What's important, how rich/poor you are relative to someone else, or relative to how rich/poor you used to be?

Question

Leftists look at "sweatshops" in other countries and decry capitalism - but without capitalism those people would still be peasants living naked in the woods or in thatch roof houses living on yams and grubs. You gotta start somewhere and they have no skills - they're slowly getting some. $120 sneakers versus $2/day is a stark comparison but it used to be $1/day and before that was subsistence farming equating to a dime a day.

Leftists compare the poor here with the wealthy here but most of the poor here are immigrants or 1st generation citizens - and are richer than they were in their home countries - - - ironically, where the economy is less free.... And economic mobility in absolute terms continues to increase here - Sawhill points out that you might not catch up to the couple that is now living the life you want to live, but your chances of getting to the point where you're living that life within the next decade are improving dramatically.

http://www.nytimes.com/specials/downsize/21cox.html
http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/1988/05/art1full.pdf
http://www.frbsf.org/econrsrch/wklyltr/el97-07.html#winners
http://www.dallasfed.org/fed/annual/1999p/ar95.html
http://money.cnn.com/2005/05/25/pf/record_millionaires/index.htm?cnn=yes
http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/28/news/economy/millionaire_survey/index.htm?cnn=yes
http://money.cnn.com/2006/03/28/news/economy/millionaires/?cnn=yes
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Labor/bg1773.cfm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6214022/site/newsweek/

WHY a balance? Who determines this balance if not the consumers? And why - why does it matter?

The "gap" between the richest of us and the rest of us keeps growing, but if you draw a line in terms of income or wealth to define what is "affluent" or "comfortable" the proportion of this country that is above it keeps growing.

And if you draw a line to define what is "poor" the proportion of this country that is below it is also growing but not nearly as fast, and only because the rate at which people from OTHER countries where they HAVE more of a 'balance' through preventing anyone from getting rich is growing at a very rapid pace - i.e., we're not making new people, we're importing them.

So if you not only eat well but have the sofa, kitchen, wardrobe and vacations you always wanted, who cares if some rich guy in Greenwich has another mansion, a plane and three more yachts?

"...with globalization first world workers are poorer" sorry Paula the numbers just don't say that - unless by "first world" you mean Europe, and again, that's because of their socialist economic policies. The numbers are clear, that's not the case here.

Stony your answer is to let them eat less, and stale, cake, but try to make them feel better by taking away more from everyone else.

That's how it has ALWAYS worked out - the only way to achieve equality is to cut down the top, to take from the top, leaving a smaller pie for all of us.

As Churchill said the choice is unequally shared plenty or equally shared misery.

Besides Stony, who is advocating slavery? Where'd I do that? I'm saying quite the opposite - I'm advocating freedom - - - - for all of us.

Beardog how is giving people a job exploiting them????? Nobody's forcing anyone to do anything - except in some parts of China but that's the Chinese government, not private companies.

Um, oohbother, free trade has created more jobs than it has lost. Unemployment is 4.6%. Net, we're creating jobs. And the ones lost are the lower-skill jobs while most of the ones created are the higher-skill jobs.

Answer 1

Relative to how rich or poor I used to be. I can't do anything about other people..............

Answer 2

My license to steal from the public expires if I do not take 40 hours of continuing education courses in the next 6 months .
I wonder if I should renew my mortgage brokers license or take the few hundred thousand I made off upfront fees and get out now into something else before everyone claims I caused the 2 trillion dollar bail out of the home mortgage industry .
I remember the good old days when we touted stocks to make money and then they changed the regulations and before that the loans we took out that we never repaid "whoops about that savings and loan crisis tax payes bailed out at the tune of over 50 billion", but earning a living is tough and not for the faint of heart .

In this country its about degrees of poor .
The poorest you can get is to end up on welfare . Thats still a place to live with running water and electricity and food to eat and thats more then millions of Iraqi's have who fled to SYRIA for protection and help .

Answer 3

Try asking the people in the US who "Used to be" employed by companies who observed pollution controls, safety laws, and paid a decent wage
in order to give sub-standard polluting unsafe low paying jobs to starving people in some other country?

Better yams and grubs than lead poisoning.

RE: More hours worked for lower pay was the finding of the latest census - finding that household wealth increased by the sole means of increased hours worked, not pay increase.

Answer 4

Dude- exploiting people in poverty isn't capitalism. Whatever gave you that idea? That's just corporate communism, it's akin to indentured servitude- keepin 'em workin' for the man. Capitalism would encourage those people to start their own businesses and work for themselves. Look at some of the Microloan programs in Africa for an example of how real Capitalism handles that.

Stop standing on the left while you yell at them.

Answer 5

Neither. There will ALWAYS be someone else richer than you. And anyone willing to work should be able to improve his station in life. The only thing that's really important regarding wealth is that you have sufficient to meet your NEEDS.

God promises that if you put Him first, He will see to your needs. Wealth is a distraction from that which is truly important.

Answer 6

There will always be someone richer, smarter, better looking than you. And there will always be someone poorer, uglier and dumber than you. So the obvious answer is relative to how rich/poor you used to be and with globalization first world workers are poorer.

Answer 7

LMAO!!

YES! YES! LET THEM EAT CAKE!!

WITHOUT SLAVERY THE AFRICANS WOULD STILL BE SAVAGES!

What wonderful logic you have!

Answer 8

there's a balance.