Causes of Inequality In America

The utopians are never at a loss to criticize free market economics. The latest attack is from Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize winner in economics, who says inequality is worse now in America than during the past century. Stiglitz says the American dream of opportunity is now a myth. Stiglitz blames this on a political system he said rewards the rich.

Time Magazine's July 2, 2012 issues has the same liberal line, that free market capitalism has divided the gap between the rich and the poor and destroyed the American dream of the poor becoming better off by working hard. Time says the government policies of the past, Social Security, Homestead Act, and others helped the poor people realize the American dream. The inferences from both Stiglitz and Time is that the government needs to do more.

I think the reason the gap between the rich and poor has increased is due to government policies that did not exist a century ago when there was an even wider gap between the rich and poor. Today the government rewards people for staying poor by providing millions of poor people with their basic needs; food, shelter, clothing, and health care. Why would many of these poor people try to compete in the daily grind of the work place when they can get by on the production of others, especially the rich.

A century ago most people were poor, working on the farm, a coal mine. or factory. There were no unions. Workers worked six days per week. The Vanderbilts, Carnegies and Morgans were very rich. Today we at least have a middle class thanks in part to past policies that allowed workers to keep most of their production, and before there were so many government rules and regulations that currently inhibit a poor person from starting a business and moving up into the middle class.

Another social policy that has created a poor class is the divorce racket and the single mom factor. Women no longer have to negotiate with men for support. The women, with the backing of the State gun toters, can force a man to support her. This soon makes men stop trying to better themselves because the traditional rewards, family and home, are no longer there.

People like Stiglitz and the Time authors never rest. To them there will always be inequality and they will try to pass laws that will make people equal. If we doubled the standard of living of the poor people Stiglitz and other utopians would not be satisfied because there would still be inequality. What these utopians feel is the deadly sin of envy. They are also control freaks. They want to control my life and decide how my production should be spent. They want the government to solve problems, problems that are best solved by individuals. A healthy society is the result of individual action, not the action of some ruling government body with badges and guns.

"Americans are so enamored of equality that they would rather be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom". Alexis de Tocqueville

I think Tocqueville was right about Americans even in the 19th century. The difference in Americans then and now is Americans of the 19th century thought they could move up in status by hard work. Today they want the government to move them up in status by taking from those who have more and lowering the status of those who are in the upper class.

I think most people in recent human history have wanted to be equal to those in their tribe. This is why private property has been rare in human history. Most property was owned by the tribe and controlled by the Chief. People always felt safe if no one had more than them. They felt like they had a better chance at food and mating if no one was better than them. Since humans developed agriculture and the ability to produce their own food and own property to leave to their descendents this argument for or against collectivism has been ongoing.

Another quote from Tocqueville- "When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness". I think the past of America no longer illuminates the future as it used to, therefore there is no spirit of hope in America. The spirit has been suffocated by thousands of pages of rules and regulations, and gun toting government mobsters. I refer to government employees as mobsters because they use force, aggression, and coercion in creating monopolies like roads, parks, lottery gambling, post offices, etc. There is nothing voluntary about the State. You either comply with the dictates of the State or go to jail.

Charles Tolleson, The Happy Misanthrope