Middle Means What?

[peristaltor]

Okay, we need to define our terms. When people are described, either by themselves or by others, as being "middle class," that means they earn an about average wage.

Comments

[albionwood]

But if we did that, we might have slightly fewer stinking rich motherfuckers, and if I understand the arguments correctly, that would be bad. Somehow. Hm.

[peristaltor]

Ah, but we wouldn't have fewer of them. They would simply be slightly less stinking rich as they, well, fucked their mothers.

Somehow. Yeah. Hmm.

[csue_n_moo]

Why, yes! Yes we should!

But that's evil class warfare redistributionist communism. Or something.

It's funny, I always describe Tom & I as "working class" even though we're both multi-degreed professionals, because we HAVE to work for a living. (Neither one of us has a trust fund.)

[metalmensch]

This seems pretty standard. I know I would redistribute some of my expenses if I wasn't given additional encentives to carry a higher mortgage load: I still support a flat tax.

[peristaltor]

Ah, the myth of flat tax efficacy. All you have to do to burst that myth's balloon is actually look at places where they still use the flat tax, like Estonia and Hong Kong.

I had a roommate from Hong Kong in college. He noted that HK had both one of the largest homeless populations and the greatest per capita concentration of Rolls Royces.

I would highly recommend a reading of The Spirit Level. The tinkle-down effects of widening income disparity extend far beyond economics.