Infographics on the distribution of wealth in America, highlighting both the inequality and the difference between our perception of inequality and the actual numbers. The reality is often not what we think it is.
Okay, unusual that this site says "educate". Because I'm surprised this came from a Business Economice professor, unless he was studying citizens understanding of economics. This is what is called "Pareto's Law". We know Mathematically that no matter what country you live in wealth is divided like this. 80% of wealth is controlled by roughly 20% of the population. If you did this study in China you would get around the same number.....you would get the same numbers in Haiti, you would get the same numbers in Venezuela. So one could say that almost every country is capitalists, it simply depends on WHO the 20% are. In the Soviet Union it was the state. In France and places like that it is the state. In America it is people. And in Australia it's mainly people. So don't get too freaked out by this. It simply shows that wealth cannot be redistrubted from the top. Because the 20% never changes. What does change is how many people are in the bottom 10% versus somewhere in the middle. So when the middle class grows, it does not grow because the top earners shrink, it grows because the bottom earners shrink.
I think his point is that it's one thing to think the top 20% own 80% of the wealth and a completely different thing that the top 1% in fact owns 40% of the nations wealth . I think the main concern here is the stark contrast in people's perception of what they think the wealth distribution in the country is and what it actually is.
Okay, unusual that this site says "educate". Because I'm surprised this came from a Business Economice professor, unless he was studying citizens understanding of economics. This is what is called "Pareto's Law". We know Mathematically that no matter what country you live in wealth is divided like this. 80% of wealth is controlled by roughly 20% of the population. If you did this study in China you would get around the same number.....you would get the same numbers in Haiti, you would get the same numbers in Venezuela. So one could say that almost every country is capitalists, it simply depends on WHO the 20% are. In the Soviet Union it was the state. In France and places like that it is the state. In America it is people. And in Australia it's mainly people. So don't get too freaked out by this. It simply shows that wealth cannot be redistrubted from the top. Because the 20% never changes. What does change is how many people are in the bottom 10% versus somewhere in the middle. So when the middle class grows, it does not grow because the top earners shrink, it grows because the bottom earners shrink.
ReplyDeleteI think his point is that it's one thing to think the top 20% own 80% of the wealth and a completely different thing that the top 1% in fact owns 40% of the nations wealth . I think the main concern here is the stark contrast in people's perception of what they think the wealth distribution in the country is and what it actually is.
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