Yaron Answers: Is Inequality On The Rise?

[Ed__Powell]

Workers see wages and some benefits. Employers see the total cost of employment which has five primary factors:

1) Wages
2) Benefits (Health and life)
3) Regulatory compliance
4) Taxes (payroll and unemployment insurance)
5) Expected cost of litigation due to employment regulations

As we know, cost of benefits has skyrocketed, but also #3 and #5 has gone through the roof. So total cost of employment has gone way up, but wages have stagnated. Why is anyone surprised?

You have to appreciate the fact that Brook gives an honest, thoughtful (and lengthy) answer rather than just spout off an agreeable two minute boilerplate sound bite.

[helluvastart]

the wages were doubled and everything else quadrupled. before lower middle class were able to buy a house. today no

[sctura]

any gain by banks or corporations is only possible because of our central banking system. inflation is primarily the result of over printing money, something only the fed can do. this could be all but eliminated by using actual gold for currency .

[Deleuzeshammerflow]

I tend to struggle with the idea of personal worth for two reasons: how is worth determined? and, for example, how is a singer worth more than a mason who produces society?

[eggory]

A given person does not have the same value to everyone, he has a different value to each individual depending on what he contributes to his/her particular life. I could be mistaken, but what I believe Yaron is talking about is a person's average perceived value in the judgement of all members of productive society, the kind of average which determines "market value". This is different from objective value, to which society's judgement is of little importance in determining.

[mites]

because people have attached more value to the singer, and he/she generates more revenue for the firm based on album and concert sales than the mason does. They're both equally valuable members of society, and worth the same as humans and individuals, but theres a reason one makes more money

[ohmyliver]

Can anyone explain why then there's been a massive boost in productivity amongst workers in the developed world over the last 30 years, yet wages, in real terms, have stagnated or declined?

[Ed__Powell]

Although "inequality" is not a principle on which to base a country's economy, it is a general trend that under cronyism (as in the third world or Central America), inequality is much greater than in a free country. Inequality is much greater now in the US than it was in the "Gilded Age" of the late 19th century when the US's economy was at its most free.

If you don't like inequality, get the government out of the economy and especially end the Fed and resume free banking.

[MikeFerriss]

This guy is weird. He misuses the word "freedom" because in his Randian ideal world one isn't free to help their fellow man.