Income gap widens between Canada's rich and poor, OECD study says

[fairvotecanada]

Well, those who pay taxes, perhaps. I'm guessing you aahhh, not so much.

I might not anymore as I am handicapped; but I once did too, pay your over-blown salary of paper pusher...

[Kitch]

On the contrary. I'm quite intelligent and well-read.

You, on the other hand, seem incapable of debating or discussing anything with resorting to emotion. Nor, I must say, does your writing evidence much in the way of skill or education.

Problems with basic English comprehension? I said "most" not "all". The two words are not synonyms. Have someone better educated than you explain what a dictionary is and look them up.

If they made good choices, then they'll have savings, won't be deep in debt, and, presuming they have skills, will be able to find other jobs, or retrain for them. It's all about making good or bad choices. I understand this concept will confuse you as your "profession" hates to ever blame anyone for doing anything wrong. Teachers who suck at their jobs can't be fired, and children who don't bother to learn rarely fail their year. Too bad real life isn't like that.

I am helping by paying taxes, which I have always paid, and by contributing to various charities - by choice. And the only people I'm putting down are those who accept their situation and are willing to live in poverty for decades rather than explore other options.

Situating yourself on a higher horse does not equate to higher education. You're a clown and me saying so says nothing about my intellectual capacity nor my ability to teach. And yes, I am passionate about some things. Anger doesn't immediately make me wrong... but your tunnel vision on this issue does prevent you from acknowledging its complexity.

Most = majority, no? You're right though. My question wasn't a good one. I'm challenging you on the notion that poor = result of bad choices more often than other reasons... not the number of possible reasons.

Don't let YOUR little feelings get hurt because I'm noticing the selfish, CLOSED MINDED character of your posts.

So nothing is left to chance? It's ALL about good and bad choices? You ridicule me for my tendency to be emotional yet you lack the capacity to experience empathy, it seems.

[Kitch]

Who am I keeping down? I support skills training and education - I support them quite strongly. I think our skills training programs should be greatly expanded rather than warehousing people on welfare.

Who's disagreeing with you on that?

What of a person who is skilled, in a division of labour sort of way, who makes a good living and provides a good life for their family... until an entire industry craps the bed? Such as manufacturing in Ontario?

You're being hard on people who suffer from consequences rather than decisions.

[Kitch]

Most of the "wretched souls" I've seen who are "poor" still manage to have large TVs with cable, stereos, DVD players, computers, MP3 players, cell phones, and more than enough money to pay for booze and cigarettes. Nor are do any of them appear to be wasting away for want of food. On the contrary, most seem to be quite fat.

I think Shakespeare would have been quite startled to go into a Canadian housing project in search of his wretched souls and see how many people were grossly overweight.

He'd also be shocked to see how many people so far into the future are unable or unwilling to open their minds to possibilities.

You miss the point of the quotation though. Don't comment on my education.

[Kitch]

Funny, I would have said "If you tremble with indignation at every injustice you're an emotionally overrought twit and I want no part of you."

That's because you seem awfully concerned with yourself.

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy:

that is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness."

John Kenneth Galbraith

And I want no part of a society filled with people like you. Would it even be fair to call that a 'society'?

[Riverwind]

I know that by 'problem' you're referring to the poor people who take advantage of social assistance... what does that have to do with the income gap?

Frankly, I find these discussions of "income gaps" as thinly veiled appeals to communism. Capitalism will produce income inequality and complaining about it is pointless. The more interesting questions are:

1) Does everyone, regardless of income, have access to the basic necessities of life.

2) Does everyone have access to the education/training required that would allow them or their children to improve their lot.

If the answer to both of those questions is yes then no one should care that the richest people have X times the income of the poorest.

