My response:
Here is the measure of the coefficient of income inequality, which has been steadily rising, showing the widening spread between upper and upper middle class earners and lower middle and middle class earners:
US income Gini coefficients over time
Gini coefficients for the United States at various times, according to the US Census Bureau:
1967: 0.397 (first year reported)
1968: 0.386 (lowest coefficient reported)
1970: 0.394
1980: 0.403
1990: 0.428
2000: 0.462
2005: 0.469 (most recent year reported; highest coefficient reported)[3]
oThe average for industrialized nations is approximately .375 (or 3/8), which is a measure of how fast the Lorenz curve rises.
You will note for the chart that is included in this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient, that we were relatively flat until 1980. What this says to me is that those at the top of the income scale have been able to appropriate more and more of the country's intellectual capital for themselves, because the distribution of intellectual capital has not changed appreciably. If the trend continues, we will soon be in the same category as many developing nations - which, whatever else you think, cannot be good for a democracy. You will note that in the colored graph, we are closer if not matching central and south america much more closely that Japan and western Europe - a development of the last 25 years.
One obvious consequence is your pay package, as well as that of those at large, leveraged law firms. The observed change from my graduation til today is not simply anecdotal but real. You yourself have observed it in your blog in differentials between the pay of classmates of your dad who went into law versus teaching.
One question is whether this has any relationship to productivity, an inverse relationship, and what it says about (real) standard of livings of Americans in different deciles of income. I would like to know similar facts for the Gini coefficient for wealth distribution. However, I think it indisputable that the perception that the corporatization of America has occurred to the detriment of most salaried and hourly workers is clear. It is a form of socialism where the wealth is captured not by the government and redistributed but by those at the top of the economic food chain.
I do not think it is healthy for the country, much as it makes you and Mester disproportionately wealthier for certain benefits conferred upon you by birth and schooling.
Interjection from a friend:
FYI - and I may havementione4d this in passing on Friday - a few weeks ago back in Jer'lem I I heard a talk by a brilliant (to my mind) sociologist, who made the following argument: A crucial element of what we call 'the 60s" and one, perhaps the, defining difference etween the old & newlefts, is that the latter advocated a politics of subjectivity, personal experience and authenticity, self-expression. The New Left version of that fell apart for several reaons sbut a major one was its inability to find a mature institutional expression. Once this subjective, expressive element was injected into the culture it breahted new life into Evangelicalism, which had been languishing since the 1920s, and was better able than the new left to give an instituional expression, anchor and legitimacy to the subjectivism that had been set loose in the culture by the New Left.
I thought this was reallyinteresting and maybe compelling.
In which case the dynamics you are describing and the indying salience of the culture wars are somehow related to this broader redefinisition of politics as the personal, in ways that are manifest in Evangelicalism, radical Islam, the settler movement in Israel -- as well as the identity politics of minorities etc. that we usually associate with the left.
My original point:
I think the strong religious element in the party (to a large extent the result of southern baptists becoming conservative, but not exclusively) is near the heart of the problem. When you and I disagreed about Ford-Reagan in 1976, Iowa was for Ford - a moderately conservative (but conservative and Republican) midwestern state. Now the party there can be (not is, but can be) dominated by a new movement of evangelicals (of which my brother is a part). And business interests have declined (Madison has an interesting argument about the wealth of a state and its population in the federalist papers, and it seems right to me, which means that from the time we were 15 til now, the wealth of Iowa has declined tremendously relative to that of other states). I blame this [as leading to] the ascendancy of the power of the evangelicals, along with their development.
In short terms, the natural intellectual leaders of the party in the past - the champions of ideas like Hayek and Friedman and the like are overshadowed by those concerned with cultural issues. This tends to put off the more liberal (classically, not american) elements of the party and makes them not want to run. The idea of freedom (in all areas, emphasized by the battle with communism) has been replaced by the idea that the main battle is over defining the culture, which a large part of the old guard would not even have seen as the main mission of the party since it was out of step with the idea of freedom of all kinds. Now I am not saying that there was not an element of or seeds of cultural conservatives in the old party, but market and political freedom overshadowed it. I think this has driven away (not necessarily in a voting sense but in a willingness to run for office sense) many Republicans who would make good candidates. I think of McCain as a conservative of Ford-like stripes, and yet the hard right is villifying the man even for ideas, like opposing the Bush tax cuts (which have become some sort of mantra), which 25 years ago would have been seen as a fiscally responsible approach to the deficit (though I think technically economic from an economic point of view relying more on the tax cuts and less on the Fed's drastic rate cuts would have been much better for the economy, given economic understanding about what type of stimulus would have been best back then, as I understand from my friends like Mike Scherer at Harvard). The war has not helped at all.
