With inequality increasing, many around the world might assume that Americans would want to close the income gap by instituting a more progressive system of redistribution. But the opposite is true: Americans’ perceptions of privilege, opportunity, and social mobility contrast markedly with views elsewhere.
asks why the perception of social mobility is so often at odds with the reality.
The banking system we take for granted is unfixable. The good news is that we no longer need to rely on any private, rent-seeking, socially destabilizing network of banks, at least not the way we have so far.
shows why the current private system is unfixable – and why we don’t need to tolerate it anymore.
Like Vladimir Putin, China's leader is so steeped in a narrative of victimhood and fearful of appearing weak that it is hard to imagine him ever leading China out of the mess he has created. He could well be remembered as the leader who squandered history's most remarkable economic success story.
about the country's increasingly worrisome trajectory, both at home and abroad.
Artificial IdiocyFrank Rumpenhorst/picture alliance via Getty Images
坎布里奇—为什么民主政治制度没有能够足够快速地对仇恨做出反应,导致专制民粹主义者成功利用了它们——不平等性和经济焦虑、社会地位感的下降、精英和普通老百姓之间的裂痕?政治党派,特别是中左翼如果能采取更果断的日程的话,也许右翼本土论政治运动的崛起本可避免。
理论上,不平等的加剧导致再分配的要求。民主政客的应对之道应该是向富人征收更多税,并将所得到的收入用在后进人群头上。这一直觉由艾伦·梅尔泽尔(Allan Meltzer)和斯科特·理查德(Scott Richard)的著名政治经济学论文形式化:中位和平均选民的收入差距越大,税收就越重,再分配程度也越高。
但在实践中,民主政体与此南辕北辙。所得税的累进性下降,对累退的消费税的依赖增加,对资本的征税出现了全球竞相降低的现象。政府不去刺激基础设施投资,反而采取对低技能工人伤害尤其大的紧缩政策。大银行和公司得到援助,但家庭却得不到。在美国,最低工资没有得到充分调整,其真实水平有所下降。
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