3 ms·
I am not really sure what this article is about. It seems like a rant that randomly includes Galloway's personal opinions on a number of random topics. I suppos
by throwawaysea 6y ago
I am not really sure what this article is about. It seems like a rant that randomly includes Galloway's personal opinions on a number of random topics. I suppose he admits this in his opening line where he calls it a stream of consciousness.
This paragraph stood out to me as basically his unfounded opinion:
> I think it all comes back to one central theme: income inequality. Capitalism is sort of this gangster construct that leverages a species’ selfishness and creates all sorts of prosperity from that selfishness. But the key to successful capitalism has always been a middle class. At the turn of the millennium, America was the only superpower, and we had the most prosperous middle class in the world. In the past 20 years, the key feature of China’s rise to superpower has been adding several hundred million people to its middle class. But for the past 50 years in America, we have decided to transfer wealth from the middle class to the shareholder class. The lower and middle classes haven’t done any worse, and they haven’t done any better but the share of income controlled by the top one percent has exploded. And I believe that creates all sorts of externalities.
Or maybe a simpler explanation is that China (and other nations) have a more motivated population that is willing to work harder for less, a more competent government that is better at planning and executing, and less societal division over distractions like [activist issue of the day]. From my experience in conducting business internationally, I am increasingly finding that other nations display America's old culture of grit and ingenuity and deep focus much more so than modern America does, where that culture is often attacked and vilified.
I also do not believe the commonly repeated explanation that a gap in share of income is problematic. If everyone has better life expectancy, standards of living, and purchasing power than 50 years ago, then why does inequality matter? The minimum standards are better for everyone. I'm still blown away that the Internet exists, that we have mRNA vaccines, that we can land rockets on drone ships, and most adults can afford something as incredibly powerful as a smartphone. Having a great life and complaining about inequality isn't some moralistic fight for justice - it's just envy.
> People under the age of 40 are fed up. They have less than half of the economic security, as measured by the ratio of wealth to income, that their parents did at the same age. Their share of wealth has crashed. Many are bored. For the first time in our nation’s history, a 30-year-old isn’t doing as well as his or her parents were at 30. That creates shame and rage in households across America.
The same cohort also has a significant number of people with degrees in fields that have no value (no value to others, therefore no economic viability), a distaste for manual labor or the trades, unrealistic entitled expectations driven by social media echo chambers, and other issues. Blaming the system or previous generations is simply a self-serving take. I would say they are still better off living today than 50 years ago, and their income relative to others is not as relevant.