Anyway, I despair. Oddly, Roe v. Wade, which is so clearly wrong, may have become such a focus that the party has lost its bearings - becoming too focused on things like that and gay marriage - pushing out more important issues like balancing the budget; ensuring the health care system gets reforms that restore some degree of market incentives for providers (not insurers); and cutting defense spending so that tax rates can be lowered - and also dealing with systemic problems which widen the gap between middle and upper middle class in the country (I remember David Bradford, Princeton professor, and member of the President's CEA in 1992, pointing out this trend to me). To be sure, free trade has economic benefits, but our inability to be a nation that produces and has a strong, secure working class (in the same position economically relative to the upper and wealthy classes as 30 years ago) tends to have divisive effects; and is a sign that our economy while profitable has weakened. (FM Scherer at Harvard has pointed out to me not only the problem of the trade deficit, and its inability to continue - which signals at some point inflation and possibly the Fed losing control over monetary policy - but also if you look at a breakdown of national income [by] category of income, corporate profits are far out-sized [vis-a-vis] personal income compared to any time in the last 40 to 50 years - which I see as ultimately undermining the strength of the Republican base, which [has been] small contributors who were small entreperneurs - like our friend and very successful Don Gringer).
So I despair on many levels. The farm system being one.
The Response:
Well, I feel much the same way, although with less intensity all around:
I do not hate W., but I *wish* he were more articulate and had
controlled spending. I do not know whether McCain will be too hotheaded
to win. The anger makes him genuine in a way that no other Republican
is. I think he stands a plausible chance against both Democrats, but a
less than even chance. Also, he does not seem too old to me. He has a
young wife, and remember the old adage: "You are as old as the woman
you feel."
Your farm system point is distressing, but there is one caveat I have
been wondering about. The circumstances of our withdrawal from Iraq
will define the political views of literally thousands of soldiers,
Marines, and sailors who are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. The war
in Iraq is now on such a positive upswing (at least if you read
mil-bloggers) that the soldiers on the ground feel they are making real
progress and victory is at hand. If the Dems pull the rug out from
under them it will create a generation of officers who (i) resent them
for the decision, (ii) have accomplished an enormous amount under
extraordinarily trying circumstances and demonstrated irrefutable
leadership and management skills to boot, and (iii) who know a lot more
about the Middle East than any other group of Americans. These people
are going to be very successful in business (as a class), and eventually
head into politics. They will start defining organizations and politics
about 2020, I think.
But that's a long time from now.
Here is the measure of the coefficient of income inequality, which has been steadily rising, showing the widening spread between upper and upper middle class earners and lower middle and middle class earners:
US income Gini coefficients over time
Gini coefficients for the United States at various times, according to the US Census Bureau:
1967: 0.397 (first year reported)
1968: 0.386 (lowest coefficient reported)
1970: 0.394
1980: 0.403
1990: 0.428
2000: 0.462
2005: 0.469 (most recent year reported; highest coefficient reported)[3]
oThe average for industrialized nations is approximately .375 (or 3/8), which is a measure of how fast the Lorenz curve rises.
You will note for the chart that is included in this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient, that we were relatively flat until 1980. What this says to me is that those at the top of the income scale have been able to appropriate more and more of the country's intellectual capital for themselves, because the distribution of intellectual capital has not changed appreciably. If the trend continues, we will soon be in the same category as many developing nations - which, whatever else you think, cannot be good for a democracy. You will note that in the colored graph, we are closer if not matching central and south america much more closely that Japan and western Europe - a development of the last 25 years.
One obvious consequence is your pay package, as well as that of those at large, leveraged law firms. The observed change from my graduation til today is not simply anecdotal but real. You yourself have observed it in your blog in differentials between the pay of classmates of your dad who went into law versus teaching.
One question is whether this has any relationship to productivity, an inverse relationship, and what it says about (real) standard of livings of Americans in different deciles of income. I would like to know similar facts for the Gini coefficient for wealth distribution. However, I think it indisputable that the perception that the corporatization of America has occurred to the detriment of most salaried and hourly workers is clear. It is a form of socialism where the wealth is captured not by the government and redistributed but by those at the top of the economic food chain.
I do not think it is healthy for the country, much as it makes you and Mester disproportionately wealthier for certain benefits conferred upon you by birth and schooling.
Interjection from a friend:
FYI - and I may havementione4d this in passing on Friday - a few weeks ago back in Jer'lem I I heard a talk by a brilliant (to my mind) sociologist, who made the following argument: A crucial element of what we call 'the 60s" and one, perhaps the, defining difference etween the old & newlefts, is that the latter advocated a politics of subjectivity, personal experience and authenticity, self-expression. The New Left version of that fell apart for several reaons sbut a major one was its inability to find a mature institutional expression. Once this subjective, expressive element was injected into the culture it breahted new life into Evangelicalism, which had been languishing since the 1920s, and was better able than the new left to give an instituional expression, anchor and legitimacy to the subjectivism that had been set loose in the culture by the New Left.
