so dumb down that casemods can understand it, maybe
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The middle class piece is shrinking and the poor is growing and so is the rich.
Now let’s see a chart on who pays how much of the taxes. Dare ya’.
I know, right? I mean those poor bastards in the top 20% own 80% of American’s wealth, all while running corporations in which only 66% don’t pay taxes! I’m sure those people on welfare are on it just to spite us real Americans who are underpaid and receive less and less benefits each year. How dare they need money for rent and food and gas to keep from freezing to death. MORE TAX CUTS FOR THE RICH! Pay cuts for public unions! Anything else is socialism.
Sarcasm FTW!
Seriously. A 1% tax increase on the rich could make way for a 10% drop on everyone else and STILL come out ahead on revenue… And they’d STILL be paying a lower percentage overall than the lower class, yet they whine about how unfair it is that they should be expected to pay the same taxes as everyone else.
What about the other 4%?
That’s the dog’s share –
The problem with this stupid example is that wealth is not finite. The poor can create a bigger slice of pizza if they want or have the ability. They’re not limited to their Ethiopian-sized slice just because Jabba has 2/3 of the deep dish.
Wealth is finite. You cannot just create money out of nothing. You can create debt out of nothing, but debt is the opposite of wealth.
The only way to have more wealth than another is by taking more than the others. So if the poor were to take more, someone would instantly lose some.
For all intents and purposes, at the micro level, wealth is essentially infinite. Just because Bill Gates has lots of money doesn’t keep me from getting lots of money either. There isn’t a gold standard nor is there a cap on valuation of assets.
Bottom line, charts and posts like this are wrong because one person’s wealth doesn’t prevent someone else from gaining wealth either. The poor are poor due to a mindset, lack of ability, or choice, not because the evil rich are conspiring against them.
As Notme says, wealth is finite. In a sense at least. “Creating more money” leads to inflation, which puts things right back where they were, if not worse.
Wealth is not finite, however, as long as a small percentage of the population controls the means of production, owns the large majority of acreage and directly influences or even controls the laws and governmental bodies regulating wealth – then the poor are not going to be able to collectively rise into new wealth.
Depends on what one means by “wealth” and how the “value” of that wealth is calculated. There are a LOT of assets out there (art for example) that are valuable only with respect to cultural demand. The theoretical value of priceless things yes, may be effectively unlimited but go ahead and try to liquidate that asset at the same time another person is liquidating their similar assets.
Resources however ARE limited and as such the availability of goods is limited. These resources are just as concentrated as assets with largely intangible value. The availability of vital resources is rapidly diminishing at the moment. I’m just waiting to see how people react once we start seeing phosphorous shortages. Then the sheets really will hit the fan…
According to Scott Walker, the big piece is the union’s share –
And that’s why Walker is an an idiot and a liar.
The sad thing is the Rich is the smallest (population) of all the groups listed.