Of course, there will be arguments about what the basic necessities are and what constitutes access to training/education. There is also a question of what do about freeloaders who really are not interested in helping themselves and spend their time whining about how society 'owes' them a living. Some people simply dismiss the freeloader problem and are perfectly happy with a system which feeds 9 freeloaders for every person who is legimately in need. Others want a balance and recognize that limiting the number of freeloaders will result in some people with legimate needs falling through the cracks.

Edited October 24, 2008 by Riverwind

[marksman]

Who am I keeping down? I support skills training and education - I support them quite strongly. I think our skills training programs should be greatly expanded rather than warehousing people on welfare.

That's commendable. But you've also taken a very narrow view of what poverty is and reject any attempts to combat poverty outside of a very narrow range of options. You might not be consciously trying to keep anyone down but advocating simplistic solutions to complex problems has that effect. Characterizing people as either disabled or lazy drunks doesn't help anything.

Victim? Victim of their own stupidity and lousy choices, often enough.

That would be blaming the victim. No room for external causes. Poverty must only be caused by stupidity and bad choices is that it?

For the most part, in Canada, it IS the parents fault. If kids are going hungry it's almost certainly because mom is spending that money on her cell phone bills, or cable, or booze.

I'd be happy to read the study that shows that.

Here's an amazing concept for you to try and wrap your mind around: some people ARE superior to others.

Yes but it's never the people who say that. And never the people who take such a narrow view of reality so that they can feel better about themselves.

[Alta4ever]

Who's disagreeing with you on that?

What of a person who is skilled, in a division of labour sort of way, who makes a good living and provides a good life for their family... until an entire industry craps the bed? Such as manufacturing in Ontario?

You're being hard on people who suffer from consequences rather than decisions.

How much union interference was invovled surely the government, markets and CEO's are all that can be blamed. GM, Ford, and Chrysler suffer at the hands of a far to powerful union, that will even dictate to the companies which vehicles will be manufactured in which plants.

[Alta4ever]

Frankly, I find these discussions of "income gaps" as thinly veiled appeals to communism. Capitalism will produce income inequality and complaining about it is pointless. The more interesting questions are:

1) Does everyone, regardless of income, have access to the basic necessities of life.

2) Does everyone have access to the education/training required that would allow them or their children to improve their lot.

If the answer to both of those questions is yes then no one should care that the richest people have X times the income of the poorest.

Of course, there will be arguments about what the basic necessities are and what constitutes access to training/education. There is also a question of what do about freeloaders who really are not interested in helping themselves and spend their time whining about how society 'owes' them a living. Some people simply dismiss the freeloader problem and are perfectly happy with a system which feeds 9 freeloaders for every person who is legimately in need. Others want a balance and recognize that limiting the number of freeloaders will result in some people with legimate needs falling through the cracks.

"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries." Winston S. Churchill

[marksman]

I'm not sure you can conclude that. Statistical correlation does not mean a cause and effect relationship. There are many factors which influence the crime rate.

But despite increasing income inequality Canada's homicide rate has been on a general decline since the 1970s.

There are lots of factors but if you'd read the link and the sources cited there you'd see that those factors were controlled for in the studies. The evidence shows that you can say there's a link between economic inequality and homicide rate. It'd be nice to believe otherwise but that's not what the evidence says at this point.

As has been pointed out the size of the gap doesn't imply that people are getting poorer or less healthy, in fact it is likely people have never been as healthy.

But you're guessing again. It's been shown that socioeconomic status affects health where poorer people are less healthy than richer people. This doesn't just apply to some poverty line cutoff where only people below that line are less healthy. It's a constant gradient. Poor people are less healthy than middle class people who're less healthy than rich people. It's true that poor people in Canada may be better off than poor people in the US but that doesn't change the fact that within Canada itself increased economic inequality means increased health inequality. And that should be a cause for concern or at least further investigation.

Remember I was answering the question about why economic inequality matters. I'm not saying the OECD results show that poor Canadians are dying in the streets.