I thought this was reallyinteresting and maybe compelling.
In which case the dynamics you are describing and the indying salience of the culture wars are somehow related to this broader redefinisition of politics as the personal, in ways that are manifest in Evangelicalism, radical Islam, the settler movement in Israel -- as well as the identity politics of minorities etc. that we usually associate with the left.
My original point:
I think the strong religious element in the party (to a large extent the result of southern baptists becoming conservative, but not exclusively) is near the heart of the problem. When you and I disagreed about Ford-Reagan in 1976, Iowa was for Ford - a moderately conservative (but conservative and Republican) midwestern state. Now the party there can be (not is, but can be) dominated by a new movement of evangelicals (of which my brother is a part). And business interests have declined (Madison has an interesting argument about the wealth of a state and its population in the federalist papers, and it seems right to me, which means that from the time we were 15 til now, the wealth of Iowa has declined tremendously relative to that of other states). I blame this [as leading to] the ascendancy of the power of the evangelicals, along with their development.
In short terms, the natural intellectual leaders of the party in the past - the champions of ideas like Hayek and Friedman and the like are overshadowed by those concerned with cultural issues. This tends to put off the more liberal (classically, not american) elements of the party and makes them not want to run. The idea of freedom (in all areas, emphasized by the battle with communism) has been replaced by the idea that the main battle is over defining the culture, which a large part of the old guard would not even have seen as the main mission of the party since it was out of step with the idea of freedom of all kinds. Now I am not saying that there was not an element of or seeds of cultural conservatives in the old party, but market and political freedom overshadowed it. I think this has driven away (not necessarily in a voting sense but in a willingness to run for office sense) many Republicans who would make good candidates. I think of McCain as a conservative of Ford-like stripes, and yet the hard right is villifying the man even for ideas, like opposing the Bush tax cuts (which have become some sort of mantra), which 25 years ago would have been seen as a fiscally responsible approach to the deficit (though I think technically economic from an economic point of view relying more on the tax cuts and less on the Fed's drastic rate cuts would have been much better for the economy, given economic understanding about what type of stimulus would have been best back then, as I understand from my friends like Mike Scherer at Harvard). The war has not helped at all.
Anyway, I despair. Oddly, Roe v. Wade, which is so clearly wrong, may have become such a focus that the party has lost its bearings - becoming too focused on things like that and gay marriage - pushing out more important issues like balancing the budget; ensuring the health care system gets reforms that restore some degree of market incentives for providers (not insurers); and cutting defense spending so that tax rates can be lowered - and also dealing with systemic problems which widen the gap between middle and upper middle class in the country (I remember David Bradford, Princeton professor, and member of the President's CEA in 1992, pointing out this trend to me). To be sure, free trade has economic benefits, but our inability to be a nation that produces and has a strong, secure working class (in the same position economically relative to the upper and wealthy classes as 30 years ago) tends to have divisive effects; and is a sign that our economy while profitable has weakened. (FM Scherer at Harvard has pointed out to me not only the problem of the trade deficit, and its inability to continue - which signals at some point inflation and possibly the Fed losing control over monetary policy - but also if you look at a breakdown of national income [by] category of income, corporate profits are far out-sized [vis-a-vis] personal income compared to any time in the last 40 to 50 years - which I see as ultimately undermining the strength of the Republican base, which [has been] small contributors who were small entreperneurs - like our friend and very successful Don Gringer).
So I despair on many levels. The farm system being one.
The Response:
Well, I feel much the same way, although with less intensity all around:
I do not hate W., but I *wish* he were more articulate and had
controlled spending. I do not know whether McCain will be too hotheaded
to win. The anger makes him genuine in a way that no other Republican
is. I think he stands a plausible chance against both Democrats, but a
less than even chance. Also, he does not seem too old to me. He has a
young wife, and remember the old adage: "You are as old as the woman
you feel."
Your farm system point is distressing, but there is one caveat I have
been wondering about. The circumstances of our withdrawal from Iraq
will define the political views of literally thousands of soldiers,
Marines, and sailors who are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. The war
in Iraq is now on such a positive upswing (at least if you read
mil-bloggers) that the soldiers on the ground feel they are making real
progress and victory is at hand. If the Dems pull the rug out from
under them it will create a generation of officers who (i) resent them
for the decision, (ii) have accomplished an enormous amount under
extraordinarily trying circumstances and demonstrated irrefutable
leadership and management skills to boot, and (iii) who know a lot more
about the Middle East than any other group of Americans. These people
are going to be very successful in business (as a class), and eventually
head into politics. They will start defining organizations and politics
about 2020, I think.
But that's a long time from now.