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Empowering those at the bottom won't necessarily fix the inequality "problem". If Modi fixes the economy he'll empower those at the bottom. Right now everyone i

Empowering those at the bottom won't necessarily fix the inequality "problem". If Modi fixes the economy he'll empower those at the bottom. Right now everyone in India is equally poor. Fixing the economy might make this place unequally rich like the US. I imagine Piketty would consider that a problem if he knew India existed. If you want solutions for empowering those at the bottom, look to Bryan Caplan rather than Piketty. http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2014/05/meant_for_each.html http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2014/05/meant_for_each.h...

anigbrowl 12y ago
Right now everyone in India is equally poor. Well, that's bullshit. I'm not endorsing Piketty, but you're making even less sense, unless there's a joke I've missed. I do agree about unrestricted international immigration, such that there's a free flow of labor as well as capital. Unfortunately most people are mercantilist and opposed to the promulgation of global standards that would be required to make this work.
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  It's an attempt at poetic exaggeration - the point is the comparison between India and the US. India has a Gini of 33, the US has 45. Yet simply compare poverty in the US to upper middle class status in India, and you quickly realize that inequality isn't the most salient factor at play. I'm not sure why you believe we need some sort of "global standards" for open borders to work. I'm undecided on the issue, but I can't see how "global standards" play a role. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equ... http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/the-haves-and-the-have-nots/ http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/the-haves-and-t...
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    OK, but France (Piketty's home country) has a Gini index of 32.7 and I find it easy to conceive of significant wealth disparities between individual French people notwithstanding their relative economic homogeneity. India was a poor example to pick, not just because of the existence of Indian billionaires, but because of the genetic institutionalization of inequality there in the form of caste, such that (until very recently) if you were born a Brahmin you had massively greater economic prospects than if you were born a Dalit. Anyway, as far as open borders go, the primary argument against them is that everyone will flood into those countries which have the most favorable conditions for workers, not just in terms of pay but in terms of safety, contractual rights and so forth. You would certainly want some sort of receiprocal arrangement, such that if people from China want to immigrate to the US, US people should be equally free to live, work and invest in China. You don't need to harmonize everything of course, but it's an incredibly difficult sell politically if you don't have reciprocity, on top of being an incredibly difficult sell because of mercantilist and xenophobic tendencies in the receiving economies. I'm heartily in favor of open borders and free trade in general, but most people hate the idea - even Tea Party types who profess a general disbelief in governmental competence.
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      As I said, my use of the term "equal" was poetic exaggeration. India is a perfectly good example, since it illustrates that a relatively smooth wealth distribution doesn't mean you get a flush toilet. The caste system is still here, though nowadays it's more a social problem than an economic one. Your discussion of harmonization sounds like countries need to harmonize to avoid competing with each other. What's wrong with competition, and allowing the better countries to get more workers?
      - anigbrowl 12y ago
        India is a perfectly good example, since it illustrates that a relatively smooth wealth distribution doesn't mean you get a flush toilet. This is obtuse even by your standards, Chris. You could equally well argue that South Africa with a Gini of 63 is enormously economically empowered, but you're not guaranteed a flush toilet there either. What's wrong with competition, and allowing the better countries to get more workers? Try being a politician explaining that to economically dislocated domestic voters. Hell, look how bent out of shape people here get about immigration and the US only ranks 180th out of the world in population density. I don't think it's it's an economic necessity, but it's a political reality, unfortunately.
        yummyfajitas 12y ago
        You could equally well argue that South Africa with a Gini of 63 is enormously economically empowered... I'm arguing only that inequality is orthogonal to what we really care about: standard of living. But discussing standard of living is a political loser - poor Americans have a very high standard of living, and the historical story is one of more or less consistent improvements. (If you disagree, try this thought experiment: name a good or service people at the bottom lack.) As for political reality you are correct. The fact that a few million rich Americans are jealous of their richer neighbors will always seem more important to politicians than hundreds of millions of truly poor people who can't vote for them.
tormeh 12y ago
You think India is equally poor? Uh-huh... There are no equally poor places. It's an American libertarian fantasy construct. http://www.forbes.com/india-billionaires/list/ http://www.forbes.com/india-billionaires/list/
- known 12y ago
  Sounds like https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominant_minority https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominant_minority
selmnoo 12y ago
> I imagine Piketty would consider that a problem if he knew India existed. I have no idea why people keep saying this about Piketty. You know that he's written on India quite a lot, both in the book and seperately where India is the sole subject of his work, e.g.: http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/BanerjeePiketty2005.pdf http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/BanerjeePiketty200... as well as China: http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/PikettyQian2009_AEJPP.pdf http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/PikettyQian2009_AE...
- yummyfajitas 12y ago
  Most of us have only read the one book, not his entire work. In the book, I recall him only saying that he has no 200 year long timeseries. If someone can hadoop a wordcount, I'll bet that the word "Balzac" appears more frequently than "China". Any book which purports to discuss inequality, yet somehow ignores the inequality between France and India, is almost comically myopic.

