Government transfers provide 90% of income for bottom percentile

This should give you pause.

"As government transfer payments to low-income households exploded, their labor-force participation collapsed and the percentage of income in the bottom quintile coming from government payments rose above 90%."

People experiencing income in the bottom fifth of the US population get 90% of their income from the government. Think about that. And while you're complaining about greedy rich people, remember who supplies the transfers.

"Americans pay $4.4 trillion a year in federal, state and local taxes. Households in the top two earned-income quintiles pay 82% of the tax bill."

But enough is never enough.

The Grumpy Economist: Defining inequality so it can't be fixed (johnhcochrane.blogspot.com) 

 Incredible Shrinking Income Inequality - WSJ

Disparities

I wish every preacher, politician, prophet and prognosticator could read (or re-read) THE UNPRECEDENTED EXPANSION OF THE GLOBAL MIDDLE CLASS: AN UPDATE (2017) by the Brookings Institution,   non-profit organization devoted to independent research and policy solutions.  https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/global_20170228_global-middle-class.pdf   Just as an aside, some conservatives consider Brookings part of the “deep state,” i.e. certainly not a Trump supporter.

I commented on that document at my blog in May 2017. I’d forgotten the eye opening research and conclusions and re-read it today.  In light of the current pandemic and the self-flagellation I hear from educated, comfortably middle-class Christian Americans about health disparities, systemic racism, income gaps, struggling inner cities, and failures to thrive of various populations this report is truly stunning.

Here it is:   About TWO-THIRDS of the WORLD are now middle class.  Think on that a moment.  When my great grandfather (b. 1828) set out as a young man to “go west” about 95% of the world existed in overwhelming poverty and the government provided none of the social services we expect today. All that charity was left to the churches and local communities—taking care of the sick and poor and providing children (who often worked in factories or as farm labor) with an education.

In 1990, more than a third of people on Earth lived on less than $1.90 a day, adjusted for local prices (this is the line the World Bank uses as its main metric). By 2013, barely 10 percent of people did; the rate had been cut by more than two-thirds. And most of the recent growth of the last 2 decades has not been among white people (aka Europe and North America) but among Asians and Africans. Even in the U.S. the riches ethnic groups are Asians—Indians and Filipinos. https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-biggest-asian-origin-communities-in-the-united-states.html

Of course, the obligatory reporting on global climate change and the percent of rich households (not middle class) consumption being in the U.S. is reported in the Brookings document.  But then, think on this: “India today (2015) is already richer than Germany was when it introduced social insurance for all workers in the late 1880s. Indonesia is richer than the U.S. was in 1935, when the Social Security Act was passed. And China is richer than Britain was in 1948, when the National Health Service was introduced.”  Social programs did not building the middle class—capitalism did.  Brookings, being left of center didn’t say that, but it’s there, in print, and on-line.

Destroying the Trump economy (which actually came after this amazing report) and attempting to make us more dependent on government rather than the values that built our country and those of the countries rising today are critical for those who want global power. Whether you think that means Soros or a global cabal of capitalists, or “woke” international corporations, we seem to be in the battle for our lives.

We need to get back to work and to stop listening to those who are trying to defeat us.

That pesky male female gap

The Pew Research Center found that 2019 will be the first year in which women will comprise the majority of the college-educated labor force in the United States. Women first received more than half of the bachelor’s degrees awarded in the 1981-82 academic year—almost 40 years ago.  Today they earn about 57% of bachelor’s degrees. The number of college-educated women in the adult population (ages 25 and older) surpassed the number of college-educated men in 2007. Does anyone fret about that imbalance created by loans, scholarships, affirmative action and unfair regulations?

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/20/u-s-women-near-milestone-in-the-college-educated-labor-force/ft_19-06-20_womenlaborforce_women-now-half-of-us-college-educated-labor-force-2/

So why are we still hearing about the “gap,” especially since for about 4 decades the college enrollment rate for females has exceeded males and for the younger demographic there is no gap given the same starting place and position? 

There’s a lot of mischief in gap statistics.  Especially college degrees.  Women, even in the same fields as men, may select different specialties—pediatrics instead of neuroscience, family law instead of corporate law, bibliographer instead of library director, or they may want to be an artist instead of a plumber or electrician. Women may decide to raise their own children and “stop-out” for 5-10 years, reentering the labor market with reduced value to employers.  Married women with husbands of equal education and financial status often have the luxury to leave the medical or law fields to start a business in a completely different direction such as interior design or selling craft items. 

Unfortunately, these “justice” studies rarely compare women with women—female doctors with female pre-school directors, or female TV hosts with female owners of bed and breakfasts, or female chefs with female dishwashers, female traffic court judges with female circuit court judges. Why not compare single women who are heads of household with married women who have no children?  In the universe of women employees there are gaps with men, but there are overlaps also, with low end of the bell curve  the men who clean the offices of  wealthy women politicians like Pelosi and Warren who are sitting at the high end of the bell curve.