It depends upon what you mean by efficiency. (Efficiency of consumption or Efficiency of production). In general society rewards individuals for production though higher income. A wider gap can be taken to mean that resources and rewards are being efficently focused on those who produce the most and are most valued. Why does it matter that a poorer person can more efficiently consume a dollar than a rich one?

You're speculating again. A wider gap can also be taken to mean that resources and rewards are being inefficiently focused away from those who can produce because the rich keep all of this to themselves rather than allowing others to reach their economic potential.

Efficiency doesn't mean efficiency of consumption or production. There're other measures. And utility isn't the same as efficiency.

Please explain. How does income inequality have a negative effect on economic growth?

I know we don't all have time to do research on every topic that comes up here but I included the link for a reason. It has information on the definition of economic utility, distributive efficiency and the possible effects of economic inequality on economic growth. I'm not an expert but much of the research seems to show that economic inequality is overall more bad than good.

But it isn't hard to come up with examples of why economic inequality can have a negative impact on growth. Growth comes from hard work and risk taking. If most wealth is concentrated in a few hands then what incentive is there for risk taking? All the hard work can be done by the poor in industries that keep the rich in comfortable lifestyles without really innovating or risking their investments. A lack of resources keeps those at the lower end from making meaningful attempts at starting their own businesses.

That's a more extreme example and doesn't seem to be the case in Canada. And economic inequality does give an incentive to people to work harder to get richer. But I don't think Canada was at the point where we were so equal that incentive disappeared so to see the gap widening to me seems more likely a bad thing than a good thing.

[normanchateau]

Then you should tell Harper to stop cutting all the programs directed at the help to these groups; you can visit my site for a link to these "cuts" on the poor/disabled and disadvantaged people of this country.

Harper had to cut those programs. The money he saved on programs for the poor and disabled allowed him to increase spending on programs he considered important:

http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=726631

For the current fiscal year, which ends March 31, 2009, Harper's government voted to spend more than $4 billion on cultural programs, including the CBC, the Canada Arts Council, the National Gallery of Canada and the Department of Canadian Heritage. That amount is $660 million or 19.7 per cent more than was spent in fiscal 2006, the last year when the Liberals controlled the purse strings.

Overall program spending during that same period is up 18.6 per cent. In other words, Conservatives have boosted spending on arts programs faster than they have boosted overall government spending.

For the current fiscal year, which ends March 31, 2009, Parliament has voted to spend more than $4 billion on cultural programs, including the CBC, the Canada Arts Council, the National Gallery of Canada and the Department of Canadian Heritage. That amount is $660 million or 19.7 per cent more than was spent in fiscal 2006, the last year when the Liberals controlled the purse strings.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, for example, will receive $1.1 billion from Harper this year, an increase of $133 million or 13.5 per cent compared to the last year under the Liberals.

Other agencies include:

• The Department of Canadian Heritage will spend $1.4 billion this year, up $273 million or 24.4 per cent compared to 2006.

• The Canada Council for the Arts will spend $181 million this year, up $30.3 million or 20.2 per cent.

• The National Arts Centre Corporation will spend nearly $50 million this year, up $18.3 million or nearly 60 per cent compared to the Liberals.

• The National Gallery of Canada will spend $53.3 million, up $8.8 million or nearly 20 per cent.

So for Harper to increase arts spending more than overall government spending, something had to be cut...programs for the disabled. Harper has a warped sense of priorities but hey, he's a tight-fisted fiscal conservative claim his supporters.

[marksman]

Frankly, I find these discussions of "income gaps" as thinly veiled appeals to communism. Capitalism will produce income inequality and complaining about it is pointless.

I find those that immediately label discussions like this as appeals to communism are those that've already made up their minds about how they think about socioeconomic status and don't want to consider any statistics or evidence that might upset their world view. Capitalism does produce income inequality and that's not necessarily a bad thing. But that doesn't make it a good thing. It can be a bad thing and complaining about the negative effects of income inequality is not pointless.

