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About half of Americans advocate heavy taxation of the rich in order to redistribute wealth, a higher percentage than was the case in 1939. More generally, a large majority of Americans support the principle that wealth should be more evenly distributed in America, and an increasing number -- although still a minority -- say there are too many rich people in the country.

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http://www.galluppoll.com/content/Default.aspx?ci=27208

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too many rich people

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Originally posted by abnormal:

That seems to focus on the wrong side of the issue.

Doesn't it make sense to improve the lot of those people who are "not rich" than try to pull down those who are "rich"?

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"There is, in fact, a manly and lawful passion for equality which excites men to wish all to be powerful and honored. This passion tends to elevate the humble to the rank of the great; but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level, and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom."

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed." -- Dwight Eisenhower (http://www.costofwar.com)

"I can't stand the pompous among us who complain about welfare. The biggest welfare recipients in the United States are the richest people." -- Larry King, 1995

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Originally posted by abnormal:
So is it better to "raise the poor" or to "tear down the rich"?

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Oh this one is easy! Raise the poor! I think EVERYONE should have 400' yachts, several properties around the globe and a trophy wife/arm-candy husband.

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Originally posted by abnormal:
So since you can't have them nobody should?

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You presume, sir! Who says I can't have them? I just don't want them. I married money, once, years ago. And subsequently divorced it. The one kilo tins of caviar, weekend flights to Italy....just struck me as grossly irresponsible.

No, it's more like, if we lived on an infinite mountain of resources then by all means. But with increasing evidence that our global resource base is not only heading into the red across many sectors, but half the planet can't even feed itself properly, the sort of materialistic perversion epitomized by those with too much money sets a very poor example which far too many people fall victim to.

Maybe president Dubya and Steve Harper should tell their rich friends to stop accepting government welfare cheques in the mail.

Perhaps the last three most politically conservative nations with highest rates of child poverty among rich nations could do with electoral reform.

Maybe Canada could be more economically competitive, like Scandinavia and other economies where greater equality exists.

[ 28 April 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

Saudi Arabia has a superrich minority, and rich Haitians live well side by side with grinding poverty.

What's wrong with a handful of billionaire families and a few conglomerates running Canada ?. Why doesn't Canada, a G8 country, rate in the top ten list for most competitive economies in the world ?. We have more billionaires per capita than either Russia or the U.S.A. Maybe we should pump even more oil and gas and massive amounts of electrical power to the States, because we've dropped from 13th to 16th on the Global Economic Competitive Growth Index. And we're shovelling more of the national income to about ten percent, and even moreso to about one or two percent of the population like never before.

[ 28 April 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]

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Originally posted by abnormal:
So it's better to take it away from the haves than to improve the lot of those that don't?

I always figured the important thing was not the spread between the bottom and the top but whether or not the lot of those at the bottom was improving. Tearing down the rich does absolutely nothing to help the poor.

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The haves having is connected to the have-nots NOT having. Michael Eisner of Disney's annual compensation - the number of workers he laid off. Net flow of resources out of Africa, large parts of local economies given over to cash crops for trade with the wealthy West - Africans stay poor, no, excuse me, getting poorer.

I think the accumulation of indecent wealth is a sociopathic, aberrant behaviour. If the obscenely wealthy were squirrels scientists would have a lot of fun studying why they found it necessary to strip the forest in order to make a mountain of nuts they couldn't get through in a 100,000 lifetimes. They'd put them in a cage beside the squirrel that keeps chasing its tail until it falls over. I suppose they'd also study the legion of poor squirrels who were willing to help the rich squirrels build their mountains.

I've no problem with society having a range of incomes - reflecting years of study, relative hardships, inconveniences and sacrifices of other aspects of the life realm, length of career, social value etc. But that range should be radically constrained from the present span.

Eh, this is old ground. The analyses were done centuries ago - too great a spread damages the social fabric, I should think that was self evident.

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Originally posted by Merowe:
Eh, this is old ground. The analyses were done centuries ago - too great a spread damages the social fabric, I should think that was self evident.

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Exactly. Much will always have more at the expense of the many.

A couple of years (maybe 3) ago while travelling through NB on the way to Quebec I bought a St. John newspaper. In it I read a small article that Mr Lord, the then premier, was hosting a weekend fishing party with a guest list that was stated as including George Bush (sr), Brian Mulroney, and "a number of prominent business leaders from Atlantic Canada" . This is not an exact quote but definitely the flavour of it.
One does not have to have lived very long in this region to make a pretty good guess at who these last guests included, and maybe to speculate a tiny bit on who really runs things in our democracy

Jake

[ 28 April 2007: Message edited by: Jake ]

[ 28 April 2007: Message edited by: Jake ]

Some Dems continue to flog these kinds of themes about wealth inequality, like John Edwards, whereas folks like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama stay far away from this kind of language. Obama in particular, whose entire candidacy is based on a silly and outmoded belief that the US population can be, or should be, "united" around any one theme or idea.

As to the US political situation, things are getting strange(r). There's a growing mood of unease, frustration, and anger among a surly electorate. The Republicans are rudderless and the object of open hatred, but few trust the Dems to address the main issues facing the country. Many voices still clamor to blame it all on foreigners, whereas others want to cling to the fading economic dominance with a death grip, or deny global warming reality with the same zeal they deny evolution.

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Originally posted by pacific eugene:

You Canadians sure picked a great time to pursue deep integration, heh...

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