Where the left got it right. Income Inequality

[robosmith]

6 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

The Powers that be have been lying since the first Sumerian shaman declared to the people that the animal sacrifice to Anu was a success.

I'm sorry to pop your cherry on that one.  

In other news, Clinton DID have sex with that woman Ms. Lewinsky.

But did he have "sexual RELATIONS". which is what he denied? And is a BJ really "intercourse"?

Quote

Sex and sexual relations, while often used interchangeably, have distinct meanings. Sex primarily refers to the biological act of intercourse, while sexual relations encompass a broader range of physical and emotional interactions, including intimacy and connection. 

 

[Nationalist]

1 hour ago, Michael Hardner said:

1. Ah ok, good.
2. *I* am ?  No.  I'm not.
3. The Progressive movement, which I assume means the 60s "libs" allowed people to pursue things that they otherwise were prevented from pursuing... ie more "freedom"
4. It's worse than before.  Lots on the right are decrying our political systems for that very reason.

1. 😜

2. Ok strictly speaking, I suppose you are not. But you do contribute to a social issue by coming on heavily for one side of the disagreement. You know my stance on that. We can do both without causing inflation.

3. The Hippies wanted to grow their hair, smoke dope, make love not war. So I suppose in some ways you're right. Progies started decades ago. Many of them wound up on Quadra Island...so I've seen. If I remember correctly, both political parties were opposed to the riots and madness. Today the Democrat Party and even the Canadian Liberals, go as far as encouraging such behavior. 

You say "freedom" rather mockingly. Tell me...do you value law and order? You value institutions. You must value law and order. This is "The Social Contract". Now...are you free to donate to charities? I do. I'm sure you do too. I do it because I'm actually happy to help.

But when I'm told i'm donating my money to pay for people filling up Niagra hotels that just...showed up and learned to say "asylum"...now I'm a tad concerned. I dont remember paying for hundreds of thousands of refugees being part of that Social Contract.

You mock freedom because you dont like it. You want absolute institutional control.

4. And what's not to decry? 

[User]

2 hours ago, paxamericana said:

Not what the data says. The middle class is shrinking. You can't bury your head in the sand or live in an echo chamber. This is becoming a big issue.

First, this was not a discussion about the shrinking middle class. 

Second, that is not a chart showing the middle class shrinking. That is a chart showing income share. 

The data shows that the median income has been increasing for the middle class while those in the middle class have gone down from about 60% to 50% since about 1970.

In conclusion, once again, you just keep throwing crap at the wall and still have no consistent clearly defined point here. 

 

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

The fact it leads to social upheaval when it gets to far out of balance.

Example? What is "too far" out of balance?

 

[User]

36 minutes ago, robosmith said:

But did he have "sexual RELATIONS". which is what he denied? And is a BJ really "intercourse"?

Of course, the biggest liar on the forum is going to defend Clinton lying about his behavior... 

 

[gatomontes99]

8 minutes ago, User said:

Of course, the biggest liar on the forum is going to defend Clinton lying about his behavior... 

 

Oh My gawd that was so so so bad. "It wasn't a sexual relations. It was just a relationship that had a momentary sexual aspect to it."

Even he can't beleive that. If he does...good gawd. 

[eyeball]

11 minutes ago, User said:

Example? What is "too far" out of balance?

Haiti, Venezuela, prewar Germany to name a few. The French Revolution, Russia, China. Heads have been cracked in your country to on occasion when unions got a little to full of themselves.

The paper revisits the age-old question of how economic inequalities may affect the emergence of political violence.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305750X24002900

[herbie]

Oh FFS. WTF does Bill Clinton have to do with income equality?
And every rich philanthropist is 'on the left' too?

[User]

52 minutes ago, eyeball said:

The paper revisits the age-old question of how economic inequalities

We are not talking about "economic inequality"

Come back when you have something substantive to offer. 

[paxamericana]

1 hour ago, User said:

consistent clearly defined point

Affordability. It is a problem for poor people when rich people jack up prices.

 

[User]

2 minutes ago, paxamericana said:

Affordability. It is a problem for poor people when rich people jack up prices.

 

More gibberish. Just throwing random crap at the wall. The discussion was not about a claim that rich people jack up prices. 

But if this is what you want to discuss now, how are rich people jacking up prices?

 

[paxamericana]

53 minutes ago, User said:

 how are rich people jacking up prices?

 

I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt here and assume you’re trying to have a honest discussion. 

Through the financial system and leveraging credit.
The typical loan uses income to debt ratio, here in the states it is 1:3 . Meaning you can buy 3x your income. The math works out that a millionaire can buy a 3 million dollar worth of house(s). A person making 200k can afford 600k. Assuming it takes 10 months to build a house, the millionaire can snag up 5x the house of the person making 200k. But as every transaction raises real estate appraisal and no one sells at a loss, that house is no longer 600k, it is a value higher and is now out of reach for the person with a 200k income. Add in another buyer who is also a millionaire and that 600k house is now bidded at a much higher and faster price closer to 3 million, their disposal purchasing power. And granted as you mentioned before if there were more houses available this would lower the price but the point I raise was that it takes less time to apply for a loan than to actually build that house.

We can discuss other example of your choice but I assume you all on here are in your near retirement if not already retired and understand how real estate financial asset are appraised. 

Edited August 21, 2025 by paxamericana

[User]

10 minutes ago, paxamericana said:

I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt here and assume you’re trying to have a honest discussion. 

OK. 

10 minutes ago, paxamericana said:

Through the financial system and leveraging credit....

This is not a real explanation. It is just another vague, baseless assertion. 

Rich people are not buying up homes as you say nor are they all leveraging themselves with debt as you say. Nor does it mean they buy multiple houses... buying a bigger better house is not jacking up the prices of homes for everyone else as you are arguing. 

12 minutes ago, paxamericana said:

We can discuss other example of your choice but I assume you all on here are in your near retirement if not already retired and understand how real estate financial asset are appraised

Yeah, I understand these things... which is why I am still trying to figure out what you are trying to argue on here. 

 

[CdnFox]

12 hours ago, paxamericana said:

Income inequality refers to the uneven distribution of income within a population, meaning some individuals or groups earn significantly more than others.

This creates third order effects such as affordability due to the high leverage of the hyperfinanical lending system. Those with more money can jack up the prices because we can print more money faster than natural means of production say growing crops or building new apartment buildings. Demand in effect out strips supply. 

I would disagree. I've never seen any evidence of any kind of correlation between the number of very rich and high inflationary rates.

In fact if anything the opposite appears to be true. During some of them. Of extreme wealth creation for the very wealthy inflation has been at its lowest

Consider your graph for example, we've had extremely low Inflation rates between 2000 and 2020. Yet according to you that time encompassed a huge amount of increased wages for the very wealthy

So it would seem that you're just proving your own theory.

I'm afraid you haven't made a case to demonstrate why income inequality is a bad thing at this point

[gatomontes99]

9 hours ago, paxamericana said:

The problem with income inequality is affordability. Affordability for those who are on the lower bracket. Essentially inflation without the wage rise to account for it. 

Well, no, we had wage increases mostly because labor shortages resulting from boomers retiring.

[eyeball]

4 hours ago, User said:

We are not talking about "economic inequality"

Yeah you're right, its about the left. It usually is with you clowns.