Of course, there will be arguments about what the basic necessities are and what constitutes access to training/education. There is also a question of what do about freeloaders who really are not interested in helping themselves and spend their time whining about how society 'owes' them a living. Some people simply dismiss the freeloader problem and are perfectly happy with a system which feeds 9 freeloaders for every person who is legimately in need. Others want a balance and recognize that limiting the number of freeloaders will result in some people with legimate needs falling through the cracks.

Others want a balance? Your description of the options available is 1 sided. Some people dismiss the freeloader problem. And some people dismiss the legitimate needs of poor people. The people that want a balance recognize that some freeloaders will get into the system and some legitimate people will be missed. Within that balance there's the camp that says it's better to try to help more legitimate people and we'll try to limit freeloaders as best we can. Compared to the other camp who want a balance that focus on eliminating freeloaders and say we'll try to cover as many legitimate people as we can.

Personally I think the focus should be on helping those in need and not on limiting access. But that doesn't mean I dismiss the freeloader problem.

[August1991]

I read this news report and I noted that it failed to note a key detail: Canada's demographics.

In the period 1995-2005, Canada's baby-boomers entered their prime earning years. They were rich. I would expect this to continue and between 2005-2015, the difference between rich and poor will become even more pronounced.

This entire thread assumes that rich people are one group and poor people another. In fact, we all tend to be poor when we're young and then we become richer with age. In Canada, when we talk about rich and poor, we're talking about the same people but at different stages in their life.

What is the English expression? Salad days?

My salad days,

When I was green in judgment: cold in blood

Shakespeare

We have all lived through salad days. So, it is meaningless to discuss statistics on rich and poor in rich countries without reference to demographics.

I'm working on a book right now about people who live in the rain forest in Panama. People in Canada have no idea what poverty is.

My thinking too.

[marksman]

I read this news report and I noted that it failed to note a key detail: Canada's demographics.

Aaarrggh! 2 seconds of google searching or reading the posts in this topic can answer some of these questions.

http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....st&p=354216

August1991 you're absolutely right that demographics plays a part in this. The article didn't say this but the country notes for the report did. 1 of the reasons why I'd like to see the real report. I'm just not going to pay $100 for it.

The part you'd be interested in is this

One fifth of the increase in income inequality is linked to changes in the age and household

structure of the Canadian population, such as growing shares of single-parent households

or people living alone.

The article didn't report this part of the country notes. It also didn't get all of its information correct so I'm guessing this was a rush job that turned out poorly.

[Riverwind]

Personally I think the focus should be on helping those in need and not on limiting access. But that doesn't mean I dismiss the freeloader problem.

It is not that simple since a poorly designed system will actually increase the number of freeloaders.

For example, a generous system that provided more than minimum wage which discourage people from taking minimum wage jobs.

Providing generous support to single mothers will encourage more mothers to keep children they should be aborting or giving up for adoption.

IOW - any system has to have benefits low enough to ensure that people have no incentive to stay in the system if they really do have choices.

[Renegade]

There are lots of factors but if you'd read the link and the sources cited there you'd see that those factors were controlled for in the studies. The evidence shows that you can say there's a link between economic inequality and homicide rate. It'd be nice to believe otherwise but that's not what the evidence says at this point.

Again, "link" doesn't mean "cause".

But you're guessing again. It's been shown that socioeconomic status affects health where poorer people are less healthy than richer people. This doesn't just apply to some poverty line cutoff where only people below that line are less healthy. It's a constant gradient. Poor people are less healthy than middle class people who're less healthy than rich people. It's true that poor people in Canada may be better off than poor people in the US but that doesn't change the fact that within Canada itself increased economic inequality means increased health inequality. And that should be a cause for concern or at least further investigation.

Remember I was answering the question about why economic inequality matters. I'm not saying the OECD results show that poor Canadians are dying in the streets.

