assets will need to be seized.

What do you mean by a "sustainable future"? My understanding of the term has nothing to to with improving the lives at the bottom of society.

What is your evidence that nationalization of the largest industries is beneficial and to whom is it beneficial?

Again you are talking about corporate wealth and not personal wealth. They are not the same.

 

[El_Machinae]

What do you mean by a "sustainable future"? My understanding of the term has nothing to to with improving the lives at the bottom of society.

Really?
There's a communication gap here, for sure. Famine and ecological devastation impact the poorest first. Preventing a negative is awfully similar to adding a positive, especially since experiencing a loss is more painful than missing a gain.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Really?
There's a communication gap here, for sure. Famine and ecological devastation impact the poorest first. Preventing a negative is awfully similar to adding a positive, especially since experiencing a loss is more painful than missing a gain.

That is what I want to clear up. re we talking worldwide or national? Are we talking now (next ten years) to improve lives or are we talking a 50 year transition to less ecological devastation? For younger folks a longer time horizon is expected. For me, I'll likely be dead and gone in 12 years. I see easing the pain and suffering "now" is more important.

 

[El_Machinae]

That's a common theme, and it's also applied to pleasure. People greatly value current pleasure compared to future pleasure. And we value present pain more than future pain.

I won't speak for Stink, but 'sustainable' to me implies eco-system level thinking, and therefore would be thinking internationally. So, I'm glad you asked the question, because your interpretation of his statement wouldn't have occurred to me.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

There are a lot of assumptions in your post:

• $25k annual wage (I used that number up thread and said it was just a guess). Do we know the actual number?
• Do we know that 10k higher wage jobs at other companies were displaced? No we don't.
• How many unionized drivers have been replaced? Don't know, but we do know that UPS has been hiring up to 100,000 workers for the holidays.
• Having been both a short order cook and stocker in the preReagan years, I can say that neither provided more than subsistence wages.
• Also we don't know what will happen this spring and to what extent shopping will revert to local brick and mortar businesses.

And yes change is coming and those who want to earn a good living had best be prepared. There isn't a way to stop the technology that will increasingly replace workers of every sort, but mostly starting at the bottom. The pandemic has only accelerated that change.

I don't have exact figures for most of your questions, I was just using numbers others had posted for the sake of argument. Knowing their exact figure either way won't make a major difference to the argument.

But I do have an answer for this -

Having been both a short order cook and stocker in the preReagan years, I can say that neither provided more than subsistence wages.

Federal minimum wage in 1965 was $1.25/hr, or $10.33 when adjusted for inflation. It rose to $1.60/hr or $13.22/hr by 1968. For comparison, federal minimum wage is now $7.25/hr and has been stuck there for about a decade. The last time there was an effort to raise it, it was only to $10.10/hr (less than in 1965) and the effort failed.

A couple other huge differences we shouldn't overlook -

Life was cheaper in all respects back then. In the preReagan years, you didn't have to have a cell phone and wireless plan, or an internet connection just to function in modern society. Many of the creature comforts were also cheaper, if they existed (depending on how far pre- we are talking, cable TV may not have even been a thing). And while we can argue that people don't need cable or PC games to function, we can't really say that about the internet or cell phones, student loans or hospital bills.


The other thing is that the proportion of truly minimum wage jobs as a portion of the overall society was much lower back then compared to now. Moreover, if you worked as a short order cook or a stocker back then, there was a reasonable expectation that you'd be able to work your way up to a decent living. Back then, you could have started as a short order cook and got consistent, decent raises and then maybe be promoted to a management position that was a good living.

Today, you're lucky to get a dime/hr raise per year and managers in most locations make ~$25k/yr for atrocious hours. And I have to reiterate that $13.33 in 1968 went a lot further than it does today, much less $7.25. It may not have been the high life but it wasn't destitution either.

It has gotten so bad with how companies were abusing salaried employees that Obama forced through a rule change to make those making less than ~$40k on salary eligible for overtime and even that was quickly overturned by Trump, relegating many ambitious people to effectively less-than-minimum wage when compared to the amount of mandatory uncompensated overtime they work.

I can't speak about your time in those industries but when I worked them, there were an awful lot of middle aged workers making right at or just above minimum wage with literal decades of experience. I have a hard time believing that was the case back then.

 

[Birdjaguar]

@El_Machinae Clarity is important and I see economic relief as something different from "sustainable". One can certainly relate them over the long term. As I see things finding ways to improve the current lives of children, everyone's future is brighter.

 

[El_Machinae]

Piles of creature comforts are cheaper now than they were back then, which is part of the dilemma. And it's also the reason why "your generation wastes money" is a false or diversionary criticism.

I'll say again, the pre-politcian Elizabeth Warren lectures are essential viewing. Look up the ones she does on UCTV. Every time someone has watched them, they come back to me with their Eureka! moments.