Jasmine Ware
Ms.Johnson
Period 5
28 February 2018
Wealth inequality: a growing issue in America
Wealth inequality all but gave birth to our nation. Between taxation, navigation acts, and writs of assistance, the colonies were engulfed with laws that caused disparity and created social classes, leading to the colonies separating from Great Britain during the revolutionary war in 1783. Inequality has been rampant throughout many parts of the world. It also has been widely prevalent within the United States.
When it comes to inequality, not many people think of it in terms of wealth. While wealth inequality has always been an issue in the United States, it has became more of a pressing matter in America since the late 1980’s, and has only continued
…show more content…
As americans it is not only right to help each other, it is necessary for the betterment of the country. It is inept for the government to watch their country struggle, while spending massive amount of money for funding on frivolous things like sororities and fraternities Many cities in America are filled with people who earn less than what the standard of living is in the country .They experience many hardships and often struggle because of the issues within their community.
This is the biggest issue with wealth inequality. It hinders the ability of americans to take risks and investments that could be very beneficial to them in the future, while also limiting the success of the less fortunate by supplying them with limited resources . Wealth inequality inevitably has a major role in america's current poverty level, which in turn could possibly lead to crime.
One major benefit of wealth equality would be a significant drop in the current crime rate. Many crimes are committed in low income neighborhoods.This is a result of the limited resources in these areas, such as jobs, hospitals, schools, and other basic necessities. Wealth equality would fix these issues by giving them more opportunity and creating new jobs. It would also slowly drop the crime current crime rate over time, causing the economy to also improve in the
…show more content…
China has also benefited greatly because market socialism. According to an article by The Monthly Review, Jul-Aug 2004, “When the leaders of China of announced their program of market socialist reforms in 1978, they argued that it was a necessary step to overcome growing problems of economic stagnation and waste caused by the Mao era's overly centralized state systems of planning and production” “China then experienced a rapid growth and a complete industrial transformation in the 1980’s, which caused many who opposed the idea of market socialism, to view it as an attractive vehicle for achieving sustained growth, an egalitarian distribution of goods and services, and new forms of democratic participation in economic decision making (The Monthly Review, Jul-Aug 2004).” Wealth equality or socialism is not always to be opposed or feared, it can actually benefit the economy, and raise the standard of living for the
As McAdam and Kloos write, “the country is now more starkly divided in political terms than at any time since the end of Reconstruction and more unequal in material terms than roughly a century ago and greater, even, than on the eve of the Great Depression” (McAdam and Kloos 4). An increase in inequality has only given rise to protest groups such as Occupy Wall St that protested the rising inequality between the 1%
Economic inequality is the uneven distribution of wealth and differences in economic security found in each individual in a specific country or region. Today, the topic is being discussed profusely by the American presidential candidates and by many writers around the world because of the beliefs of whether there should or should not be wealth redistribution policies put into action. Larry Schwartz, the author of “35 Soul-Crushing Facts about American Income Inequality”, makes a valid claim that economic inequality is the foundation of the problems that the entire American population face such as poverty and a hindrance of economic growth. To begin with, Schwartz has an exceptional argument that the high rate of economic inequality, like is
Wealth, race, gender, and mental illness has torn society apart and lead to inequality. These major reasons for inequality has affected everyone in its path leading to major consequences as well as issues and problems. In China, a new found wealth has left the social classes more divided and issues are beginning to rise. Meanwhile in the U.S., wealth is destroying students and unequal views toward specific types of people are weakening the patriotic bond. To begin, there are many types and factors that play a part in inequality and the consequences of societies from it, but one of the main reasons and apparent factors is wealth.
The bottom 40% of Americans barely have any of America's wealth and the top 1% has more of America’s wealth than we believe the whole top 20% should have. (Politizane, 2012) “Wealth is distributed in a highly unequal fashion, with the wealthiest 1 percent of families in the United States holding about 40 percent of all wealth and the bottom 90 percent of families holding less than one-quarter of all wealth.” (Greg Leiserson,Will McGrew,Raksha Kopparam,
Throughout all of history wealth has never been distributed evenly; no monarchist kingdom, communist utopia, socialistic society, or modern free market has ever existed in a state of equilibrium. The laws of the land have always seemed to operate in a manner of some sort of prejudice. The rich generate wealth at a much higher rate than the poor. Income inequality has existed, in some form or another, since the first trade transaction. Since, we have begun record keeping, statistics show the rich controlling increasing amounts of the total income.
