Capitalism fails American middle class

0 Comment(s)Print E-mail Shanghai Daily, September 26, 2011
Adjust font size:

We know one thing for sure: the gap between rich and poor in the US has widened in the past 30 years.

In 2007 the top 1 percent of earners took home 18.3 percent of national income - that is more than two and a half times their level in 1973, when their share was 7.7 percent.

For a long time, the US was in denial about its growing income gulf. The middle class clung to the old promise of mass affluence - and used home equity loans and credit card debt to make that dream real.

The elite, particularly the conservative intellectuals who have dominated the national economic debate since the Reagan era, insisted that growing income inequality was propaganda invented by the class warriors on the left, and cited robust consumer spending as evidence.

In a 1998 speech at Jackson Hole at the annual gathering of American economists and economic policy makers, Alan Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Reserve, argued that what mattered was what people could buy, not what they earned.

"Inequality in consumption, when measured by current outlays, is less than inequality in income," he said. Greenspan illustrated his point with some unusual measures of inequality - ownership of consumer goods like dishwashers, microwaves and clothes-dryers. The comforting result? Even though inequality as measured in dollars was growing, when measured in dishwashers, microwaves and clothes dryers it was decreasing.

The 2008 financial crisis and the prolonged economic downturn has eviscerated the consumption defense as ruthlessly as it has burst the credit bubble that allowed the middle class to feel richer than it was.

Fact of life

Income inequality is today a fact of life, as essential to doing business as the rate of inflation: Proctor & Gamble executives study the Gini co-efficient, a technical measure of income inequality, to divine what is happening to their erstwhile middle-class consumer base, and have decided the best strategy is to give up on the center and to market instead to the top and the bottom.

Citigroup advises investors to design their portfolios around income inequality. It calls this strategy the "Consumer Hourglass Portfolio" and has created an index of companies that serve the rich and the poor while avoiding the vanishing middle.

Once income inequality has become a tool for marketing executives and stock pickers it becomes pretty hard to deny. But we can still argue over what is causing it.

1   2   Next  


Print E-mail Bookmark and Share

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)

No comments.

Add your comments...

  • User Name Required
  • Your Comment
  • Racist, abusive and off-topic comments may be removed by the moderator.
Send your storiesGet more from China.org.cnMobileRSSNewsletter
主站蜘蛛池模板: 四虎永久精品免费网址大全| 国产看午夜精品理论片| 中文字幕在线网站| 日韩色视频在线观看| 亚洲国产精品yw在线观看| 男女一边摸一边做爽的免费视频| 嘟嘟嘟www免费高清在线中文| 韩国在线观看一区二区三区| 国产真人无码作爱视频免费| 色多多视频在线观看| 欧美波霸影院在线观看| 免费国产美女爽到喷出水来视频| 美女把腿扒开让男人桶爽了| 国产乱码卡一卡2卡三卡四| 黑人巨茎大战白人美女| 天天综合色天天综合网| 丁香狠狠色婷婷久久综合| 无码午夜人妻一区二区不卡视频| 久久精品国产亚洲夜色AV网站| 欧美一区二区三区久久综合| 亚洲国产精品ⅴa在线观看| 正在播放高级会所丰满女技师| 人人妻久久人人澡人人爽人人精品| 精品一区二区三区水蜜桃| 又黄又爽又色又刺激的视频| 美女视频黄频a免费观看| 国产a级午夜毛片| 色欲精品国产一区二区三区AV | 美女的尿口免费| 国产一区在线观看视频| 被吃奶跟添下面视频| 国产喷水在线观看| 麻豆波多野结衣| 国产成人无码精品一区在线观看| 欧美性xxxxx极品人妖| 国产熟女一区二区三区五月婷| aⅴ免费在线观看| 国产福利vr专区精品| 亚洲激情小视频| 天天干天天摸天天操| 久久国产一区二区三区|