Liberal Views on the Injustice of Inequality

Because there are poor and there are rich, this is seen as injustice.

Any attempt to "fix" this issue however brings about an injustice.

How do we determine injustice and what is fairness?  Should income be equal?

Has that not been tried and failed miserably?  Does not that require a complete sessation of individual rights, including but not limited to property rights?

 

 

Links:

Fairness Test: a modern day test of what is being done now.   And What is Fair?

SOTU Address:  fairness used extensively

Williams on Inequality: in professions

Principles Involved:  free enterprise at risk

Moral Basis for Fairness: a statement of ethics

Generosity Index:  how generous is the USA

 

The Liberal view of inequality becomes at times a very emotional issue, a religious view that an injustice is being performed by the rich.

 

Some links:

http://news.yahoo.com/six-waltons-more-wealth-bottom-30-americans-182819449.html

           http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/income-inequality-in-america-chart-graph

 

 

A file by Levy College:  http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_589.pdf   (left leaning Bard College)

ABSTRACT
I find here that the early and mid-aughts (2001 to 2007) witnessed both exploding debt and a consequent “middle-class squeeze.”  Median wealth grew briskly in the late 1990s.  It grew even faster in the aughts, while the inequality of net worth was up slightly. Indebtedness, which fell substantially during the late 1990s, skyrocketed in the early and mid-aughts; among the middle class, the debt-to-income ratio reached its highest level in 24 years.  
 
The concentration of investment-type assets generally remained as high in 2007 as during the previous two decades. The racial and ethnic disparity in wealth holdings, after stabilizing throughout most of the 1990s, widened in the years between 1998 and 2001, but then narrowed during the early and mid aughts.
 
Wealth also shifted in relative terms, away from young households (particularly those under age 45)  and toward those in the 55–74 age group. Projections to July 2009, made on the basis of changes in stock and housing prices, indicate that median wealth plunged by 36 percent and there was a fairly steep rise in wealth inequality, with the Gini coefficient advancing from 0.834 to 0.865.  (Note:  these values for Gini are quite different than any others reported on elsewhere.)
 
Tax rates over time CBO:  http://www.cbo.gov/publications/collections/tax/2010/all_tables.pdf
 
http://inequality.org/program-inequality-common-good/   stresses inequality and has some links