"Half of America's Revenues Go to Richest 0.25 Percent"
"[Earners of over $1 million/year,] who constitute less than a quarter of 1 percent of all taxpayers, reaped almost 47 percent of the total income gains in 2005."
Duly Consider: Does Bill Gates work 100,000 times harder than you? Is he 100,000 times smarter? Does he work 4-million hours per week?
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2 comments:
Half of REVENUES don't go to the richest 0.25%, but half of all revenue GAINS have gone to them over the past X number of years. So, it's not that they have havlf of hte money, but the HAVE received the biggest RAISES of late.
As far as Bill Gates working several million times as many hours as I do - of COURSE he doesn't. But that doesn't matter worth a darn. Neither of us get paid by the hour. His wealth is a measure of how much more VALUABLE TO SOCIETY his contribution is than mine. Millions upon millions of people depend upon his software to make their living - myself included (I work at a "DotCom"). If all of us who depend upon him give him the equivalent of $1 each, his wealth will be truly vast. By my estimation, he has been drmatically UNDERPAID for his entire life, and the surpluses that he (and other entrepreneurs) has created created in his life have dramatically added to EVERYONE'S welfare.
The entrepreneur is the engine of prosperity. The ability to get an idea, start a business, and create something out of nothing is what has led to the trmendous prosperity in this country. When someone starts a business, they create opportunities for countless other people.
Economics is not s Zero Sum Game. When a business owner creates wealth, he doesn't take it from someone else. He CREATES that wealth out of nothing, and adds to the total amount shared by everyone. If anyone is unhappy with their lot in life, and feels envious of the affluence of others, they should come up with an idea, create a business, take it public, and make a fortune. Nobody is stopping you but yourself!
Marc, some good points some bad. Economics isn't a zero sum as you point out - but wealth creation as you state it isn't without consequences either - it leads to inflation which does affect and directly hurt people.
in 1916 the California minimum wage was 16c/hr on January 1st 2008 it will be $8/hour, and yet you may well be worse off earning $8/hr than you were earning 16c/hr.
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