92% of Americans Prefer Sweden’s Wealth Distribution
Good thing everyone knows how terrible socialism is. Otherwise, these findings would be shocking.
Americans vastly underestimate the degree of wealth inequality in America, and believe that the distribution should be far more equitable than it actually is, according to a new study.
Or, as the study’s authors put it: “All demographic groups — even those not usually associated with wealth redistribution such as Republicans and the wealthy — desired a more equal distribution of wealth than the status quo.”
More interesting than that, the report says, is that the respondents (a randomly selected 5,522-person sample, reflecting the country’s ideological, economic and gender demographics, surveyed in December 2005) believed the top 20 percent should own only 32 percent of the wealth. Respondents with incomes over $100,000 per year had similar answers to those making less than $50,000. (The report has helpful, multi-colored charts.)
The respondents were presented with unlabeled pie charts representing the wealth distributions of the U.S., where the richest 20 percent controlled about 84 percent of wealth, and Sweden, where the top 20 percent only controlled 36 percent of wealth. Without knowing which country they were picking, 92 percent of respondents said they’d rather live in a country with Sweden’s wealth distribution.
We need to start hammering home the problems with income inequality in the U.S. Unfortunately our politicians feel they have to say “America f*ck yeah!” instead of discussing what’s really going on. Democrats are crouched in defensive mode so they’re pretty useless right now.
I think arguing for the fairness and economic justice aspects of income distribution is a losing argument. I’d rather frame it as a technical economic argument: if your customers don’t have any money, your business can’t succeed. That is something Americans can understand, and if done right it would hammer a wedge between small business and big business.
Another silly Liberal Idea. You want someone who doesn’t pursue an education, stay out of trouble with the law, multiple marriages and zero work ethic to be the same as someone who does the opposite?
If you get past the emotional weakness you have and realize most make money for all the right reasons. They get an education. They work hard. They have a stable personal life. They don’t look for handouts and they pay most of the taxes so liberals can sit home and complain.
You care about wealth? Then why do Libs support trial lawyers who do nothing of value and yet you oppose things like education scholarships for poor minority kids in DC?
Liberals are such whiners and wimps. They complain yet give almost no money to charity and want the government to do it all.
There are plenty of people who have an education and have stayed out of trouble that are suffering. They’ve either lost their jobs, were soaked by the bankers in their housing or had the bad luck to get sick. Having those people suffer is part of the libertarian paradise.
Also, can the people who think the rich work harder or are more deserving please explain Paris Hilton.
92%
Paris Hilton had a grandfather who worked hard, took chances with investments and built a hotel chain that is now providing very nicely for his family. It’s her grandfather’s money to give to her if that what he chooses to do with it. Paris Hilton’s problem is that she’s a pretty, young, socialite which garners her all the attention of the media. There are plenty of rich children that don’t act like Paris Hilton – or if they do it’s handled privately within the family as it should be and not splashed all over the internet and tabloids.
My fiance and I are the owners of a small company. We work seven days a week. I work a full-time job and after work and on weekends I help with the company. This way we always have my steady income to fall back on if business slows down. We don’t get weekends off – maybe couple of hours to watch a football game and have dinner on a Sunday. We do take off holidays and we did afford ourselves a week in Myrtle Beach this year (after three years of not leaving our home, literally) to try and build this company into something that can eventually sustain itself. Every dime we earn pays our bills and goes right back into the company to try to first sustain and then build a little bit at a time. It’s hard, tiring, very demanding but totally worth it. And one day when we are the owner’s of a successful company I don’t want anyone telling me what I earned is not what I deserve. Screw that! Envy is an ugly thing.
Paris Hilton grandfather worked hard – why does she deserve to get his money for free? My grandfather worked hard, too. He ran his own farm. My other grandfather served in WWII, was a POW and lost his brother in that war. He worked hard.
So, anon2day’s response is that we need and aristocracy? I think we need an even playing field.
It’s her grandfather’s money to give to her if that what he chooses to do with it.
Her grandfather’s money is not subject to taxation, after estate taxes. It’s Paris Hilton’s unearned income off that money that is subject to tax.
I think the majority of Americans support the idea that the income gap should not be so large. The problem comes with the system that redistributes the money. Simply taking from the rich and giving to the poor is a bad idea. (Just as taking from the poor and middle class and giving to the rich is a bad idea.)
We need to invest as a nation in job training, infrastructure and a significant revolution in our education system. Anyone who read Friedman’s column yesterday can see the difference between what China’s doing and what we’re doing.
So we should support closing the income gap, but not through transfer payments. Start with not extending the Bush tax cuts for those making over $200,000 (face it, they didn’t work).
To WTFC and others who think like that: How many people do you suppose fit the profile you have created out of media accounts (face it, you don’t know any of the people you claim live that way) and your own over-active imaginations? Do you really think that’s where the money goes? Do some homework. It’s a pittance compared with hundreds of billions each in farm subsidies, corporate welfare and arms programs.