No I'm not guessing when I say that an increased income gap doesn't imply that poor people are getting less healthy. That is a statistical fact. Yes poor people are more likely to be less healthy than rich ones (to a point), but an increased GAP doesn't imply that they were less healthy than before. For example both the poor and the rich can be absolutely wealthier (and by implication healthier) than they were 10 years ago, and have a larger income gap than they had before. You mention a health inequity. First, does a health inequity matter? Second, what is the health equity in societies such as Canada which provide public healthcare?

You're speculating again. A wider gap can also be taken to mean that resources and rewards are being inefficiently focused away from those who can produce because the rich keep all of this to themselves rather than allowing others to reach their economic potential.

Efficiency doesn't mean efficiency of consumption or production. There're other measures. And utility isn't the same as efficiency.

I'm speculating only as much as you are. What I'm pointing out is that your contention of increased efficiency depends upon the way you measure efficiency. And as you agree, utility isn't the same as efficiency. So why is maximizing utility important to society?

I know we don't all have time to do research on every topic that comes up here but I included the link for a reason. It has information on the definition of economic utility, distributive efficiency and the possible effects of economic inequality on economic growth. I'm not an expert but much of the research seems to show that economic inequality is overall more bad than good.

I've read the link. As described there are both good and bad implications of economic inequity. What is not there and we are left to speculate is at what cost are we willing to reduce economic inequity and how are we ensured that resulting effects of reducing economic inequity are worth the cost?

But it isn't hard to come up with examples of why economic inequality can have a negative impact on growth. Growth comes from hard work and risk taking. If most wealth is concentrated in a few hands then what incentive is there for risk taking? All the hard work can be done by the poor in industries that keep the rich in comfortable lifestyles without really innovating or risking their investments. A lack of resources keeps those at the lower end from making meaningful attempts at starting their own businesses.

I don't see this speculative example is valid. When wealth is concentranted in he hands of the rich, they are more likely to invest it to generate more wealth. When that wealth is distributed to the poorer, it is spent to meet immediate needs.

[White Doors]

This entire thread assumes that rich people are one group and poor people another. In fact, we all tend to be poor when we're young and then we become richer with age. In Canada, when we talk about rich and poor, we're talking about the same people but at different stages in their life.

EXACTLY

Even they way they word it, it is clear that they are trying to imply that the 'rich' and the 'poor' are a static group of people.

What they should be looking in to, and I have yet to see a study that does this, is how 'easy' it is for people to be upwardly mobile. ie: If you put the effort in, get the education and training that you need, how long does it take you to move up through the classes? THAT is the key question that should be studied.

Right now what they are really studying is how much more people who are in the peak of their careers earn compared to someone that is just starting out. big deal. There should be a large difference.

[Jerry J. Fortin]

Thew "rich" are defined as folks with high "net" worth. Between the falling dollar and the stock market crash these folks are about to take a big hit. Now the icing on the cake would be a credit crunch that pulls the rug out from under the housing sector. When that happens the remaining leverage some of these "rich" folks have on paper will disappear.

The key to surviving the coming months will be not merely getting "liquid" but instead being out of debt entirely aw well as not requiring credit at all. My advice? Get out of debt, stay out of debt. Buy stocks and bonds with your own money, not borrowed money. Buy precious metals in the form of coins or wafers. Buy real estate only to rent out, and only then if you can afford not to borrow money to do it. You can assume an existing mortgage as long as you can pay it down enough to avoid the coming loss on real estate values.

Give it time, say 6-8 years before things turn around.

[marksman]

It is not that simple since a poorly designed system will actually increase the number of freeloaders.

For example, a generous system that provided more than minimum wage which discourage people from taking minimum wage jobs.

Providing generous support to single mothers will encourage more mothers to keep children they should be aborting or giving up for adoption.

IOW - any system has to have benefits low enough to ensure that people have no incentive to stay in the system if they really do have choices.

It seems like you're equating focusing on people who've got legitimate needs with a poorly designed system. Having that focus doesn't automatically mean you'll have a poorly designed system. We can agree that a poorly designed system isn't in anyone's interest.

