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Please do not believe all you see on TV. They just have to sell sensations.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lazul
So it is not the nature of the people.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lazul
Let's change the system!Quote:
Originally Posted by Lazul
Glad you joined us ~:cheers: ~:grouphug:Quote:
Originally Posted by Lazul
Thanks Ser Clegane! :thumbsup:
The only nation to attempt actual socialism on a grand scale to my knowledge was Russia. They could not compete and their economy tanked.Quote:
Increased socialist policies will evidently mean an altered free market, but that doesn't mean there cannot be wealth created and GDP growth. In fact in many countries after a socialist govt is elected GDP stays at exactly the same trend levels. Where has a modern socialist government turned a country into such a drastic state as you attempt to illustrate? The facts show that there is nothing in your populist claim about socialists making 'wealth disappear'.
If you eliminate such things as personal property, the ability to grow wealth, and hard work=better pay - you eliminate the basis of a strong economy. When the government is the only entity that has enough wealth to start and sustain industry and business, it creates a myriad of issues that are detrimental to the economy.
As European nations have flirted with socialist policies, their economies have suffered and rebounded in turn.
I dont consider Britains government socialist, nor the minimum wage. Their socialist policies cannot be shown to have helped the economy though. And thrashaholic seems to have called into question your GDP claims.Quote:
Socialist governments do generally realise that you cannot suddenly take money from the rich and give it to the poor direct, as it doesn't work in the modern climate, that is why it is gradual, secret if you like. Over here people don't know about Labours socialist policies through lack of media attention and intentional shunning of them, but they are there making peoples life better - and the country is growing GDP wise faster than it ever has before, more consistently than it has before. That is after a minimum wage and vast increases in public spending on public owned institutions.
As I said earlier, eliminating a wealthy class eliminates the ability for people to create industry, which hurts the economy... kills it actually.
I think we should define exactly how far you would take socialism. Its begining to sound like you support more of an FDR style socialism than a Marxist view. I dont mind properly run welfare and safety nets, as long as the government doesn try to subversively engineer the populace through taxes. There is plenty of money to pay for helping people down on their luck without taxing wealthy people to extreme levels. Thats why I support a flat tax.Quote:
Just because there are rich people who create business' and jobs, it doesn't mean some people have to live in poverty, misery and hardship, simply because they are born into a situation with less chances. There is not justification for that, you can scream about rich people being 'needed' all you like, the reality is poor people are not desirable for a country such as mine and yours which creates such huge wealth.
The difference between socialism and responsible capitolism is that the safety nets in socialism are so great that they create dependency on the government. The safety nets in a responsible capitolist country should be designed to help people get back on their feet, not support them as they lay on the ground the rest of their life.
In any event, I think I understand your view of socialism better now. I have no problem with government supported help for the poor. However, I think in some european countries it has been taken too far and now a large group of people are living off the government at the expense of the successful people, who should be creating jobs and reinvesting in industry instead of being taxed to support the leaches. In the long run a continued destruction of the wealthy will hurt economy.
Now lets get the facts on this a little more specific - I hear this all the time from those who expouse socialism as the way to go - but all they do is throw that percentage out there like it is some great inequality.Quote:
Originally Posted by Al Khalifah
A study
Her opening line is kind of enlightening on the subject
http://falcon.arts.cornell.edu/ams3/rich1.htmlQuote:
Professor Anna Marie Smith
The following is a summary of reports on the distribution of income and wealth in contemporary American society. There are of course substantial debates among academics about this data. This is the case, first of all, because the enormous and enduring gap between the rich and the poor in this country challenges the very foundation of cherished American ideals and raises serious moral questions. However, virtually every single one of the significant truth claims that are made in the social sciences are, by their very nature, subject to contestation. No data comes to us in its "natural" or "a-political" form; information is always already shaped by the frameworks that we necessarily use to make otherwise inaccessible forces comprehensible for us. Further, all frameworks -- especially the ones that are called "objective" and "scientific" in positivistic social science disciplinary discourse -- are always shaped by political struggles and diverse ethical and moral perspectives. The advanced student is encouraged to trace the figures cited here back to their sources and to investigate the controversies behind their conceptual definitions, statistical methods, and so on.
