Posted on 12/18/2013 2:20:18 AM PST by Olog-hai
The growing gap between the richest Americans and everyone else isn’t bad just for individuals.
It’s hurting the U.S. economy.
So says a majority of more than three dozen economists surveyed last week by The Associated Press. Their concerns tap into a debate that’s intensified as middle-class pay has stagnated while wealthier households have thrived.
A key source of the economists’ concern: Higher pay and outsize stock market gains are flowing mainly to affluent Americans. Yet these households spend less of their money than do low- and middle-income consumers who make up most of the population but whose pay is barely rising. …
(Excerpt) Read more at bigstory.ap.org ...
I had to read the headline a few times to be sure I was reading it right.
Three dozen? Sounds like they polled the professors and graduate students at some school, somewhere.
(Yes, if congress just raised the minimum wage to $100, everyone would be rich!)
They won't talk about the "education gap" between rich and poor, and how dysfunctional, unionized urban school systems keep the poor, poor.
These are the dull economists who think there is only a finite amount of wealth and every dollar Bill Gates has is a dollar I don’t have. Jealousy and envy is what drives the left.
My income is unequal to Warren Buffet’s
gimme some
The technical term for what these economists are doing is “mental masturbation”.
The only possible effective way to address income inequality is to have the Fed stop interfering with interest rates. With higher interest rates there would be an incentive to save and create capital that can be used productively.
Unfortunately this isn’t possible because the slightest increase in interest rates would make servicing the massive government debt impossible. Thus money continues to be printed, inflating stock market and real estate values and creating an illusion of a viable economy.
Remember - the solution to economic distortions caused by government intervention is always more government intervention!
Financial institutions like banks and insurance companies employ lots of economists.
Look for earned stock income to be added to the earned income wealth redistribution program to share the gains with those that own no stocks. It’s only fair. The poor would have owned stocks, if they had the money to invest. It’s not fair that stock investors get all of the gains.
(sarcasm off)
Ya' think maybe the elite, whatever political role they play like being the elite and plan to keep it that way?
here we go again..
Growth in upper income brackets is not the cause of the underclass being stuck on zero, and income redistribution from the top quintile to the lower two quintiles will not remedy the situation. In fact, redistribution will probably exacerbate the problem in the long run by making people more comfortable with long term dependency.
The issue is how to get the welfare classes working, and moving upward. This would indeed be good for the economy, and it would indeed reduce income inequality. The left has only one play in its playbook, but increasing welfare benefits is not the answer.
Yep—60% of them claim Obamacare will have no effect on the economy. None of them, at least, could bring themselves to claim it would be a boost to the economy. The AP of course found the 40% who admitted to the harm to be marginal, of course.
“Financial institutions like banks and insurance companies employ lots of economists.”
If they do, they probably don’t employee communists like the ones quoted. (Companies that need accurate weather predictions do not use the National Weather Service. Governments don’t know sh*t about how things really work, whether it’s weather prediction, website building or economics.)
Crony Capitalism
First, if having a degree in economics somehow imparted someone with special knowledge that allowed them to determine the best course for making the economy thrive - there would be a high demand for economists at all levels of business. However, most of the economists we know are theoreticians who work at universities, or go from a university environment to government. There’s a reason there aren’t a ton of jobs for economists in the private sector. The reason? They don’t appear to be very useful in helping businesses thrive.
Regarding income distribution, we need to be concentrating on how we can make more pies, not how we are going to slice up the pie we have. More pies, bigger slices for everyone.
Indeed!
Yes and all of these communist economists hate Capitalism and are flaming socialist keynesian drones. They worship big intrusive government and wealth redistribution. Those that are free market believers are NEVER quoted.
No, the government spends half the rich people's income, much of it sacrificed on the alter of sloth never to be seen from again. Without the small percentage of high income earners the government would go bankrupt in 3 days.
But of course. They also polled only those that they knew would answer “correctly”.
Not necessarily. The wealthy are reaping the benefits of QE, while the middle class suffer inflation.
Bingo.
Obama is screwing the Middle Class every day, but remember unemployment insurance will grow our economy.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.