Income Inequality Income Inequality or “wage gap” is a big topic for freedom fighters and liberals for the simple fact that it isn’t equal for everyone. Because the wage gap is so prominent it's one of the biggest “facts” that discrimination is still apart of everyday American society. The wage gap from these radical interest groups think the economy is get a dollar take a dollar instead of a free flow economy. This misguided idea of the economy is absolutely not true and isn’t at the fault of the Government, but the people.
The United States was considered the land of opportunity for many generations, but the situation has now changed. America is no longer the country where all people can pursue their American Dream. The main reason why the lower class cannot achieve their goal of upward mobility is the fact that the top one percent of the population holds most of the wealth of the country. These wealthy Americans also have a better chance of increasing their wealth than the lower classes do. Wealth, or net worth, is not only made up of money; it also includes everything a person owns that is of value, such as their house and property.
The decline and rise of inequality has varied between the Great Depression and World War II (Kopczuk & Saez 2004). Because of the limited fluidity in both ends of distribution it is more likely that the children of poor families will remain poor and the children of wealthier families are more likely to remain wealthy in the United States than any other wealthy country (Couch & Lillard 2004,
As much as people hate to admit it, society and the world revolves around money. Whether someone wants to go to college, own a house, support a family, live luxurious etc all these things are dependent on wealth. So, knowing that the top one percent wealthiest people in the U.S owns more than the other ninety-nine percent combined is a little terrifying, and it’s partly due to the income inequality in the U.S. When there are people supporting their families on minimum wage and no one has taken action it’s time for a change. So, when it comes to the subject of wealth everyone will agree that is necessary to live. Where this consensus ends, however, is whether income inequality actually exists.
Wealth and Inequality in America Inequality The inequality in America has increased over time; the gap between the rich and the poor has become a problem that many Americans don’t see. Inequality is the extent of income which is distributed unequally among the citizenry. The inequality of the United has a large gap between the poor and the rich making it unfair to the population, the rich are becoming wealthier and the poor remain poor. The article “Of the 1%, By the 1%, For the 1%”, authored by Joseph E. Stiglitz describes that there is a 1 percent amount of American’s who are consuming about a quarter of the United States income in a year.
The problem with the widened wealth gap is that the inequality may harm the quality. Meaning that those in the higher classes see it as you can use the money with no restrictions. However, economist believe that the “relationship between inequality and economic freedom, with the possibility that policies that are meant to reduce inequality will reduce economic freedom, which will then only make inequality worse.”
For my final argumentative essay, I have chosen the topic wealth disparity. In my opinion, this topic needs to be research more in depth. The problem of wealth disparity is not just a national societal problem, but global societal problem. The distribution of wealth nationally has created social class system of the haves, and have nots, moreover, wealth disparity or wealth distribution; for example, there is wealth disparity between blacks and whites in America. In compelling surveys done by the United States Census Bureau, show that white men on a whole annual salary are higher in comparison to black
Even income inequality brings benefits to the economy but the negative effect of income inequality in much more compare to its benefit. As an example, income inequality will bring negative effect like discourages the investment and hence affect to the GDP of a country. As higher income inequality, the lower the GDP. Income inequality might cause
According to author Robert Putnam, Americans were never really worried about “equality of income and wealth.” Instead, they focused their concern to “equality of opportunity” and “social mobility.” The equality of income and wealth refers to the amount of money that individuals bring in based on their salaries from their job. This is an individual entity in which people mostly do not worry about it on a larger scale within society. On the contrary, we tend to think more about equality of opportunity and social mobility.
The more unequal the society is, the more likely the death penalty is to be administrated. This increase in safety is just one of many benefits of reducing income inequality. Government intervention is the most effective and efficient way to tackle income inequality. In conclusion, there are both advantages and disadvantages to economic inequality, but when many of the individuals in the community strive for a better standard of living, the goal of the community becomes to achieve a better standard of living. The goals of individuals match the goals of the community.