- Which statistic on wealth inequality in the US (discussed on p. 29) made the biggest impression on you? Explain why?
I think all of the statistics made big impression on me. However, the one that made the biggest one is the one of the U.S Census Bureau income studies. They said these studies refer to the “richest 20 percent” who earn thirteen times more than the poorest 20 percent. The author stated that if you made $350K ore more you are not considered as be part of the richest people. Per the author this income does not represent great wealth. First of all, I thought that someone with this yearly income was rich. I am surprised that 350K is part of the working class. Secondly, I did not think the 1 percent richest people were only 145,000 individuals or the 400 richest Americans were only billionaires and also the gap between rich and poor was so enormous. I always knew Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk were the richest people. Nevertheless, I thought there was a scale in a descending order of thousands multi billionaires, single billionaires, thousands multi millionaires, thousands of single millionaires etc. This makes me review my idea about some people that I thought who were rich and they are not. And it makes me think that percentage of chance for someone in the working class to move up to that 1% is very difficult, even impossible.
- What could be some of the implications of living in a society that has such huge wealth inequalities? Do you see this dynamic getting played out in everyday life in our society? How so? Example?
The implications due such huge wealth inequalities in a society are really important. The inequalities in wealth caused a lot of issues that can be destructive for a society. Because for people that are low paid, they cannot afford what they need to survive. As financial power is only on a small percentage hand, prices of all essentials tend to be manipulated. Those essentials are: Food, fuel, housing and health care. In this inflation time for example, since the pandemic a lot of people were lay off and went on unemployment. While most of them, did not get back to work or are not working as part time. All of those essentials price went up. Rent, food, gas costs are rising. Those who own the wealth of this country manipulates the elections in their benefits. They fund campaign of who they think will be in their favor and most the time, these people get to the governmental office head. One example is, when Trump got the presidential office, the wealthy, banks, and other corporations, the tax reform package was considered a victory given its significant and permanent tax cuts to corporate profits, investment income, estate tax, and more. Financial services companies stood to see huge gains based on the new, lower corporate rate, as well as the more preferable tax treatment of some companies. Additionally, the poorest are the ones with most debts such as, credit card, student loans. Income is being spent just to pay interest on accumulated debt.
Example: If I take like 100k for nursing studies, after obtaining my bachelor, I will work to pay these loan. It will be impossible to get out the working class and can even being considered in the poor class.
