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This is pretty disingenuous and I'll explain why. The next 1% after the top 1% owns a pretty sizable chunk too. And the next 1% after that a large chunk, and so

This is pretty disingenuous and I'll explain why. The next 1% after the top 1% owns a pretty sizable chunk too. And the next 1% after that a large chunk, and so on. The top 10% has 75% of U.S. wealth, the top 20% has 87% of U.S. wealth. So carrying on about the 99% as if wealth is distributed in anyway evenly within that group is more than a bit silly. Especially when you look at the bottom 50% having a pittance, somewhere between 1-2% of U.S. wealth. The next natural group after discussing the 1%'s wealth, isn't the other 99% just because 100-1=99... So really your argument falls apart for me because most of the 99%, the bottom 70%, end up owning just about 1% of the world's wealth. And that's a fairly small slice of pie to be split between 227 million people. And before you show me the math that it's actually quite a bit per person. Don't forget that in reality the bottom 60% only has almost as much wealth as the whole next 10% and that most of the population isn't seeing the wealth you're describing.

lordlimecat 8y ago
For starters, "disingenuous" implies bad faith on my part and that's pretty uncharitable. This isn't shilling, or paid posting, or social commentating-- nor even is it me stating facts (beyond those contained in others' references). It's just a thought I've had in the past. It'd be nice if common civility meant you didn't jump out the gate assuming bad intent on my part. In any event, I was not aware of that purported wealth distribution, but the median income in the US is $59k and the median income of the world is 9k. We can argue cost of living and so forth, but it is no exaggeration to say that nearly everyone in the US today is living on the upper crust of humanity in terms of wealth and lifestyle. Across the political spectrum people tend to agree that keeping jobs in the US is a good thing while ignoring that that perpetuates the very form of wealth inequality they decry when talking about national politics. Not that I think they're wrong to argue that the government should favor its own citizens over others internationally, but it does seem rather hypocritical to me.
- spiralx 8y ago
  You might be interested in this article about how wealth is divided in the US, even if you don't agree with all of its conclusions: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-birth-of-a-new-american-aristocracy/559130/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-bir...
  - lordlimecat 8y ago
    I will / am reading it, but if as its title and first few paragraphs suggest its discussion is on the top 10%, it doesn't really change my statement. $59k median income means literally half the country-- 2.5% of the world's population-- is making at least 6 times as much money as literally half of the world. It is not until you get to some US income percentile around the 15th that incomes drop below the world's 50th percentile income bracket. I do not deny that there is wealth inequality in the US nor do I have any elegant solutions to it, but I perceive a lot of self-interested hypocrisy around the issue. Surely fighting wealth inequality means cheering when manufacturing jobs are sent overseas, and the corporation's US base means that we can use economic leverage to enforce safety / wage standards on these new jobs in India / China / Mexico. This brings up the global median income, surely a good thing for anyone concerned with income equality.
    - Brockenstein 8y ago
      Well it's more complicated than that. We mourn jobs that are sent overseas. But a lot of things can be made much cheaper elsewhere and we as consumers benefit from cheaper prices. It's just in an argument about jobs, people don't want to argue the whole picture and the complexities of trade. They want their cheaper prices, and they want all those jobs too, and they want decent wages, and they want someone else to figure out how to make that possible. The other problem is all the people crying about jobs going overseas aren't the same people crying for wealth equality necessarily. So again, it's incorrect to lump everyone and every viewpoint together when it's really a huge spectrum. And on top of all that I would argue that arguing wealth inequality in the U.S. is fine because it exists in the rest of the world is a red herring. For starters, no nation, not even the U.S. is solely responsible for the state of the world and economies in every other country. And secondly, no nation is under any obligation to address the world's problems before addressing its own. And it's not effective to avoid the issue by shifting the scope around arbitrarily.
      - lordlimecat 8y ago
        To be clear, I am not arguing that inequality in the US is "fine" because it exists elsewhere. I think I've tried to make that clear in my posts. I am arguing a few other things: * That it is hypocrisy for anyone to argue against wealth inequality in the US, but decry jobs going overseas * That it is wrong to not care about wealth inequality in the world while moaning that we're only in the top 95th percentile of human wealth * That things in the US are nowhere near as bad as they are commonly portrayed
spiralx 8y ago
According to this Atlantic article, the divide is between the 1%, the next 9%, and the bottom 90%, with the top 1% increasing their wealth at the expense of the bottom 90%, and the remaining 9% desperately building walls to keep their wealth intact. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-birth-of-a-new-american-aristocracy/559130/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-bir...

