Will Wilkinson - Latest Comments in America: As Egalitarian as Germany, Sort of

Re: America: As Egalitarian as Germany, Sort of

King Kull — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 13:10:27 -0000

There's much attention to rising income inequality these days. Has anyone measured how significant the effect of lowering tax rates on the rich has encouraged them to claim their wealth as income, rather than 'hide' it in any number of ways? So while income appears to be rising disproportionately for the super rich, it may just be more visible.

Re: America: As Egalitarian as Germany, Sort of

Ken Houghton — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 12:10:42 -0000

Stronger unions also have a stronger political capability in protecting their membership, which might have the effect of a marginal shift in the post-tax imbalance.

Somehow, I'm not comforted by the idea that it's only tax maneuvers that make the US more unequal. That would be true IF the budgets were relatively balanced between the countries.

My "Willie Sutton" instincts (put the taxes where there's money to be found) don't beat the ability to lobby when it will come to politicians allocating who will pay for those increasing ex-SSTF deficits. What we've seen from weaker unions isn't just the shift from DB to DC pensions--it's also a decline in the ability to moderate the political power of the superrich.

Unions aren't a panacea by any stretch, but the strange argument that pre-tax differences are no worse than elsewhere argues for the need for stronger political influence of the lower-compensated, and unions are the closest proxy to that you're going to find.

Re: America: As Egalitarian as Germany, Sort of

John S Bolton — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 20:24:59 -0000

Inequality of income is not in itself bad, but stagnation of median income means that the impulse to increase productivity is weakened, and the more so, the longer this situation lasts. Since the redistribution of pretax income towards the superrich, is the cause of perhaps more than all of this shift, we have reason to fear that it may go further.