Uhh...I'm on my side, duh! What does that even mean? Anyway, if you had read you would have seen my stats were from wage only and has nothing to do with investments, etc. The economists are labeling this as very new. Additionally, they said this was not because of salary at the expense of profit as labor's share has been pretty constant. What is happening is that more of labor's share is going to the top - their share of labor income has been rising fast since the mid-70's but has been crazy fast since the mid-90's.
Very interesting article and interesting discussion. I agree with the spirit of what Webb is saying but I'm uneasy about the solutions he's hinting at. I'm a believer in markets and entrepeneurship and am uneasy about the things like minimum wages and protectionism. that said though I understand what Webb is saying about the vast income disparities we are seeing. The way I've always tried to think of what American society and the American economy should work is that success isn't guarentee but that the opportunity to be successful is. Many people talk about progressive taxes, capital gain taxes and other such things as artificial barriers, or penalties, towards success at the same time though as a small business owner, and I mean small there are three owners two of which are the sole employees, things like the lack of affordable health insurance, high housing, education and transporation costs are also barriers to success. If someone working 40 hours a week can't afford health care, a decent place to live, transporation to jobs and educational opportunities then its going to be very hard for them to become successful. The costs of all of those things also makes it very difficult for an employer to take on new employees when they can't afford to pay for the health insurance while paying a livable wage. So from my standpoint things like expanded government assisted or even universal healthcare along with other social benefits would help my businesss as that would take those costs out of my hand as a potential employer. Its true there is a costs to such things that will have to be paid eventually through taxes but from my own standpoint if that made my business and me more successful by allowing us to bring on more employees when he had more work and not paying for healthcare and conversely letting them go when things slowed down and not having to worry they are going to be without health insurance and living in the street I wouldn't mind paying more taxes.
No I am not kidding you. Person A has a 10 million dollar trust which he inherited. Person A pays himself $100,000 to cover his living expenses. Person B make $100,000 dollars a year. They both get taxed at 40%. Person B just got 40% of his wealth taxed. Person A got .4% of his wealth taxed.
