[Judicial Watch] Isis camp in Mexico close to Texas border

I'm not really arguing that capitalism doesn't have problems. You need sensible regulation and a safety net. I like the Scandinavian model. But too many on the left ignore the astounding increase in wealth among the poor over the last several decades.

As gar as Germany, I don't think you can look at hours worked as the relevant indicator. What's been important in their separation recently has been the adoption of supply side reforms in Germany. Unions were weakened.

Meanwhile, France raised taxes to the point where even the left there realizes they can't go higher without hurting revenue

 

That would be an intersection of supply and demand, not an example of the supply side

 

Those flatlines are truly astounding! is it adjusted for smartphones?

#gunsup

 

Check the international chart

 

The New York Times
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The Upshot

Income Inequality Is Not Rising Globally. It's Falling.

JULY 19, 2014
Economic View
By TYLER COWEN
Income inequality has surged as a political and economic issue, but the numbers don’t show that inequality is rising from a global perspective. Yes, the problem has become more acute within most individual nations, yet income inequality for the world as a whole has been falling for most of the last 20 years. It’s a fact that hasn’t been noted often enough.

The finding comes from a recent investigation by Christoph Lakner, a consultant at the World Bank, and Branko Milanovic, senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study Center. And while such a framing may sound startling at first, it should be intuitive upon reflection. The economic surges of China, India and some other nations have been among the most egalitarian developments in history.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/07/20/upshot/income-inequality-is-not-rising-globally-its-falling-.html?referrer=

 

#gunsup

 

I did, and I came up with this.

http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2014/04/04/stop-adding-up-the-wealth-of-the-poor/

 

Earlier in this thread, you are arguing about wealth

Now you are posting an article about income.

Do you know the difference between the two?

#gunsup indeed.

 

How much longer in your opinion should the majority of Americans keep patiently waiting as the wealth trickles up because of your belief in Milton Friedman's markket fundamentalism which was much talked about in the early 80's when the whole scam about cutting taxes for the wealthy and benefits for the rest started which rolled back the gains the middle class had made in the 40 previous years?

BTW not correct to claim that only philosophers" but not a substantial number of economists oppose the extreme free ideas of Friedman


'

 

Really? Three posts in a row quoting the same person, what has gotten into you?

 

Back from your proselytizing mission in Africa?

 

Back on topic folks. Our proposed Michael bay directed ISIS vs Zetas Cartel award season film. McConaughey should be the lead. There should also be at least three huge explosions and two full on gun battles. What else we got?

 

Need a hot chick.

 

Eva Mendes would be a good choice as the U.S. undercover agent infiltrating Los Zetas.

 

Definitely. Way hot.

 

It appears that there are things we can agree on.

 

I'm sure this is not true, but I am also sure it is inevitable that something like this will happen if you guys keep letting your government treat Mexicans and Mexico the way it has treated them for decades now. Mexicans are looking south and seeing tiny little pockets of how their life can at least be on a path to something better.

There must already be Arabs in the US smuggled through Mexico illegally. No one would even know the difference, people speak to me and my family in Spanish the whole time when we're in the US.

 

Depends on what you are wearing, I guess.

 

Trickle up is killing us. What will corporations do once they have sucked all the cash out of the bottom of the barrel? Will the whole thing collapse?

 

I don't think anyone disagress that over several decades, things have improved. The issue is going forward. There has, for the entirety of human history, been fairly simple and reliable relationship between business and labor: to make more money, you have to employ more people. So the system worked for everyone. For the rich to get richer, the middle class HAD to gain jobs.

Over the last decade or two, that has started to break down due to structural changes in technology and society. Businesses can now make billions without really employing many people. Compare a Facebook's profits:employees ratio to the major companies of the past. Or even compare an automaker's ratio today to their ratio 30 years ago.

So in the past, it was easy to say "make business successful, and everything else will follow". Today, making business successful does NOT necessarily mean everything else will follow. We're seeing that to a large extent in this recovery. I believe as far back as 2010, corporate profits were at absolute record highs - yet there was no real demand for employment.

So modern capitalism is losing the core element that made it so workable - and it's going to be interesting to figure out how to adapt it. The key question is: if we don't need nearly as much workers in a modern economy and we keep replacing people with technology, what exactly do we do with all those now-unemployed people?

Consumption does not go up when the money isn't flowing to the masses in the form of jobs; and jobs don't go up when they aren't needed to increase production. So the traditional cycle of increased consumption leading to more more jobs leading to more consumption and on doesn't hold up.