After discussing economic inequalities and briefly describing how it affects economic systems and societies, it reminded me of a very interesting Ted lecture that I watched over break. The speaker, Richard Wilkinson, presents hard data on how economic inequality harms societies, and explores what happens when we make the income differences bigger or smaller, as well as presenting other variables such as education, violence, trust, etc. The only objection I have on this video is that at times he sort of pushes the limits between causation and correlation. The video is about 17 minutes long, but it's well worth the time. Take a look:
http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson.html
4 comments:
I thought it was very interesting that areas with a larger gap between incomes have a greater amount of crime and other problems that can be very harmful to society. I never knew that having highly wealthy folks in a lower income area can really throw an imbalance in the economy. I say they move out and find their own place to blow their money!
I agree that economic inequality harms societies. The biggest economic inequality in America occurred in the late 20s and 30s and people believe it was a cause for the Great Depression. The second biggest economic inequality in America is occurring now and during this "great recession" were in.
I find it interesting that here in the United States believe we have the greatest opportunities to reach great wealth. We're greedy. In return, we have more inequality than other developed nations which he mentions such as Denmark and Sweden. In these nations, they have higher per capita income rates and much less inequality. Therefore, as he was saying, the people overall seem to have better educations, less criminal behavior, and overall more trust in one another. Yet, we still believe we have the best form of a capitalist economy??
As discussed in class, Economic inequality could be a positive factor as well as a negative one based on different economic situations/backgrounds. For the negative side, it is true that economic inequality can cause even deeper disparity between the rich and poor; that is making the rich become richer, and the poor be poorer, an even less healthy economy. However, Economic inequality could also be a positive factor that will improve the lives of poor people. The concept is, after fulfilling the desire for a comfortable life (or a life of luxury), rich people will invest their money in developing economies in order to make more profits. If this happens, the poor will be better off because they have jobs and other indirect benefits produced by the economic growth of the entire society.
Post a Comment