Comments for Consider the Evidence

Comment on Bar Tabs and Tax Cuts by 66789abcd

66789abcd — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 20:19:51 +0000

Why is the rich guy spending $59 for a $10 beer? He didn’t get rich that way that for sure.

Comment on Winner-take-all financial incentives, Steve Jobs, and the living standards of ordinary Americans by ezra abrams

ezra abrams — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 04:06:21 +0000

Dear Prof Laneworthy: you loose your job, get rehired without bennies at 1/3 the salary, you let me know how that super excellent Lebron james TV stuff works out for you….
I’m sure, sittin at home in your PJs you will feel that your quality of life is so much better…

I don’t see why people excuse jobs: he made wealth off of slave labor in China. I mean, how good a guy can he be ? and just because everyone else did it is no excuse
Apple has what, x billion dollars in teh bank ? they couldn’t take 5% of that and ensure that their slave labor in china had decent jobs ?

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by addicted44

addicted44 — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 07:10:52 +0000

You mention that income inequality in Sweden has remained the same as the US. However, it is worth considering whether services provided by the government should be considered separate from income in the first place (i.e., the income of the Swedes should include the market value of the services they receive from the government).

I would imagine that for the purposes of this argument, they should be considered separately as you have, but I dont think it is necessarily a foregone conclusion.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by genauer

genauer — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:25:46 +0000

@Steve and Lane,
if you can not even get income (mobility) data straight,
producing garbage results like this Corak, forget about wealth data.
We have some fairly good idea about income distribution,
but much less so about wealth.

And then “measuring” the mobility of it, at least one order of magnitude more difficult.

Tonight I am in not such a good mood, having to realize that another US economics nobel prize winner, I held in regard until a few hours ago, was just faking data to support his garbage analysis.

Economics is just > 95 % garbage in, garbage out.
Not science.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by Steve Roth

Steve Roth — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 22:01:23 +0000

Lots of good thinking. Thanks. A bit of a chicken-and-egg problem, of course.

I’d be curious to see similar analysis and thinking that looks at wealth inequality, which of course if far more profound.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by Nymnchen

Nymnchen — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:04:38 +0000

Being Swedish having insight into the Swedish statistics;
intergenerational mobility in Sweden has dropped dramatically during the last decade, during which income inequality has increased. The pattern becomes clearer in the link between children’s educational achievements and family income.
(Privatization of public schools has lead to increased segregation and this is according to the PISA study one reason behind the sharp drop in international educational ranking that Sweden has seen the last 15 years).
Can a high tax society be maintained in this environment? It looks like it can’t. Since 2006, Sweden has had a conservative government (if one can call neoliberal for conservative, that is questionable), which has drastically reduced the taxation for mainly upper middleclass incomes. This has been financed by cutting sick-leave insurance benefits and unemployment benefits. This has resulted in a decline or in the incomes of the poorest 10% resulting in a sharp increase in child poverty.
The development has partly been counteracted by a rapid increase of private debt, which has grown 2-3 times as fast as the economy, and is now amongst the highest in Europe. Obviously this is not a sustainable development, as we have seen in other countries.
So, the outspoken aim of the conservative government, that Sweden should be more like other countries, is a wish that has been granted. From the Swedish example it seems that inequality is a process that drives itself and without the constant efforts to reverse it, we will sooner or later face a situation of utter deprivation of the majority, with low aggregate demand as a consequence.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by gordon

gordon — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 11:11:18 +0000

You could also ask whether, if we want to reduce inequality of outcomes, increased mobility is the only (or the best) way. That is sort of the mirror image of your question (whether more equal outcomes is the best solution to low mobility). In your Swedish example, a society with high inequality and simultaneously high mobility would still present problems. A large distance between the top and the bottom means there are still a lot of poor people, and without separate action to improve their lot (ie to reduce the distance between the bottom and the top) you could have a society which might be mobile but which might not be sensibly labelled successful.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by genauer

genauer — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 08:07:56 +0000

Forget about those “immobility data”. The studies are never really comparable, and most the times plagued by fundamental problems (you have to wait something like 50 years to get reasonable results, who can wait that long?)
Son’s income at 32 is not a good proxy of what he later really earns and owns (like after getting the heritage) (Corak 1999). Look at Corak “chasing the same dream”, 2009, Figure 2 and 3, the differences between Canada and the US are just the statistical noise of the Mazumder 2005 US study, even for the most extreme cases. And it suffers from top coding etc.

Comment on Inequality, mobility, opportunity by Tom

Tom — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:54:34 +0000

Interesting post.

I think that you could present a cogent and politically viable argument that increasing taxation on the super-rich, and using that to fund better opportunity creating measures, would work on both parts of the problem.

Comment on Types of Mobility by Inequality, mobility, opportunity « Consider the Evidence

Inequality, mobility, opportunity « Consider the Evidence — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 03:24:27 +0000

[...] consequences it may have. One of those consequences is reduced intergenerational mobility (relative intergenerational income mobility, to be more precise). Krueger provided a graph showing that nations with greater income inequality [...]

Comment on Are Barcelona the best soccer team ever? by zion

zion — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 17:42:39 +0000

barce is the best team even by far trust me cuz i only used to watch eglish team play over the years but when i come across this barce team change everything..when i see messi do is thing with the ball make me cry no joke so what im sayin right now im so happy that im here in this time to see this barce foot ball team

Comment on Taxes and Inequality: Lessons from Abroad by Abdullah Khan

Abdullah Khan — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 17:27:40 +0000

[...] What should we conclude? I think the first chart here better reflects the impact of the U.S. tax system. It does very little to alter the market distribution of income. Redistribution is achieved mainly by government transfers rather than by taxes. We aren’t unusual in this respect, though; it’s the case in most if not all rich countries. [...]Forex Programming

Comment on Taxes and Inequality: Lessons from Abroad by Abdullah Khan

Abdullah Khan — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 17:27:08 +0000

Comment on Taxes and Inequality: Lessons from Abroad by Follow-Up, Part I: Government’s Affect On Reducing Inequality « Civilized Conversation

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 04:07:02 +0000

[...] We had eleven folks last night, a typical turnout in numbers but a better-than-average-quality discussion, I thought. Thanks to Jim for his research, presentation, and for running the meeting. The subject was poverty, but as a follow-up, let me start with a post on inequality. Here is a chart that shows how much inequality the U.S. Government actually alleviates through taxing and spending, compared to nine other rich countries. (source) [...]

Comment on How rich countries lift up the poor by ubiquitousparrow

ubiquitousparrow — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 14:23:56 +0000

Prof. Kenworthy, it will be appreciated to hear your take on the recent Alan Krueger-Scott Winship argument.