anigbrowl 12y ago

Right now everyone in India is equally poor. Well, that's bullshit. I'm not endorsing Piketty, but you're making even less sense, unless there's a joke I've missed. I do agree about unrestricted international immigration, such that there's a free flow of labor as well as capital. Unfortunately most people are mercantilist and opposed to the promulgation of global standards that would be required to make this work.

yummyfajitas 12y ago
It's an attempt at poetic exaggeration - the point is the comparison between India and the US. India has a Gini of 33, the US has 45. Yet simply compare poverty in the US to upper middle class status in India, and you quickly realize that inequality isn't the most salient factor at play. I'm not sure why you believe we need some sort of "global standards" for open borders to work. I'm undecided on the issue, but I can't see how "global standards" play a role. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equ... http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/the-haves-and-the-have-nots/ http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/31/the-haves-and-t...
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  OK, but France (Piketty's home country) has a Gini index of 32.7 and I find it easy to conceive of significant wealth disparities between individual French people notwithstanding their relative economic homogeneity. India was a poor example to pick, not just because of the existence of Indian billionaires, but because of the genetic institutionalization of inequality there in the form of caste, such that (until very recently) if you were born a Brahmin you had massively greater economic prospects than if you were born a Dalit. Anyway, as far as open borders go, the primary argument against them is that everyone will flood into those countries which have the most favorable conditions for workers, not just in terms of pay but in terms of safety, contractual rights and so forth. You would certainly want some sort of receiprocal arrangement, such that if people from China want to immigrate to the US, US people should be equally free to live, work and invest in China. You don't need to harmonize everything of course, but it's an incredibly difficult sell politically if you don't have reciprocity, on top of being an incredibly difficult sell because of mercantilist and xenophobic tendencies in the receiving economies. I'm heartily in favor of open borders and free trade in general, but most people hate the idea - even Tea Party types who profess a general disbelief in governmental competence.
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    As I said, my use of the term "equal" was poetic exaggeration. India is a perfectly good example, since it illustrates that a relatively smooth wealth distribution doesn't mean you get a flush toilet. The caste system is still here, though nowadays it's more a social problem than an economic one. Your discussion of harmonization sounds like countries need to harmonize to avoid competing with each other. What's wrong with competition, and allowing the better countries to get more workers?
    - anigbrowl 12y ago
      India is a perfectly good example, since it illustrates that a relatively smooth wealth distribution doesn't mean you get a flush toilet. This is obtuse even by your standards, Chris. You could equally well argue that South Africa with a Gini of 63 is enormously economically empowered, but you're not guaranteed a flush toilet there either. What's wrong with competition, and allowing the better countries to get more workers? Try being a politician explaining that to economically dislocated domestic voters. Hell, look how bent out of shape people here get about immigration and the US only ranks 180th out of the world in population density. I don't think it's it's an economic necessity, but it's a political reality, unfortunately.
      - yummyfajitas 12y ago
        You could equally well argue that South Africa with a Gini of 63 is enormously economically empowered... I'm arguing only that inequality is orthogonal to what we really care about: standard of living. But discussing standard of living is a political loser - poor Americans have a very high standard of living, and the historical story is one of more or less consistent improvements. (If you disagree, try this thought experiment: name a good or service people at the bottom lack.) As for political reality you are correct. The fact that a few million rich Americans are jealous of their richer neighbors will always seem more important to politicians than hundreds of millions of truly poor people who can't vote for them.

tormeh 12y ago

You think India is equally poor? Uh-huh... There are no equally poor places. It's an American libertarian fantasy construct. http://www.forbes.com/india-billionaires/list/ http://www.forbes.com/india-billionaires/list/

known 12y ago
Sounds like https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominant_minority https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominant_minority

selmnoo 12y ago

> I imagine Piketty would consider that a problem if he knew India existed. I have no idea why people keep saying this about Piketty. You know that he's written on India quite a lot, both in the book and seperately where India is the sole subject of his work, e.g.: http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/BanerjeePiketty2005.pdf http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/BanerjeePiketty200... as well as China: http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/PikettyQian2009_AEJPP.pdf http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/fichiers/public/PikettyQian2009_AE...

yummyfajitas 12y ago
Most of us have only read the one book, not his entire work. In the book, I recall him only saying that he has no 200 year long timeseries. If someone can hadoop a wordcount, I'll bet that the word "Balzac" appears more frequently than "China". Any book which purports to discuss inequality, yet somehow ignores the inequality between France and India, is almost comically myopic.