Quote:
Originally Posted by Superman
Were it not for some existing market manipulations, the gap between the rich and poor would be wider and getting wider faster, for example.
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Where did you get that idea? The gap between rich and poor is always far greater in non-capitalist, non-developed nations. The US has a HUGE middle-class, and very few dirt-poor. When you go to developing countries you'll find a tiny group of filthy rich, and huge numbers of dirt poor. It's the US's free economy that makes our middle-class possible. In many countries the governments maintain controls on the economy in order to ensure that their filthy rich cronies stay that way.
What do I mean by "dirt poor"???
I mean the vast slums of people living in dirt floored, tin-roof shacks, struggling to get by at a subsistence level. In my travels in the US, it's something I almost never see. I can't travel 5 miles in Indonesia without seeing people living like this.
By the way, the above is a fairly nice example. That's a picture that I took in Indonesia where you can see an example of how the poor live huddled near an intersection. I'll be honest, I feel kind of embarrassed taking pictures of the how the poor live when I travel since it makes me feel like an "ugly American" gawking at them. But I've seen a lot worse than this on my most recent trip when I went through a section of the city that I hadn't seen, and there were blocks and blocks of shacks with tarps for roofs, no running water, dirt floors.
Indonesia isn't unique with these conditions, China has them, Brazil, India, Africa, and so on. When we allow jobs to go overseas, it provides opportunities for these people to get a productive job. Sure it's unskilled labor, but some of the people can become drivers, basic machine operators, laborers, work construction for the factories, become cleaning people in the hotels. All at rates that are a fraction of what American's will settle for. When that happens, the whole economy becomes stronger. This has happened in Malaysia (there are relatively few tin-roofed shacks left in Malaysia), Coastal China, Taiwan, Korea and other places. In those places the standard of living is now significantly closer to the US's, with people owning cars, houses, TV's, cell phones etc., and the US will get a share of the profits of making those things -- if we're willing to allow our companies freedom to operate.
Most American's don't have a clue what it means to be poor in terms that much of the rest of the world has to live with.