Nail on the head

[Darkhorse]

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35406324

[Pudfark]

Read your link. Read the variables. Interesting that 'they' didn't identify the 'proximate cause'...very well, as in 'glossed over' it.

Just sayin', Hillary and all but two of the GOP candidates have that problem. As a socialist, Bernie shares no blame with them. His claim is he never did 'nuffin' and really never did...The only thing Bernie has done? Is unite the losers in an effort to rob the winners. Bernie's appeal is to make theft, legitimate.

[Reservoir_Dog]

Good article. Thanks DH.

[callmeslick]

nice article, and I'd add that each of those 5 categories can be embellished upon a bit. The one that caught my eye was the first one. Median income has been flat, essentially meaning that we still essentially have half of the working age populace making less than 50K per year and half above it. What that doesn't take into account is the trajectory of income of those in the top 10% tier, which has been skyrocketing since the late 90s. The visibility of that different trajectory breeds anger, and historically always does. Pud likes to blabber about civil war over so-called 'conservative' principles, but the usual cause of violent uprisings(more revolutions than civil wars) are when the wealth disparity of a society gets overbearing.

[Darkhorse]

nice article, and I'd add that each of those 5 categories can be embellished upon a bit. The one that caught my eye was the first one. Median income has been flat, essentially meaning that we still essentially have half of the working age populace making less than 50K per year and half above it. What that doesn't take into account is the trajectory of income of those in the top 10% tier, which has been skyrocketing since the late 90s. The visibility of that different trajectory breeds anger, and historically always does. Pud likes to blabber about civil war over so-called 'conservative' principles, but the usual cause of violent uprisings(more revolutions than civil wars) are when the wealth disparity of a society gets overbearing.

In your opinion what would be best way to get the median income to start raising?

[Pudfark]

Surprised Slick ain't jumped on this...

He'd prolly say...'not only tax the rich and give to the poor...we could give a dab to middle class, while we quietly raise taxes on them too."

[callmeslick]

In your opinion what would be best way to get the median income to start raising?

we have, luckily enough, a damn near perfect blueprint. It was the Eisenhower years and onward until the Vietnam war fecked up the cash flow and tied up the younger workforce:1) Use a more drastic taxation scale weighted against very high income brackets. In 1955, any income over $200,000 in a year was taxed at 90%(no one has the political will to get to that, but still, that's what worked). That would translate, with inflation to income over about 1 million bucks. Lower brackets of income would drop to a 10% bottom bracket. What this sort of scheme did in the day was to put pressure on executive compensation away from salaries and towards long-term stock options(which are cap gains income). 2) return cap gains income taxes to a 25% rate. This really doesn't accomplish a whole lot other than bolster worker confidence that investment income is taxed at the same rate as work income(Reagan saw that to be good, as you likely know) 3) get the government back into underwriting a LOT of fundamental scientific research, which is pricey for a corporation to justify the risk of zero return. This sort of thing between 1955 and 1972 led to two decades plus of economic payoffs(a bonanza, actually) when the basic research generates ideas for R and D of actual consumer or industrial goods. All of these, combined, give you an economy that starts to focus on long-term growth, which generates long-term professional employment, and doesn't fritter away capital upon speculation and the circle of fee-charging such speculation generates. edit--note that a glance at history shows that this period of time did not prevent anyone from becoming rich, or remaining rich. It just maintained a sensible balance. The middle class boomed.

Another factor here, DH, is, as I noted, the imminent change in the whole economic game. We are moving to a world in which the need for human manual labor of even moderate skill is rendered obsolete by robotics and automation. Thus, the workforce will be in research, development, creative endeavors and service sectors, with the same small segment of medical, legal or other professionals of high caliber. If we don't have a workforce of primarily well-educated adults, that median isn't going to budge, because more and more people will be earning essentially nothing, because there will be absolutely NO job for them, past labor at absolute world-rock-bottom wages. The nations that rise to the top in this post labor economy will be those who emphasize, even SUBSIDIZE higher education, creative learning(the Arts) and specialized skill learning, and making such accessible to the absolute best our society has, with ZERO regard for cost of educating them(yes, free fucking college, Pud). The Germans seem to have caught on to this set of goals, as have the Scandinavians, and the US, like them, still has the residual wealth and economic strength to survive the transition. What the US cannot afford is another decade or so of dithering. We will be left at the post.

Sorry for the long-windedness, but it was a great question that deserved a fleshed out answer.

[callmeslick]

Surprised Slick ain't jumped on this...

He'd prolly say...'not only tax the rich and give to the poor...we could give a dab to middle class, while we quietly raise taxes on them too."

DH, compare and contrast, as they used to request on those final exams in college!

[Pudfark]

The summary:

[Pudfark]

the fine print...