Bahbah, your interpretation of this stat is very dumb. Like yeah, obviously someone who was working and now retired makes less money and someone who wasn't working because they were in school and are now working makes more money. That's why your idea of polling individuals is dumb. That doesn't refute anything Im saying particularly because, as Ive said three times now and you've ignored, mobility between quintiles has declined markedly.

Plus the whole point was to argue against your moronic assertion that inequality was declining and at the lowest point in history, a point which you walked back HARD last night after getting schooled.

Haha must be tired this post is pure gold.

Perhaps statistics guru bahbah could interpret this chart for us? It seems central to the discussion of growing inequality. The title is "Growth in Real After-Tax Income from 1979 to 2007":

Note that is actually one of the more optimistic views. Before tax income looks worse and cutting in 1985 or 1995 looks worse.

Source for the graph, please.

www.google.com

But glad you finally dropped the mask and are an out and proud Trump supporter.

Uh, talk to OmahaFanatical4... he's the one who said only those who worked to build the house deserve to enjoy that housing wealth that was thereby 'created'. You seem to disagree. You feel an absentee landlord, who say inherited the property in question, is 'entitled' to wealth they didn't work to build.

Why do you disagree with OmahaFanatical4 ??

I am just surprised how much the lower 80% is seeing their income grow compared to the 81-99%ers. The 4th quintile looks like it is got about 45% growth while the 81-99ers only got 65%. It just goes to show us how even more misleading gambools original stats were since it is really just the 1% that is seeing massive income growth.

Yeah, mark me down as saying that skilled workers deserve to have their income grow faster than unskilled workers and the more skilled you are the more you should see your income grow.

I don't see the merit to looking at these statistical groupings. The real question is, are the people who were at the bottom 20% of income in 1980 still there. Of course the top 1% is always going to be super income. It really depends on how this income is derived. If a businessman makes a great product and lots of people benefit from it, then I am very pleased for him to make a lot of money for doing such good work. If someone sits at home all day and gets drunk, then I should also celebrate the fact that he has a low income as a result. What justice is there in using force to take from the industrious and give to the indolent? Always the looters cry for more, as if need equated to right.

Of course if this high income is the product of state largess or political connections, as is all too often the case, because of the etatist ideology promoted by so many on this forum, then certainly we should condemn those who get rich not through industry but through appropriation.

In before another "Not sure why I said that. It isn't true" from bahbah.

bahbah yesterday

bahbah today

Lets see what I said

But I must express a certain skepticism about someone who professes to be concerned about inequality, but instead of doing something about it on their own, they wish to use force to take my money to handle the problem. This seems more like a very thinly disguised excuse to rob me than an actual dedication to the poor.

One of the most overrated economists of all time was Ricardo. He posited that the economy was a battle between landlords, capitalists and labour, with landlords usually winning out. The whole thing was very pre-marxian and is of course total hogwash. The market economy is entirely symbiotic; people making exchanges for their mutual benefit. My landlord is a great guy (oncologist too); he gave me a place to live, I gave him money. I don't despise him for offering me this exchange, I celebrate the fact that he was willing to provide something to me that I desperately need, housing.

In no way do those two things contradict themselves. while the 1% are seeing massive income growth it is nowhere near as bad as you made it out to be. In fact the poor and middle class have seen great income growth (not the 0% you claimed).

Nope. Go back and read what I wrote. I said you'd see extremely modest growth using after tax income for the bottom 80%. If you use before tax income, you'll see negative growth. The after tax growth is in part a function of transfer payments and other redistribution, you know, the kind you rail against. As I said, I have seen these stats and know what they mean. You are a moron who guesses based on your feels.

lol at great income growth. Tell me, oh financial genius what is the CAGR behind 45% absolute growth over 35 years?

You remain a complete economic illiterate. Just write this

in place of, oh, every post you make in politics and save us all time and improve accuracy/content.

I didn't reply to him right ? Seems like my post was directed at you. The people who own the land are being payed by me as well so you seem to miss the point (whatelseisnewamirite).

Sorry, I should have included that, it was an oversight on my part. On the other hand, if you had just googled "Growth in Real After-Tax Income from 1979 to 2007" you could have come up with this CBO report pretty quickly.

Well, we weren't talking about how 'nice' peeps are, or what kinda humanistic work they do in their day job. Let's imagine the really nicest guy, who is a large animal veterinarian, and specializes in saving the cutest of the ponies. He could have 'gave' me this sweet x-box, and I could have 'gave' him some $$$. But, if he stole that x-box... well he 'played no part in the creation of' that wealth, now did he?

I love this anecdotal so-called evidence too.

Back in the day, my gf had a landlord who literally sat around all day and got drunk. He was from an uber-rich out-of-town family, and when he turned 25 he was gifted a house to live in, and across town this 3-unit apartment building as his income source. This was contingent on him moving here and managing it (we were told, mainly to get him the hell out of wherever they were from).

The problem is that he wasn't only a drunk, who liked harassing his tenants for real or imagined slights, he was also a pervert. That, and the 3-units interconnected through the closets, using doors only the landlord held keys to. The tenants, including my gf at the time, ended up getting a restraining order barring the landlord from his own property. He was forced to beg his family to hire a management company, paid for out of his income stream.

So... some landlords are cool, and oncologists and such. But some are drunken perverts, who, to bring this home in your own words, are: "someone who played no part in the creation of wealth to receive" those rents. Amirite ??

All correct. That chart was easy to find and I thought it might help focus the discussion since even with these limitations the curve is so stark.

People keep saying things like this as if it's perfectly natural and expected. But it hasn't always been like this. The massive tilting of these curves toward the top end is a relatively recent phenomenon. There are trends in progress and the question is whether those trends are sustainable.

The real question is 'was this wealth earned'. If someone creates 1 million dollars of wealth, they deserve to have it all and taking any of it from them to give to someone else (or to take for yourself) is clearly immoral. The problem is that many people get rich not through production, but through grants of monopoly privilege, straight up tax salaries or other examples of stage largess. There is a sincere justice in the market place in that everyone gets paid what they contribute to the productive process.

It's weird how lolbertarians describe highly contentious ideas that only their >1% of the world actually believe in and describe them as "clearly" the case.

OK. Well, in the examples I gave above, a very nice podiatrist selling stolen x-boxs hasn't 'earned that wealth', correct? And the drunken pervert absentee landlord never 'earned that wealth' either, correct?

Morality is not subject to a vote.

Some of it is. Taxation derives it's moral legitimacy from democracy.

Taxation has no moral legitimacy. It is manifestly unjust, which is why it requires such an extensive brainwashing machine so that people buy into this scam.

Are you against gym fees as well ?