On the heels of the US government's announcement that personal income of Americans has dropped for the first time in two years, Britain's Richard Wilkinson -- co-author with Kate Pickett of the book Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone -- came to Washington this month to talk with Congress about income inequality and its deleterious impacts on society.
Whether any of this will be news to an American audience is doubtful, as no one is under the illusion that the US is doing well economically. In fact, last month Americans learned they have the highest poverty rate since the second world war (one in six Americans living below the poverty line) and the highest youth poverty rate (one in five young people, with Hispanic youth suffering most). Last month also concluded multiple "Made in America" tours by the congressional black and progressive caucuses who were responding to the cry of the unemployed, which is only getting louder and more desperate. More recently, the Warren Buffett-inspired tax debate, regarding whether millionaires should pay at least the same tax rate as the common worker, has surfaced fractiously, pitting President Obama and Democrats against most Republicans. Underlying these recent trends, the US still maintains one the highest income inequality rates among all wealthy countries.
How vexing it is to witness America's inability to push for policies that could ensure more economic equality. Paradoxically enough, many Americans believe that they are already in the middle-upper tier of income earners or will eventually end up there. This inspires a reluctance to enact policies that would more equitably balance economic burden-sharing. America's increasing poverty rates may finally change this dynamic as a September 20 Gallup poll points out: Those who supported raising taxes on the rich outnumbered opponents by 66% to 32%.
America's past penchant for income inequality, however, is not financially sustainable, let alone morally excusable or philosophically justifiable by capitalists who claim this to be inherent in the system. This is where Wilkinson and Pickett's data is useful. It shows that with income inequality comes with a host of health and social problems. The higher a country's income inequality, the higher its infant mortality rates, obesity rates, homicide rates, illiteracy rates, mental illness rates, teenage births, incarceration rates, drug addiction rates, social immobility and lower life expectancy. In other words, the bigger the gap between a nation's rich and poor populations, the greater dysfunction in that nation's society.
It may come as no surprise to some that America has the highest income inequality among the entire rich world. It was developed largely in the last 30 years, exacerbated by tax policies that benefited the rich at the expense of the poor. It became increasingly difficult for Americans to get ahead, get insured, get educated and get a job, all of which helps with getting respect. Consequently, the bulk of America's economic growth over the last 30 years has gone to the top one-100th of 1%, who make $27m annually per household, leaving 90% of American households to subsist on roughly $30,000 a year.
Name a rich country and our inequality rates beat them by a long shot -- though it's hardly something to brag about. We also have the highest rates of homicide, infant mortality, teenage births, drug addiction, mental illness, incarceration, social immobility and illiteracy. Name the social ill and we excel at it.
These health and social problems wreak financial havoc on our society -- not only in terms of lost productivity and potential, but also in terms of costs associated with containing the violence, healing the sick, and fixing the dysfunction. With each homicide, for example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calculate that the economy loses $1.65m in medical costs, loss of lifelong employment and economic productivity costs. With each prisoner, the US spends on average $35,000 per year for a total of $80bn annually for its correctional system. Add to this the total cost of lost productivity of the incarcerated, which is another $97.7bn. And don't forget violent crime, which cost America $94bn in 2009.
Given these enormous costs to America's economy, advocates of income equality must have a seat at congressional budget super-committee's table, as it continues to convene on cost-cutting, and must push for policies that promote equal opportunity, health, education and poverty alleviation. Reduce income inequality and you reduce the rates of every kind of social malaise that are draining our federal, state and local budgets and services. Eradicate both and you have a certain moneymaker for America -- a wise and worthwhile move for a country that just raised its debt ceiling.
Michael Shank is a doctoral candidate at George Mason University's school for conflict analysis and resolution, associate with the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict based at The Hague, and serves on the board of the National Peace Academy.
Follow Michael Shank on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Michael_Shank
Paul Brandeis Raushenbush: What Does Wall Street Really Want?