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1. Distribution of wealth -- general
(Note: Income -- wages, salaries, etc. -- is relatively less important for the wealthiest Americans, who tend to hold the majority of their total assets in the form of property, stocks, bonds and so on. Any discussion of inequality must address the distribution of both income and wealth. Note also that while analysts may point to the fact that more Americans now have their own 401(k) or mutual funds accounts than before, these wealth gains may be more than offset by the decline in employer-funded pension plans.)
Between 1995 and 1998, all families saw an increase in their net worth, except those earning less than $10,000 per year and those headed by individuals who did not have a high school diploma. The rate of increase was greatest for those families with the largest family income. Families earning $100,000 or more each year increased their net worth 22.8% from $1,411,900 to $1,727,800 on average. Families with incomes between $10,000 and $100,000 enjoyed rates of increase in their net worth between 6.6% and 9.2% on average. Families earning less than $10,000 saw a 14.2% decrease in their average net worth, from $46,600 to $40,000. In 1998, the net worth for families earning more than $100,000 was 43.2 times greater than the net worth for families earning less than $10,000 a year on average. Family net worth also increased more slowly for non-whites or Hispanics than for white non-Hispanics, and in 1998 remained only 30.4% of the value of white family net worth on average.(all figures in 1998 dollars) (see below for more black/white comparisons) (Kennickell, A. et. al. 2000: 7)
The 2000 Federal Reserve study also found that the average consumer debt in families has increased by nearly $10,000 between 1995 and 1998. (Bernstein 2000) (A family's net worth is obtained by subtracting debts owed from the total value of assets held.)
In 1992, the richest 1 percent of American households owned about 42 percent of the total national wealth; whereas in 1982, the richest 1 percent owned 32%. (Herbert 1995)
In 1992, the concentration of wealth among the very richest in the United States is about twice that found in Britain.(Herbert 1995)
In 1995, the top 20 percent of American households owned more than 80 percent of the national wealth. (Herbert 1995) (Sandel 1996: 329)
In 1997, 50 percent of all financial assets in the US were owned by the wealthiest 1 percent of the population; and more than 75 percent of all financial assets were owned by the wealthiest 10 percent. (Cassidy 1997: 255)
Sixty percent of American families do not own any stocks at all, either directly or in a 401(K) pension plan; the majority of families who do own stocks have total holding worth less than $2,000. (Cassidy 1997: 255)
The share of marketable net worth held by the wealthiest 1 percent of American families fell 10% between 1945 and 1976, and then increased 34% between 1976 and 1983, and increased a further 39% between 1983 and 1989. Meanwhile, the share of wealth held by the bottom 80% fell by more than 20% between 1976 and 1989; by 1989, the bottom 80% of American families owned only 15% of the net worth in the U.S. Financial net worth is distributed even more unequally: in 1989, the top 1 percent of families owned 48% of the total financial wealth; while the top 20% owned 94%. (Herbert 1996a)
"By 1989, the richest half of 1% increased their share of the nation's wealth from 24% in 1983 to 29% in 1989 ... The holdings of those 500,000 families were worth $2.5 trillion in 1983. By 1989, they had risen to $5 trillion ... The holdings of those families grew by almost three times as much as the national debt grew during that same period. Those 500,000 families could have paid off the entire national debt, not just its growth, and still have owned 10% more wealth than they did in 1983." Rep. David Obey, The Nation, 8 April 1996, 7.