What is concerning to me is that college educated women increasingly vote for Democrats, seeing themselves still as needing additional help from the government to manage their lives.

Is there a pay gap, are teachers underpaid, and why do Democrats run on issues that are settled law?

“2020 Democratic presidential contender Sen. Kamala Harris is on a mission to close the pay gap for America's teachers, something she says is "not a partisan issue." Harris, who unveiled her new plan to increase the pay for public school teachers nationwide with a $13,500 pay raise, told "CBS This Morning" on Tuesday that "for too long" teachers have been paid "substandard wages" and are "not being paid their value to us as a society."” (CBS News)

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/kamala-harris-on-closing-teacher-pay-gap-lets-pay-them-their-value/?

Why do Democrats campaign on issues settled in law--will more laws help? Teacher pay gap? Local schools set those salaries, not the Department of Education (a federal agency that doesn't need to exist). Public school teachers according to BLS earn $63/hour (with benefits)--if they lie about teachers, then they lie about engineers and plumbers.

The "equal pay for equal work" law was passed over 50 years ago. When women continued to choose jobs that were easier, less risky, closer to home, and child-friendly, the feminists decided it became "equal pay for equal value" and what is that? Of course, a day care worker's job is valuable, but is it as valuable as an RN with an advanced degree or an entry level teacher?

What happens when you compare women with women? I was a librarian, one of the lowest paid jobs that requires an advanced degree, and dominated by women. Who is the commissar of jobs in DC who will decide that entry level Alabama librarians should be paid the same as chefs with 20 years experience in Chicago or a petroleum engineer in Alaska?

Women earn less cash prize money than men in the sciences

Except the answer is in the article.

“The analysis also shows that when considering all of the awards, women earn 64 cents of prize money for every dollar a man receives, and when cutting out the top and bottom prizes, women winners earn 60 cents of every prize dollar a man receives, the researchers report. Women also tend to disproportionately win awards for service compared with those for research, and they do not win as many prestigious prizes as men. An analysis of the most prestigious prizes shows women received only 11.3 percent of them over the 50 years reviewed; they received 5.1 percent of them between 1968 and 1977 and 17.4 percent of them between 2008 and 2017.”

If women disproportionately win awards for service (more time), and win the less prestigious prizes (less money) why would one expect the outcomes to be the same?  Maybe women enjoy the service aspect (like serving on committees) and maybe they don’t compete at the higher levels because they have chosen different career paths.  In the last decade this has changed—women are competing at higher levels than before.  They may be good, but what have they taken out of their lives?  Marriage and children?

How many women were getting PhDs in the sciences between 1968 and 1977?  Maybe 11.3% is more than their population would represent? How many American Indians have received a prestigious cash prize?  How many transwomen?  That question is coming too. And when a transwoman receives a prize, will he be counted as a woman or man?  And are the women scientists earning more than the women grad students, or the women administrative assistants?  Let’s look at all the gaps.

The wage gap myth

Women earn less than men in the same job at the same hourly wage with the same union benefits because they choose to. Yes. With everything else the same, the paycheck is less because men work more overtime. And on a broader scale, men take the jobs with more risk, and they are more willing to move where the better jobs are. A study of librarians over 20 years ago showed that--men moved more often and had more publications. For over a decade, more women have been graduating from college, but not in the same fields as men. There are limited opportunities for dance majors and art historians. In the trades, there are wonderful opportunities, but women aren't flocking there--don't want to mess up the manicure. We live in a competitive, capitalist country (except where the government interferes) and if the CEO can make more money hiring qualified women, she will do it.

https://legalinsurrection.com/2018/12/harvard-study-confirms-the-gender-wage-gap-is-just-a-myth/

You're being lied to by Democrats, socialists and progressives

Income inequality hasn't changed at all in the last 20 years--if you look at individuals. What has changed is how we group ourselves into families, households, neighborhoods and schools.

Doctors marry doctors, lawyers marry lawyers, their children go to the same schools and clubs and meet each other and marry. Teens with babies don't get married at all and their children also meet and get together socially. HUGE income inequality in those households which extends to values and work ethic. In fact, two adults working at minimum wage full time are above poverty level and making much more than that teen mom. That teen may be getting generous benefits to raise her children, but it's not boosting her income.

In the bottom quintile there are .97 men for every 100 women, and in the 4th quintile there are 1.05 men for every 100 women. The government can't take enough away from earners who choose to create a home for children with 2 parents and give it to someone not working. That's not socialist; it's just destroying families.

We are an aging population. Income changes in households with older adults too, but for the household, first as two reduced incomes. Then when one spouse dies, depending on how pensions or Social Security are structured, one income disappears. That's not inequality; that's math. Don't believe the lies that we are a greedy, unfair society. Believe instead that we are making choices in lifestyle that have a life time effect. (As for that top .01%, they've done extremely well under Obama, but I'll let a Democrat explain that one.)

 http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2011/10/real-story-behind-rising-us-income.html#.VugxJEBk-GZ