>From Peter, ...
> Redistribution is not a solution and it is only temporary, please > read about Mediocristan and and Extremistan in Taleb's Black Swan. > Inequality is a fundamental law of Nature, all you can do socially is minor > adjustments at the extremes, but it is not easy to act wisely. Hi Peter, Some personal thoughts on the matter... One of my favorite films is Dr. Zhivago. A masterpiece. I first saw the film when I was about 13 years old while we were living down in San Salvador, El Salvador. El Salvador is one of the smaller Central American countries situated north of Nicaragua. Back then, during the mid 1960s, it was estimated that 90% of the country's land was owned by 14 families. The illiteracy rate was hovering somewhere between 60% and 80%. As a young teenager, I must confess the fact my first viewing of the film... well, much of what transpired went completely over my head. Fortunately, subsequent viewings brought the harsh lessons that transpired into better focus. I realize that when some radical like me talks about "redistribution of wealth", many perceive the phrase as possessing many negative connotations. It is even perceived as an evil un-godly, un-Christian act by a few conservatives of the fundamentalist sort. However, from what I could see, from what I experienced, any country that maintains a clear and horribly lopsided "distribution of wealth" system within its borders strikes me as a far more evil state of affairs than our often flawed and clumsy attempts at redistributing wealth. As hypocritical as it might seem for me to say this, I am not in favor of uniform redistribution of wealth. That would be impossible, particularly since "equality" means different things to different people. IOW, it is a highly subjective state of affairs. I am, however, in favor of more "redistribution" of wealth than what we currently practice within the USA. How much more "redistribution of wealth" is necessary, of course, a highly debatable matter. That's what our elected officials (and all of the kings subjects) will have to iron out - and no doubt with great difficulty. Nevertheless, in my view it is necessary... it is inevitable, because it strikes me as a terrible waste of a nation's limited resources (both natural and human) to live in a country where a single individual might feel it is their god given right to own at least two Cadillacs when at the same time there are too many who are scrounging to pay bus fair to get to their low-wage paying jobs flipping burgers at McDonalds or operating a cash register at WallMart. Calling all of these unfortunate individuals bums and freeloaders will only hasten the inevitable revolution, because eventually they won't put up with it anymore, no matter what it costs them. If they have nothing else to loose... Regards Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
