Inequality: Why aren’t the poor storming the barricades?
economist.com
economist.com
The status quo allows even the poor in the first world to survive with some basic comforts - that can all be easily taken away.
To address the article's question, a recent poll[1] found that only about 1% of the population answered "inequality" in response to the question "What do you think should be the top priority for President Obama and Congress in 2014?"
"Jobs" was much higher at 16%. Therefore one might conclude that most people don't particularly care what their percentage share of the economy is as long as they feel they are fairly paid and reasonably comfortable. After all, we could achieve equality by making everyone equally poor.
Furthermore, the idea that most people would rather work hard and earn their money, rather than seizing it by force through mob uprisings, does not seem to have occurred to the author. The author is similarly apparently unaware that where this has been tried -- by the likes of Lenin, Mao, and Fidel Castro -- it was a failure, and a rather ... bloody one at that.
[1] http://www.quinnipiac.edu/institutes-and-centers/polling-ins...
In the US there is still hope for a poor kid to learn some skills (e.g. how to code) and do alright.
If the balance tips, and the average poor hardworking kid has no hope of working his way out of poverty because of crushing poverty or obligations we're likely to see a revolution.
Americans revolted over fairly minor issues. Other people stay under very serious oppression for many generations.
The punch-line is that non-participation in shared (public) resources by the wealthy is a more significant problem then disparity. An interesting premise having both plausibility and examples. Somewhere back in HN, within the last year is an interesting study of the exact question focusing (I think) on education systems. But healthcare systems also work.
If the author did mean some kind of violent uprising, then I stand by my point. There is little historical basis to think that the sort of inequality should be expected to lead directly to a revolution.
If that's not what the author meant, what did he mean by "storming the gates"? I guess it was a metaphor, but for what exactly? What purpose did it serve? I guess you can say the real point is elsewhere, and the title was just linkbait.
Regardless, it would almost be a challenge to not read the entire piece. It was incredibly short -- but I double checked just because you asked, and yes, I did make it to the end.
I'm sorry, but if one is poor they are not buying $550 fridges from IKEA. They're buying $100 fridges off of Craigslist.