lordlimecat 8y ago

For starters, "disingenuous" implies bad faith on my part and that's pretty uncharitable. This isn't shilling, or paid posting, or social commentating-- nor even is it me stating facts (beyond those contained in others' references). It's just a thought I've had in the past. It'd be nice if common civility meant you didn't jump out the gate assuming bad intent on my part. In any event, I was not aware of that purported wealth distribution, but the median income in the US is $59k and the median income of the world is 9k. We can argue cost of living and so forth, but it is no exaggeration to say that nearly everyone in the US today is living on the upper crust of humanity in terms of wealth and lifestyle. Across the political spectrum people tend to agree that keeping jobs in the US is a good thing while ignoring that that perpetuates the very form of wealth inequality they decry when talking about national politics. Not that I think they're wrong to argue that the government should favor its own citizens over others internationally, but it does seem rather hypocritical to me.

spiralx 8y ago
You might be interested in this article about how wealth is divided in the US, even if you don't agree with all of its conclusions: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-birth-of-a-new-american-aristocracy/559130/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-bir...
- lordlimecat 8y ago
  I will / am reading it, but if as its title and first few paragraphs suggest its discussion is on the top 10%, it doesn't really change my statement. $59k median income means literally half the country-- 2.5% of the world's population-- is making at least 6 times as much money as literally half of the world. It is not until you get to some US income percentile around the 15th that incomes drop below the world's 50th percentile income bracket. I do not deny that there is wealth inequality in the US nor do I have any elegant solutions to it, but I perceive a lot of self-interested hypocrisy around the issue. Surely fighting wealth inequality means cheering when manufacturing jobs are sent overseas, and the corporation's US base means that we can use economic leverage to enforce safety / wage standards on these new jobs in India / China / Mexico. This brings up the global median income, surely a good thing for anyone concerned with income equality.
  - Brockenstein 8y ago
    Well it's more complicated than that. We mourn jobs that are sent overseas. But a lot of things can be made much cheaper elsewhere and we as consumers benefit from cheaper prices. It's just in an argument about jobs, people don't want to argue the whole picture and the complexities of trade. They want their cheaper prices, and they want all those jobs too, and they want decent wages, and they want someone else to figure out how to make that possible. The other problem is all the people crying about jobs going overseas aren't the same people crying for wealth equality necessarily. So again, it's incorrect to lump everyone and every viewpoint together when it's really a huge spectrum. And on top of all that I would argue that arguing wealth inequality in the U.S. is fine because it exists in the rest of the world is a red herring. For starters, no nation, not even the U.S. is solely responsible for the state of the world and economies in every other country. And secondly, no nation is under any obligation to address the world's problems before addressing its own. And it's not effective to avoid the issue by shifting the scope around arbitrarily.
    - lordlimecat 8y ago
      To be clear, I am not arguing that inequality in the US is "fine" because it exists elsewhere. I think I've tried to make that clear in my posts. I am arguing a few other things: * That it is hypocrisy for anyone to argue against wealth inequality in the US, but decry jobs going overseas * That it is wrong to not care about wealth inequality in the world while moaning that we're only in the top 95th percentile of human wealth * That things in the US are nowhere near as bad as they are commonly portrayed

spiralx 8y ago

According to this Atlantic article, the divide is between the 1%, the next 9%, and the bottom 90%, with the top 1% increasing their wealth at the expense of the bottom 90%, and the remaining 9% desperately building walls to keep their wealth intact. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-birth-of-a-new-american-aristocracy/559130/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/06/the-bir...