Income inequality
September 21, 2015 — John Hinderaker
I really don’t like Pope Francis. Some popes have been positive, world-historical figures, like John Paul II. Others have been clueless tag-alongs with the intellectual fashions of their time. I am afraid that Francis falls into the latter category. His hostility toward free enterprise is the fruit of ignorance, not holiness. His best defense is that as a citizen of Argentina, he has no experience of the benefits of free
»
September 18, 2015 — John Hinderaker
As I noted here, just-released Census Bureau data show that real median household income declined slightly in 2014, while the poverty rate increased slightly. Median incomes for all racial groups except whites were stable, while white median household income declined by 1.7%. I have seen no comment on this fact; certainly no suggestion that the federal government is responsible for the decline or has pursued policies inimical to the interests
»
August 28, 2015 — Steven Hayward
The Energy Institute at the Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley has posted a working paper entitled “The Distributional Effects of U.S. Clean Energy Tax Credits.” The paper is a devastating indictment of who’s getting Cecil the Lion’s share of the tax credits. If this were any other cause than “green energy,” the Left would be screaming about the redistribution of income from the middle
»
August 4, 2015 — Steven Hayward
Last week we featured observations from Angelo Codevilla, author of The Ruling Class, on the deeper sources of Trump’s appeal, namely, that Trump is talking back to the ruling class in a way no other candidate can or will. Yesterday Robert Reich came in on the same theme from the left in the Christian Science Monitor, examining the appeal of Trump and Bernie Sanders: Yet as enthusiasm for the bombastic
»
July 15, 2015 — John Hinderaker
I don’t think we have written about Hillary Clinton’s recent speech on the economy. She says we need economic growth, but the policies she advocates would suppress, not encourage, growth. That’s the bottom line. But a reader also pointed out a letter to the New York Times, as quoted in Cafe Hayek, that bears on Hillary’s fixation on the middle class: Eduardo Porter opens his column today by asking “Could
»
May 5, 2015 — Steven Hayward
The largest source of inequality today is the family, so it is not surprising that liberals obsessed with inequality have to control family life eventually, either by nationalizing children (Plato’s idea, only he was kidding), or by extending regulation to family matters. Think this is far-fetched? The Australian Broadcasting Company has found a philosopher named Adam Swift who thinks parents reading to their children helps increase inequality, and therefore we
»
January 30, 2015 — Steven Hayward
So Obama has had to abandon his plan to tax 529 college savings plans to pay for his “free” community college proposal, because lo and behold lots of middle class people are 529 savers. But Republicans could still enable Obama to pay for this proposal with a tax that actually hits the genuine rich: a surtax on large private college endowments—say on all endowments that are more than something like
»
January 5, 2015 — Steven Hayward
We’ve noted the weaknesses of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century before (here, here, here, and here), but what the heck, with France ruining Piketty’s and Krugman’s Monday by cutting its high income surtax, we might as well note the latest torpedo aimed at Piketty. It comes from the website Capx (“for popular capitalism”), in a post entitled “Ten Truths About Income Inequality.” All ten are worth taking in,
»
July 15, 2014 — Scott Johnson
Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century is the book of the season. Published by Harvard University Press, it is a surprise best-seller. At the time of its publication earlier this year it neatly fit Obama’s theme of the moment on income inequality. Readers seem to have abandoned the book at page 26, as Obama seems to have abandoned the theme of income inequality. As the title of his book
»
May 24, 2014 — Steven Hayward
As John notes below, Thomas Piketty’s empirical work appears to be unraveling, and if not in fact fraudulently manipulated, it is at least highly contestable. The Spectator’s Fraser Nelson wonders, where was Harvard University Press? The answer is disconcerting: the book is simply making Harvard University Press too much money for them to care about accuracy. Maybe Piketty should just re-render his findings in the shape of a hockey stick
»
April 21, 2014 — John Hinderaker
When Scott and I wrote “The Truth About Income Inequality,” one of the highlights of our pre-internet career, we emphasized the remarkable degree of income mobility that has long characterized the American economy. The rich man and the poor man, we argued, are largely the same man in different stages of life. In recent years, some have tried to show that income mobility has lessened, but longitudinal studies don’t support
»
April 21, 2014 — Scott Johnson
The visit of French economist Thomas Piketty to the United States has not quite induced Beatlemania, Scott Winship writes at Forbes, but rather the Washington analogue of teenage frenzy. In the New York Times, Jennifer Schuessler might lend credence to the Beatlemania that Winship disclaims. “Economist receives rock star treatment,” Schuessler reports. Indeed, you can see the frenzy through the New York Times alone. Yesterday’s Times brought us Ross Douthat’s
»
April 16, 2014 — Steven Hayward
There’s hardly anyone who can top former Enron adviser (TM James Taranto) Paul Krugman in the sweepstakes for bemoaning income inequality, and so it makes perfect sense that City University of New York would hire Krugman for $25,000 per month to be a grandee at its new center to study the problem. The Onion and The Daily Show may as well take the rest of the day off. The offer
»
January 28, 2014 — John Hinderaker
Word is that President Obama’s State of the Union speech will focus on inequality. This is no surprise, as the Democrats have concluded that inequality is the issue that gives them the best chance to distract from Obamacare’s failures and fire up their base. It also offers an implicit rejoinder to the fact that Obama has presided over a lousy economy for the last five years: sure the economy is
»
January 4, 2014 — Paul Mirengoff
At his inauguration, New York’s new mayor Bill DeBlasio denounced the city’s economic inequality. He seemed to argue that to remain truly great, New York must remedy income inequality. I submit, however, that New York is great in part because of income inequality. The wealth at the top end of the economic spectrum clearly has played a major role in the city’s greatness. For one thing, the very rich have
»
December 27, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Michael Barone has written an important column about the relationship between the breakdown of the American family and income inequality and lack of social mobility. Barone relies in part on Nick Shultz’s book Home Economics: The Consequences of Changing Family Structure which I have not read. Barone’s thesis — that growing up outside of a two-parent family means lower income, less social mobility, and less “human capital” — is not
»