Support should be given so that people can meet their needs. Minimum wage shouldn't enter into the equation at this point. Once you know the level where those needs are met then if you want to give incentives to people to get jobs raise the minimum wage if you've got to. But giving support that can't even meet basic needs doesn't help anyone and helps to keep people poor. That's why I'm saying focus on the needs 1st then do what you can to limit freeloaders. So we're clear basic needs doesn't mean 4 bedroom house and playstations for everyone.

Noone should have to give up their child because they can't afford food or shelter. Our system shouldn't force families apart.

IOW any system has to have benefits that ensure basic needs are met so that people have the chance to improve their situation and get out of the system. Incentives to get out of the system need to come after these basic needs are met.

[Kitch]

Frankly, I find these discussions of "income gaps" as thinly veiled appeals to communism. Capitalism will produce income inequality and complaining about it is pointless. The more interesting questions are:

1) Does everyone, regardless of income, have access to the basic necessities of life.

2) Does everyone have access to the education/training required that would allow them or their children to improve their lot.

If the answer to both of those questions is yes then no one should care that the richest people have X times the income of the poorest.

Of course, there will be arguments about what the basic necessities are and what constitutes access to training/education. There is also a question of what do about freeloaders who really are not interested in helping themselves and spend their time whining about how society 'owes' them a living. Some people simply dismiss the freeloader problem and are perfectly happy with a system which feeds 9 freeloaders for every person who is legimately in need. Others want a balance and recognize that limiting the number of freeloaders will result in some people with legimate needs falling through the cracks.

That's quite the accusation. People who desire equality are necessarily communists? I don't think people really care that there are some very wealthy people out there, but they do care when people don't have access to the things you listed... and it's not a merely interesting question. It's an extremely important one.

I'm not advocating for giving a free ride to freeloaders. On the contrary I think that freeloading is one of the worst offences that a person can commit. There's no reason why we can't prevent this type of fraud (that I'm aware of).

If our economy is consistently growing (overall) and yet there are still people who don't have access to the basics then we're doing something wrong. Some may say "it's the survival of the fittest!" Well, I don't know how I feel about that given that we claim to be superior to other living things in the wild in terms of our ability/desire to be civilized. But regardless, the next time you watch a nature video in which some predator is looking for some prey, take note of whether it is always the weak that are attacked. Sometimes animals get into large groups (think fish, for example) to protect themselves but the ones who are unlucky enough to be on the perimeter of the group are the most vulnerable... not necessarily the weakest.

[Renegade]

Noone should have to give up their child because they can't afford food or shelter.

Er, No one should have a child if they can't afford to provide food or shelter.

[Kitch]

How much union interference was invovled surely the government, markets and CEO's are all that can be blamed. GM, Ford, and Chrysler suffer at the hands of a far to powerful union, that will even dictate to the companies which vehicles will be manufactured in which plants.

I won't deny that some unions are too powerful and can be as greedy as some corporations. That's a problem.

But unions are, sometimes, necessary. Companies should not be able to exploit employees, but employees should also not be able to exploit this. I can't offer any solutions for that.

That doesn't say anything about my original point though. You're saying that because unions are powerful, in the case of auto workers, the companies were forced to make moves, and that it was not the economy that initiated the plant closures. That can be debated, but the point is this; what of the employee that voted against strikes and anything that unions typically vote on? That person cannot be blamed for the power of the union and therefore can't be blamed for the circumstances that they're suffering from.

Now, I'm digging here obviously. Who knows how likely it is that such a union member exists (realistically... all you union haters out there can't claim to KNOW either). But my overall point is that people aren't always responsible for their circumstances. Sometimes things happen by chance or as a result of OTHER peoples' decisions.

[Kitch]

"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries." Winston S. Churchill

So we have to choose one or the other?

We have to be completely equal (in terms of finances) or the opposite?