PHOTOS: Thousands in Boston Protest Income Inequality
IMF: Income Inequality Worsens In Most Developed Countries
Income inequality is bad for growth
Chris Matthews: Is Obama Doing Enough To Convince Liberal Voters He Cares ...
We need a different poverty target that tackles causes, not symptoms
New study shows high income inequality slows economic growth
Opponents underline these differences and spawn contempt. A specter of homogeneity, not only in outward appearance, but the inward, sometimes innate, attributes of personality and behavior. Ironically, so much so there is an allelic drift, de-evolution, a loss of sacrifice and the requisite resistance progress requires.
However every renaissance is preceded by a dark age.
“Rooted in freedom, bonded in the fellowship of danger, sharing everywhere a common human blood, we declare again that all men are brothers, and that mutual tolerance is the price of liberty.” Will Durant
“…the process of necessity is so directed that it overcomes the rigid externality which it first had and reveals its inward nature. It then appears that the members, linked to one another, are not really foreign to each other, but only elements of one whole, each of them, in its connection with the other, being, as it were, at home, and combining with itself. In this way, necessity is transfigured into freedom - not the freedom that consists in abstract negation, but freedom concrete and positive.” Hegel
When a small group of people are so wealthy, yet unhealthy, there is a MAJOR temptation that a very unethical, evil "business" that could spring up to "support" that wealthy, multi-billion (maybe even trillion) dollar clientel---body parts---teeth, kidneys, livers, hair, anything AND everything that will improve the life and health threatened condition of that mega wealthy individual and his family.
I really wonder how many poor, BUT healthy people have died to support the income of these rouge businesses, to support the health of the mega-mega wealthy?
I TRUELY believe this is NOT fiction I'm suggesting, but rather REALITY!!!!!!!!!!!! To that point, I'd say it is dangerous for anyone to brag on the internet about their health, their family's good teeth, their family's longevity, their family's good hair----I really think there are people combing the internet to find new victims for their rich clientel, a clientel that "may" be clueless, but yet SOOOOOO desperate they don't ask questions.
Well, I suppose we could push for a policy whereby all of the nation's wealth, public and private, is simply dumped into the ocean (thereby destroying it). The end result would be the income equality the author so yearns for: no one would have anything.
We now have an economic system that is more akin to fuedalism than a modern induswtrialized society. Fuedalism provides for almost no growth.
What the right doesn't seem to understand is that a more equitable society is actually good business and doesn't mean everyone has less. For most people it means they have more.
It works elsewhere; it can work here.
No one will care. They haven't cared for the last 30 years and they don't care now. Talking to Congress is like talking to a telephone help line that is located in Bangladesh.
I nominate the author as the first to do so.
I was raised in Europe and Europeans could never understand why the richest country in the world could have such high rates of poverty, when I went to the USA for my PhD I learned that this is due in large part to racism. Most European nations were racially homogeneous when I was young which was why racism was not a problem in Europe then, except in wartime Germany of course, but that was really a matter of religion, not race.
My favorite example: the 2009 PISA reading scores for low-povertÂy American schools (less than 10% free and reduced lunch) are actually BETTER than the scores for super-highÂ-scoring Finland (the poster child country for great education, and not coincidentÂally a country with a 3% poverty rate).
If you're interestedÂ, see the table on p. 15 of this report:
http://nceÂs.ed.gov/pÂubsearch/pÂubsinfo.asÂp?pubid=20Â11004
Uh, there have been plenty of generations with one parent — the father — holding down two jobs to feed the family. That's nothing new.
>>>A family's financial position has everything to do with their child's (statisticÂal) ability to compete.>>>
Might we be talking about heads of households — provided there are even TWO parents in the family — who don't have the skills to get better than low-level jobs, yet are still demaning mid-level pay and bennies? See, life doesn't exactly work that way.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2047664/Occupy-Wall-Street-Children-1-good-time-protests.html
... and don't let them TANK the economy. What a concept.