blatham wrote: ...By 'real gap', I suspect he refers to conditions elsewhere, where extremes of wealth and poverty exist. It would be true to say that the US doesn't reflect such disparity. But how much is too much? And why would we hold that disparity is or might be a wrong at all? How close to crossing some line are we?
Or craven might be pointing to the terrible poverty of some parts of the world, a situation not reflected in North America. So why are WE whining? I happen to agree with part of this view (even if it's a mis-statement of craven's point)...the distance between 'want' and 'need' in our culture is probably morally inexcuseable given the situation of so much of the rest of the world, and given that the planet is a closed system with finite resources and finite ecological limits.
Even the "Economist" in listing the incomes (in dollars) of the top and bottom deciles and using the difference as a measure of income disparity in developed countries, was itself using a misleading statistic. Better to use the ratio of this difference to the income of the median. This dimensionless ratio would then accurately measure income disparity as a fraction of the median (or mean if you prefer) income - a result far more meaningful both from a mathematical and a practical perspective. This statistic would slightly reduce the disparity gap between the U.S. and other developed countries, owing to our generally higher median income. It would also place most undeveloped countries at the top of the disparity gap list precisely because of the often grotesque disparity between the living standards of the few rich and the multitudes of poor in those countries. This outcome illustrates an important and fundamental truth - capitalist economic development enhances the general welfare of the whole people.
Both Tartarin and Blatham have referred to the "unequal" consumption of the earth's resources by the U.S. What remedy do you propose for the solution of this "inequity"? I can't imagine a realistic one that would not have far worse consequences for the world. Here again it has become customary to frame the discussion in terms of flawed and misleading statistics. Equally as important as the gross consumption of resources is the net production of economic goods resulting from that consumption - on that scale we come out pretty well. We produce a very large fraction of the world's stuff. Moreover production of all kinds in the developed world is far more efficient in terms of production per unit of resources consumption than what prevails in undeveloped economies. Finally, while the U.S. is usually singled out as the top resource consumer, the most significant disparity is between the G-8 (less China for the moment) nations generally and the rest of the world. Viewed in that (correct) perspective the 'problem' takes a different shape. It is simply one of efficient development and production.
The 'trickle down' process that Tartarin so despises has done far more to raise the standards of living of the poor in the world than have all the socialist reformers of the past century. For one, the green agricultural revolution of the 1960s and 1970s virtually ended starvation in asia - today the world produces a surplus of food, and starvation exists only where political and economic processes have distorted needed distribution. (While lamentable, these problems are much less than the agricultural famines that once afflicted much of the world.)
None of this is to suggest that there are not excesses which we should seek to remedy. It is however important not to advance remedies that would be far worse than the 'disease' they purport to cure. I would like to see a federal tax on gasoline at the pump, increased investment in interurban rail transportation, increased use of nuclear power for electrical power generation, a rationalization of the environmental rules on the use coal for power production (measure pollution in terms of pollution/unit of power produced instead of per unit of fuel consumed.), accelerated exploitation of domestic sources of gas and oil, and the elimination of most agricultural subsidies. Apart from the continuing vulgarity of American entertainment media, that would take care of most of the items on Tartarin's list.