More than 11 million American households had negative net worth in 1998. (Rainbow/PUSH Coalition 1998)
The median net worth of the top 20% of Americans is 28 times greater than that for the poorest 205. (Rainbow/PUSH Coalition 1998)
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2. Distribution of income -- general
Between 1950 and 1978, the poorest 20 percent saw a 138 percent increase in their family income, while the top 20 percent had a 99 percent increase. This was, therefore, a period in which income inequality tended to decrease. However, between 1978 and 1994, the real incomes of the poorest 20 percent declined 17 percent while those of the wealthiest 20 percent increased 18 percent. (Corn 1995)
Whereas the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest decreased between 1947 and 1968, it increased significantly between 1968 and 1994. (Holmes 1996)
In 1997, inflation-adjusted average hourly wages were still below their 1973 levels. (Cassidy 1997: 255)
Seventy-five percent of the income gains during the 1980s and 100 percent of the increased wealth went to the top 20 percent of American households.(The New York Times 1995)
Where the top 20% of the nation's households received 40.5% of the national aggregate income in 1968, they received 46.9% in 1994; during the same period, the share of the income going to the rest of the nation's households either declined or remained stagnant. The average income for the top 20% of households increased 44% (in constant dollars) between 1968 and 1994, while that for the lowest 20% increased only 7%. In 1978: the typical CEO of a large corporation earned an income 60 times greater than that of an average worker; by 1995, this difference increased to 170 times. (Cassidy 1997: 255)
According to a study by the Twentieth Century Fund, by 1989, the inequality in the distribution of wealth in the U.S. had reached a 60-year high, and by 1995 had surpassed the levels in all other Western countries. (Herbert 1996a)
In 1979, 16 percent of all money produced by the corporate sector went to profits and interest; by 1997, this figure had risen to 21 percent (Cassidy 1997: 255)
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Economic Policy Institute reported that the income gap between the poorest and richest U.S. families continued to widen through the 1990s. Earnings for the poorest fifth of American families rose less than 1% between 1988 and 1998 but jumped 15% for the richest fifth. (Note: a family is defined as a household with at least two relative cohabiting.) Income for the poorest fifth of families rose on average $100 to $12,990, while income rose $17,870 to $137,480 for the richest fifth of families. (All figures are adjusted for inflation.) The report's authors cite as causes for the increasing gap the large capital gains from the stock market that heavily favor wealthy investors; the replacement of manufacturing jobs with lower-paying service jobs for the poorest workers; and the stagnation in the minimum wage after inflation is taken into account.(American Press 2000)
Family incomes before taxes increased for all income groups between 1995 and 1998, while unemployment was less than 5% and the consumer price index rose at an annual rate of 2.2%. The proportion of families with incomes of more than $50,000 rose about one fifth, to 33.8%, while the proportion of families with incomes below $10,000 fell about one sixth to 12.6%. The average family income for the poorest quarter of the population rose between 1989 and 1998 by 9.7%. However, average income only grew between 1995 and 1998 for families headed by individuals with at least some college education, and the rate of growth for non-white or Hispanic family income was lower than that for white non-Hispanic family income. (all figures in 1998 dollars) (see below for more black/white comparisons) (Kennickell, A. et. al. 2000: 4-5)
Between 1978 and 1998, the income gap between the rich and the poor widened in the U.S. The gap increased in New York more than in any other state. (When we divide the population according to income in five equal parts, each part is called a quintile.) The poorest quintile saw a 6% decrease in income on average in the U.S. as a whole, and a 21% decrease in New York. The second quintile saw a 1% decrease in the U.S. and a 4% decrease in New York. The third quintile saw a 5% increase in the U.S. and a 4% increase in New York. The fourth quintile saw a 11% increase in the U.S. and a 14% increase in New York. The wealthiest quintile enjoyed a 33% increase in the U.S. and a 43% increase in New York. The richest five percent of the population saw even greater increases: 55% in the U.S. and 67% in New York. (all calculations were adjusted for inflation) (Bernstein 2000)
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3. Poverty
During the 1990s, poverty among single-mother-headed families declined somewhat, but the poverty rate among all families -- approximately 8 percent -- remained largely unchanged from the 1980 and 1990 levels.(Kilborn, 2002: A14)
[The poverty line was officially defined as $17,600 for a family of four in 2000.]
