What happens to that calculation when you remove 12,000,000 to 20,000,000 illegal aliens who take jobs at or below minimum wage? Take them out of the calculation and the income gap is much better now than it was in the 70's, 50's or 20's. Of course we can't really remove them from the equation as long as businesses want them to fill jobs for wages so low that American citizens won't take them, or as long as politicians can use them for political political purposes.

I don't suppose simply taking from those who have a little more than some others actually works. Well it sort of works in the long run but eventually it fails. Just ask the Ukranian Kulaks or the white farmers of Zimbabwe (or anyone in Zimbabwe for that matter). The problem with radically 'redistributing' wealth and that the people who have it tend to object violently. You see - you can't really have Marx without Bakunin and Bakunin advocated killing whomever it took to effectuate Marx's goals.

the more they change. The comparable statistics, back in the 1960's, were that the top five percent had twenty percent of the wealth, while the bottom twenty percent had five percent--which the New Republic of that era pointed to as illustration that, without the (relatively modest) redistributive tax and social welfare systems of the New Deal/Great Society, capitalism would create this deep divide between rich and poor.

Those numbers were disturbing. These numbers are shocking. Welcome to the opportunity society--or is it the new ownership paradigm?

In his 1875 "Critique Of The Gotha Program", Karl Marx wrote what is one of his most memorable quotes: "From each according to his abilities; to each according to his needs". Simply stated, a re-distrubition of wealth, food or whatever was the antidote to the ills of a society that disproportionally disenfranchised the poor. Worse, the haves kept the have-nots from ever gaining ground.

In his Godless Communism, he attempted to argue for the poor, for the hungry, for the homeless and for the powerless through the offices of "the state". However, didn't Jesus argue for the same rights for the same people, but, through each of us individually? Marx and Jesus were both right, it would appear.

Should the rich pay more in taxes? Should the poor pay less or nothing? What is the responsibility of "the state" to ensure that people don't go hungry, become homeless or lose all hope?

Mr. Thompson plays the "us-versus-them" card far too cavalierly, with complete disdain for the lesser among us; in his blind ambition to win the Presidency, he tramples the poor with gleeful abandon.

Mr. Thompson's "bogeyman" of a Democrat in the White House metaphorically raping the wealthy in favor of the poor sounds incredibly crass and venal. He should know better and he should be ashamed of fomenting class warfare.

Marx was right. Jesus was right. Thompson is wrong.

That would be Dear Alan G. of course.

Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3peAYJSJSg

'Income inequality in the US today has reached extremes not seen since the 1920s, but the trend started three decades earlier. More than $1 trillion a year in relative income is now being shifted annually from roughly 90,000,000 middle and working class families to the wealthiest households and corporations via corporate profits earned from low-wage workers overseas. '

Super Capitalism, Super Imperialism and Monetary Imperialism

Henry C.K. Liu

http://www.henryckliu.com/page143.html

"They want to take from those who they feel like they can't get to vote for them and give to those who they feel like who can. It's just that simple."

This logic is universal to politics, regardless of whether "us and them" is defined based on a simple socio-economic class continuum, or a hodge-podge of industries and interest groups. Again, I think of the Conservative Nanny State as a perfect example.

The tyranny of the majority becomes sacrosanct when they know they can't defend their positions any other way.

You will hear the old cannards like ' self made man' , 'bootstraps' and 'he earned it' even when they are talking about the third billion someone has made , mostly from the base of a large inheritance preceded by a large trust fund.

The Public Trust means spoils to be had. The Common Weal is common indeed.

As Paul Krugman knows these people are not only selfish , but mean spirited and vile.

Good ol' Foghorn Leghorn, he is just like the rest of the "top tier" candidates. They talk really tough, taxes this, spending that, but when they need money they just export paper. Inflation destroys the middle class, that is the real class war. Thompson, Edwards, the special interests, they get the cash fresh and entrench themselves like a tic on Leviathan. The people who don't invest, fixed income, poor people, etc. they face the consequences every time the Fed reads its tarot cards.