I never quite understood the "wealth inequality" thing. It is to me a rather meaningless slogan. Wealth inequality is opposed to what: wealth equality? Like everyone possesses exactly the same amount of wealth? This sounds nonsensical. "Everybody's poor" fits precisely the definition of wealth equality, obviously not a good outcome. If some inequality is permitted, what's the desired mean and what's the acceptable deviation? Is there a correlation between that and the abilities, work ethics of the person? Are people allowed to be lucky, win lotteries, have hard working parents that saved up?

I understand the goal of reducing poverty. I understand the goal of limiting the unchecked power and influence of certain individuals of groups, caused by them having excessive wealth. But the issue of "wealth inequality" is in the "not even wrong" category for me.

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nevon a day ago | parent | next [-]

It's a matter of scale. Your characterization of the opposite viewpoint being complete equality is a strawman. What people are opposed to is the extreme levels of wealth inequality that exists, not the concept that one person can build more wealth than another.

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qcnguy 19 hours ago | parent [-]

It's not a strawman argument because he's arguing with people who cite "wealth inequality" on its own as a justification for riots. There isn't any limit or objective quantity attached to the argument - it's phrased in such a way that it can only be interpreted to mean absolute equality. Otherwise it'd be expressed differently, something like "if the gini coefficient is >X then rioting is OK, if it's <=X then violence is not the answer".

Obviously, people don't make that argument, and the implication is that they don't really want to be tied down to any actual existing real world situation. By extension there's no level of wealth inequality they would accept. Then one must wonder why not? Perhaps they just enjoy watching the left riot. Alternative explanations welcome.

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munksbeer 13 hours ago | parent [-]

Perhaps one measure of acceptable is:

People aren't taking to the streets rioting - wealth inequality is at acceptable levels

People are taking to the streets rioting - wealth inequality is at unacceptable levels

Yes I know, that is trite, and circular, but maybe there is something in it. No-one is going to be able to define an exact acceptable level of wealth inequality, but your argument is an asymmetrical standard. I could just as well argue that your view says it is ok for the top 0.1% of people to have 99% of all the wealth while everyone else shares the other 1%. Would you deem that acceptable (assuming we live in the real world and not a fantasy of no scarcity)?

	▲	spwa4 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Except the riots on the streets aren't about wealth inequality, they're about a proposal for reduced government spending. Why? Government spending has been supported by constantly taking out new debt, and now both issuance of new debt is sputtering and increased interest payments are due. This has, of course, not convinced the government to stop increasing debt. This is people's reaction to merely slightly reducing the rate of debt increase. The problem is not even that the debt is too high, but because the state's demand for new debt just for this year is too high at the interest rates they're offering.

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Eddy_Viscosity2 a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Maybe think of it in terms of 'power inequality' and maybe it will make more sense to you.

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lcnPylGDnU4H9OF a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Substitute "wealth inequality" with "extreme wealth inequality" or "rising wealth inequality" to see the problem.

Both are true. The difference between a billionaire and a person living paycheck-to-paycheck is extreme and billionaires are getting richer.

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imtringued 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

>"Everybody's poor" fits precisely the definition of wealth equality, obviously not a good outcome.

"The majority is poor" fits precisely the definition of wealth inequality, obviously not a good outcome.

Seems like you're arguing in favor of poverty. (Note, this is your argument redirected at you, not mine)

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ndsipa_pomu 16 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How about thinking in terms of being able to afford food?

If there's a small minority of the population that are so rich that they cannot meaningfully even spend their money (e.g. billionaires) and at the same time there's a sizeable percentage that cannot afford to eat regularly, then that's wealth inequality.

It's not so much about making everyone equal, but ensuring that almost everyone can provide for their basic needs (e.g. housing, food, medicine).