More important, why do you misrepresent the liberal position as caring mainly about the mythical people you have created? So you can demonize us, obviously, the same way you have demonized people who aren’t doing as well as you. What you are suffering from can be treated, but at it’s root, your problem isn’t political. It’s psychological.
Strengthening unions would be a one of the ways to give wage-earners more leverage without transfer payments.
EFCA is kind of an ugly way to increase union participation, but I’ll take it if it helps level the playing field.
The top economic agenda for Obama should always have been: Let the tax cuts for the rich expire to help the deficit, and pass EFCA to help increase real wages.
Steny Hoyer is my nominee for Asshat, due to him going on FOX yesterday to surrender on tax cuts. Hoyer is now using the line “We will make sure we extend the tax cuts for the middle class” after the elections, and is conspicuously leaving out the part about letting the tax cuts for the rich expire. And of course he is blaming it all on the Senate.
So Hoyer is now setting up a play where after the elections, they can extend the tax cuts for the rich, too late to be punished for it by the Dem base. Asshat.
Unions, as organized in this country, are no answer. In Europe, unions fought for universal health care through the political process. In the US, they fought for universal health care for their members alone. I’m afraid that American unions have displayed the same selfishness that American corporations have. Look no further than all those Stoltz projects and the union position on them for evidence of that.
I’m afraid that American unions have displayed the same selfishness that American corporations have.
I certainly hope so – that is what makes them work. It is an adversarial relationship, one in which labor is currently bent over the barrel.
Pass a gaggle of anti-corruption laws along with EFCA if you can.
How surprising. They basically asked “Hey, in other countries more people have more money, would you like that?”
and 92% of Americans said Yes.. duh.
The question is not the What.. it’s the How.
Thanks for posting this story, Jason. It is an important finding since it indicates that most Americans want social and economic outcomes commensurate w/ the social democracies of Europe, where, by all credible accounts, people enjoy a better and more stable standard of living than in the US.
As was said above, increased union membership is key to addressing wage inequality. That’s the record in European social democracies. Since Sweden is mentioned in the study as a country w/ low wage inequality, it serves as a good example. Union membership is about 70% in Sweden. The low wage inequality and high union membership in Sweden is no coincidence.
If you can imagine a corporation as a pyramid, the people that run it being the blocks, and the size of the block being the income for the person from the corporation, then you will see our current system defies physics (science, reason, and humanity). Placing the massive blocks on top of the little blocks would crush them worse than a false flag attack on 9/11 (Operation Northwoods).
Questions to be asked:
Why is hoarding anything other than money a disease, yet hoarding money gets respect, power, resources, and names in magizine lists?
Why do we, as Americans, see obvious inequalities in 3rd world countries where a military dictator owns all, yet fail to see those same inequalities in our system that spreads power/wealth among the top business, govt, banks, contractors, religion, etc.?
Finally, why do fake republicans proletariats believe in this carrot and string system? Even if you do support it, your pennies will be taken away from you and you children and their children will be further inslaved.
So, if 92%, a pretty whopping number, really favor Swedish-style economic redistribution, why are the Democrats running so poorly this year? Heck, how do any conservatives ever win a single election, anywhere?
President Obama and the Democrats managed to get a national health care reform bill passed, and the result is a strong majority (which has run between 53% and 63% since March) favor repeal of it, and the Democrats look like they’re going to get plastered in the November elections. President Obama proposed extending the tax cuts for everybody but the top 2% of producers, but the Congress doesn’t even seem like it will vote on that — though the Speaker is trying — and there are enough Democrats on board for extending all of the tax cuts that it doesn’t seem likely that the Speaker could get a majority in the House for the 98% bill if she does try.
Politicians aren’t stupid, not when it comes to them knowing what they need to do to get re-elected. And if this 92% figure was anywhere close to accurate, you’d think that this would have flown through, months ago.
“So, if 92%, a pretty whopping number, really favor Swedish-style economic redistribution, why are the Democrats running so poorly this year? ”
The DC Democratic shot callers watch way too much Fox News.
The survey has at least one major flaw: participants were presented with Sweden’s *income* distribution, but the US’s *wealth* distribution, a meaningless comparison. The wealth distribution 92% expressed a preference for doesn’t exist, in Sweden or anywhere else.
People often express preferences for free lunches. This doesn’t mean anyone should run on this platform.
WTFC, you sound like an ignorant child of a republican… Wealth redistribution is not all about giving lazy people handouts… It’s about maintaining the middle class you fucking punk. Grow up.
UI – Can you please explain to me how anyone can get ‘soaked by the bankers in their housing’? Bankers didn’t force anyone to purchase a home they couldn’t afford. Is anyone ever to blame for their circumstances in your world or is it always someone else’s fault and someone else’s responsibility to fix everything. Also, who are you to determine who should get Conrad Hilton’s money and whether they should get it for nothing? He paid more in taxes than you and everyone in your neighborhood will pay in a lifetime. When will it be enough for you?
Anon2day – Good for you and your husband. I wish you well with your business. It’s people like you that make this country great.