07/24/2023
This meta-analysis is only vaguely related to the subject I want to discuss today, but does a good job of illustrating the basic situation.
Thesis: those who extract resources from others without their consent stand to benefit the most from those people believing that they exist within a meritocracy.
Another way of saying this is: if you’re the one winning a rigged game, you have the least incentive to make that game equitable.
In fact, your greater incentive would be to convince others the game is equitable.
It’s easier to convince people of this concept if they don’t have the opportunity to travel or experience other opportunities/cultures.
From the link:
“Earnings have stagnated, except for those at the top end of the income scale, thus the distribution of income has become more unequal. While stagnant income among low-income individuals is worrisome, an additional concern is that increased inequality may limit intergenerational mobility, which is defined as the degree to which conditions at birth and childhood determine outcomes later in life. In other words, it measures the passing of socioeconomic standings from one generation to the next.”
“We find evidence to suggest that recent increases in the top 1 percent income share does have negative associations with intergenerational mobility, even controlling for a series of other factors. This finding is an important contribution of our study to contemporary debates about negative effects of income inequality because the increase of the top 1 percent income share has been the primary driver of rising inequality in recent decades, mostly in the United States (Atkinson, Piketty, and Saez 2011; Hout 2012; Jones 2015; Keister 2014; Volscho and Kelly 2012).”
The depth of the deception between average people and the wealthy is usually genuinely incomprehensible.
You have undoubtedly been programmed by your family of origin as to how to talk about money and status. Programming does not have to be conscious, but for the wealthy, it is.
When we have this data, why is the idea of a wealth or income cap controversial?
Because working class people are programmed in their jobs to compete as if they have a chance to make it to the top.
They aren’t hearing “we should control these people who are destroying the planet,” they hear, “I think YOU, PERSONALLY should be forbidden from becoming even moderately rich.”
The reality is that the rich have SO much that they have stolen from their workforces, they can afford to bury the whistleblowers and opposition.
Not because of merit. Because they made the game and the rules.
We provide an overview of associations between income inequality and intergenerational mobility in the United States, Canada, and eight European countries. We a...