And he had a good point. Here in the US or any developed nation, we're always focused on the super rich in America. And we tend to forget that just by being born in the West we are fortunate and enjoy such high standards of living it is unfathomable to us how 1.2 billion people in the world live on a dollar a day.
Ergo, if the truly globalist, environmentalist, socialist really cared, they too would argue for not just redistributing the wealth of the richest in the US, but also advocate taxing themselves to help out those in other countries that REALLY ARE in need.
Which is why this web site is a sobering reminder of how we are really lucky and why we should be thankful to capitalism (of course the web site draws a different conclusion, but regardless). I just threw in $40,000 to show how rich the AVERAGE American is relative to the rest of the world;
(Kudos to Visualizing Economics)
So the question is, to make everything "Fair".
ReplyDeleteDo we knock the U.S. down to everyone else's level OR Do we export Capitalism and bring everyone else up to the U.S.?
The answer varies depending if you are a Democrat Socialist or Republican Capitalist...
Hi dear Captain
ReplyDeleteCould you please introduce me some elementray books on the essentials of Economics.I am an amateure and realy like to know from scratch.
many thanks
Anon- Not that you're cynical ;)
ReplyDeleteImab - Well "The Wealth of Nations" is probably the founding document for all of capitalism. But it will be a boring and dry read. Freakonomics would be a better read if you haven't read or studied econ before. Naked Economics would help. "Wealth and Poverty" by Gilder is a good read. Otherwise I would always recommend reading The Economist. That will help.
I recommend P.J. O'Rourke On The Wealth Of Nations; everything Smith wrote condensed into a funnier form. Also, if you're looking for capitalism (since you're here, I will assume you are) try Free To Choose by Milton Friedman.
ReplyDeleteThe WEB site to calculate wealth does it by groups. Everyone (107,565) with an annual income > 200,000 are lumped together. According to the site, people making $200,001 are a wealthy as people making $200,000,000.
ReplyDeleteGood catch, you'd think it wouldn't be too hard to come up with a formula that would use standard deviations to get a slightly more accurate #.
ReplyDeleteThe point is at one end of the scale, the difference between 1 dollar a day and ten dollars a day is more than the difference between 200 thousand or 200 million.
ReplyDelete