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Wed 22 Oct, 2008 01:30 am
In
today's Guardian (page 11 of the printed edition)
Quote:Economic inequality is growing in the world's richest countries, according to a 30-nation report released Tuesday.
The gap between rich and poor has widened over the past 20 years in nearly all the countries studied, even as trade and technological advances have spurred rapid growth.
The Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said its 20-year study found inequality had increased in 27 of its 30 members as top earners' incomes soared while others' stagnated.
The U.S. has the highest inequality and poverty rates in the OECD after Mexico and Turkey, and the gap has increased rapidly since 2000, the report said. France saw inequalities fall as poorer workers are better paid.
Wealthy households are not only widening the gap with the poor, but in countries such as the U.S., Canada and Germany they are leaving middle-income earners farther behind.
Source:
Wall Street Journal
In Germany,
the gap between the poor and rich is increasing at an alarming rate.
Social mobility is lowest in countries with high inequality such as the United States, United Kingdom, and Italy, the report says:
Link to OECD report
They're almost certainly counting the 20M illegals in those numbers for the US.
Has anybody tried computing those numbers for the US WITHOUT including either illegal aliens OR members of demoKKKrat wholly-owned voting blocks (i.e. members of groups designed for permanent victim status by the rogue demoKKKrat party)?
I.e. has anybody ever tried to compute those ratios just for the normal people in the US?
@gungasnake,
oinkasnake attempts to define normal...that's ******* rich.
Walter
I've just begun reading a review of James Galbraith's book (not online, unfortunately) which, I think, likely points in the correct direction for understanding how and why this situation has evolved. Here's the Amazon page on it...
I don't find those stats surprising at all. What is surprising is that China is not listed, but they have been closing down factories like crazy for lack of buyers of their products. Many were just locked out of their factories without any warning, and those who had made long-term plans to work to earn money are now without any income.
China has always been a basket case; the majority of Chinese already lived in poverty, and their government has done very little to nothing to stop the pollution that has been killing their citizens. Most of their rivers are 1/3d polluted and getting worse. Bad water and pollution is a deadly mix; now they are losing their jobs.
@blatham,
How about anti-communism that controls the government of any country?
@cicerone imposter,
It is not surprising China is not listed as it is not a member amongst the OECD countries.
http://www.oecd.org/countrieslist/0,3351,en_33873108_33844430_1_1_1_1_1,00.html
I think I first started to pay attention to the gap back in 1986 when I worked for a (then) very profitable computer company. One Christmas, the company paid out millions in bonuses to the top 2% in management, the guys in the warehouse got $100 each and a dinner gift certificate to TGIF's. That company could not survive without it's warehouse staff and yet they were considered about as valuable as a teenager turning 16.
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