Mr. Churchill was a smart man indeed. But this particular quotation doesn't do justice to the debate. How can you possibly make definitive statements about models of society in one sentence?

[marksman]

Again, "link" doesn't mean "cause".

I'm not saying economic inequality is a 1 to 1 cause for crime. But higher inequality correlates with higher homicide rates so it isn't unreasonable to say that growing inequality is worrisome from that point of view. You tried to say there were other factors but the evidence shows those factors were controlled for when proving that correlation.

No I'm not guessing when I say that an increased income gap doesn't imply that poor people are getting less healthy. That is a statistical fact.

I was referring to your guess that people are most likely healthier. Maybe that's true but you'd need some evidence to show that not just your feelings on the matter. Without something concrete it's just a guess.

First, does a health inequity matter? Second, what is the health equity in societies such as Canada which provide public healthcare?

I think it matters. Especially if we see that the inequality is a large 1. Growing economic inequality means we should probably look into this as well.

There was a study comparing England with the US. I think it found that the English were better off. I don't have the link but I'm sure if you search for SAS gradient and health it'll come up. Your question is better suited for google.

I'm speculating only as much as you are. What I'm pointing out is that your contention of increased efficiency depends upon the way you measure efficiency. And as you agree, utility isn't the same as efficiency. So why is maximizing utility important to society?

That's exactly my point. We can both speculate on what a wider gap means. Is it really so hard for people to see that a widening gap raises questions and concerns that we should investigate?

Your question on utility is better suited for an economics class. I don't know offhand any good intro to economics links but I'm sure you can find some. Or an economics textbook at a library.

I've read the link. As described there are both good and bad implications of economic inequity. What is not there and we are left to speculate is at what cost are we willing to reduce economic inequity and how are we ensured that resulting effects of reducing economic inequity are worth the cost?

The 1st question can never be answered by a study like this. It's up to us to decide at what cost we're willing to do something. Polls will answer that not studies on statistics.

Your 2nd question has an easy answer. We aren't. We're never ensured of anything with any government program. How are we ensured that a tax cut will deliver the promised benefits? We're not. See Reagan's policies for an example. How are we ensured that daycare will be improved with a small tax credit instead of investment in daycare spaces? We're not. Those questions only get answered in hindsight years after policies are put in place.

I don't see this speculative example is valid. When wealth is concentranted in he hands of the rich, they are more likely to invest it to generate more wealth. When that wealth is distributed to the poorer, it is spent to meet immediate needs.

You're entitled to your opinion. My speculations are just as valid as yours. I've even said that the wealthy do invest their money. Just like you so our examples aren't that different. But I'm saying it isn't hard to see that many won't be willing to risk their fortunes and will choose safer investments that usually lead to less growth than riskier investments.

It seems that for some reason you think spending on immediate needs means the money just disappears. But you've missed part of the problem. If fewer people have greater wealth then there's less people out there with the opportunity to take risks and innovate. It doesn't seem a big stretch to think that less opportunities mean less growth.

Either way recent studies seem to show that higher inequality leads to less growth and more growth leads to greater inequality.

It's obvious that information like this leads to more questions and areas for potential concern. Saying a statistic like this doesn't matter ignores reality. This statistic can't be used on its own as the basis for any great policy change but it can form the basis for more research and should be a part of any policy rationale.

[Kitch]

EXACTLY

Even they way they word it, it is clear that they are trying to imply that the 'rich' and the 'poor' are a static group of people.

What they should be looking in to, and I have yet to see a study that does this, is how 'easy' it is for people to be upwardly mobile. ie: If you put the effort in, get the education and training that you need, how long does it take you to move up through the classes? THAT is the key question that should be studied.

Right now what they are really studying is how much more people who are in the peak of their careers earn compared to someone that is just starting out. big deal. There should be a large difference.

When did age become part of the discussion? A few of you, now, have claimed that rich and poor people are not static groups. Well, young and old are, and you're trying to link wealth to age.