For the people who did fall below the poverty line in 1999 and 2000, their incomes were so low that they fell further below this figure than in any other year since record-keeping began in 1979. Experts attributed the unprecedented drop in their incomes to cuts in food stamps and cash assistance programs, and to the declining participation in poverty programs as a whole. (Seelye 2001: A12)
In 1998 -- a year in which the 1990s economic boom produced record wealth for the richest households --, nearly one in five American children lived in a household that fell under the poverty line. (Henwood 2000: 8)
A 1989 Gallup poll found that 55% of Americans believed that lack of effort by the poor was the principal reason for poverty. Nearly two thirds believed that welfare programs reduced the incentive to work.(Giddens: 1996: 170)
Typically, about half of those officially living in poverty are actually working, but hold jobs that pay so little that they fall under the poverty line. (Giddens: 1996: 170)
Only 2% of able-bodied adult men under the age of sixty-five are on welfare. (Giddens: 1996: 170)
The majority of poor people do not receive welfare benefits because although they fall under the poverty line, their earnings make them ineligible for assistance. Only one third of the poor depend on welfare benefits. (Giddens: 1996: 170)
Fewer than 1% of welfare applications involve fraudulent claims. As much as 10% of income taxes is lost every year because of mis-reporting, evasion or fraud. (Giddens: 1996: 170)
One out of every four children in the United States now lives in poverty. (Herbert 1996b)
Half of the Americans who live below the poverty line are elderly. (Herbert 1996b)
Between 1979 and 1994, the number of children under the age of 6 who were living under the poverty line in the U.S. grew from 3.5 million to 6.1 million. (Herbert 1996b)
While 18% of children under 6 lived under the poverty line in 1979, 25% did so in 1994. (Herbert 1996b)
In 1994, 36% of the children residing in large cities lived under the poverty line, as compared to 17% of the children in suburban areas and 27% of the children in rural areas. (Herbert 1996b)
The Urban Institute estimated that the welfare law passed in August, 1996 will increase the total number of children in poverty by 1.1 million. (Herbert 1996b)
Wages for working poor adults have declined to the extent that 62% of the children under the poverty line in 1994 had at least one parent who was employed; less than a third of these children lived in families that relied exclusively on public assistance. (Herbert 1996b)
Young children in poverty are more likely to be born at low birthweight, to be hospitalized during childhood, to die in infancy or early childhood, to receive lower-quality medical care, to experience hunger and malnutrition, to experience high levels of conflict in their homes, to be confronted by violence and environmental hazards in their neighborhoods, and to experience harmful delays in their physical, cognitive, language and emotional development (Herbert 1996b)
I'm not a fan of socialism, I was merely pointing out an innacuracy in Franconius argument.Quote:
Now lets get the facts on this a little more specific - I hear this all the time from those who expouse socialism as the way to go - but all they do is throw that percentage out there like it is some great inequality.
What is your argument? Or am I supposed to read all of that and then try to guess what your point is?
That the figure you used is questionable because it is skewed by the politics - and that its also not as accurate as one would like to think because of the exact same reason.Quote:
Originally Posted by Al Khalifah
Citing wealth distrubtion as an arguement for or against socialism is really nothing but skewing data to get an emotional appeal from the target audience.
The point of what I posted is that there are many such studies and many say different things - many of them often confilcting within there own content.
JAG, I don't disagree with much of what you said there. But for the most part, I would not call what you are describing "socialism." I would think of it more as "enlightened capitalism" acting in its own best interests. Kind of like when Henry Ford intentionally kept his car prices low enough and his employees' wages high enough so that they could all buy one of his cars if they so desired. It's just good business to help people help themselves.Quote:
Originally Posted by JAG
That's why the companies that treat their employees the best always have a better chance of being successful. Not to mention the fact that if you have happy employees it keeps those insidious labor unions from sticking their filthy camel noses under the proverbial tent flaps.
Do you like my sig? ~;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Goofball
If I do say so myself, it's a work of pure genius. I smell a Pulitzer...Quote:
Originally Posted by Devastatin Dave
~:cool: