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Has Hanauer got a point here?
Has Hanauer got a point here?
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A couple of years ago I had some guy telling me about this all the time. I'm not sure it's right, really, because the "rising inequality" is caused not by the poor getting poorer, but by the rich getting markedly richer. I think that's a more tolerable inequality for most because in the end people care far more about their own lives than about others' -- if the poor were taking a hit to the extent of, say, the Peasants of Wat Tyler etc, then I might take the threat of rebellion seriously, but at the moment I think it's not even close to being a problem. Apparently our economy is recovering, too. I think it would have needed to be in decline for a lot longer, and a lot harder, than was the case for there to be any threat of revolution, here or anywhere else in the Western World.
So no, I don't think he's got a point.
So no, I don't think he's got a point.
To save me having to type it all out and to save you from boredom here are some of the broadest points regarding poverty in the UK- the poorest in our society have seen their income drop by nearly 5 %.
there are other, better links if you google them but this is a starting point.
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there are other, better links if you google them but this is a starting point.
http://
// Do you think the US is special or different, he asks. You're wrong. No nation is immune, he says - just ask the Russian tsars or the French aristocracy. //
The difference is that we now have democratic countries in the US and Europe. The French and Russian revolutions happened because the poor had no way out from their corrupt leaders other than chopping their heads off. Today we can vote them out. The only problem is, there isn't much of a choice.
He is right that such a gap in wealth is not healthy for society. If the masses do reach a point of desperation, they will revolt. I do not think we are in that situation, but the gap needs to be lessened, not allowed to continue to get bigger.
The difference is that we now have democratic countries in the US and Europe. The French and Russian revolutions happened because the poor had no way out from their corrupt leaders other than chopping their heads off. Today we can vote them out. The only problem is, there isn't much of a choice.
He is right that such a gap in wealth is not healthy for society. If the masses do reach a point of desperation, they will revolt. I do not think we are in that situation, but the gap needs to be lessened, not allowed to continue to get bigger.
Poorer relative to what, though? I'm not going to run through the argument of "oh these days so-called poor people have Plasma TVs and stuff", but to some extent there is a point that this is a different kind of poverty from the blackest days of poverty in the past, such as most recently in the 1930s. As a whole, since then we have got markedly richer -- yes, with exceptions -- so if the poor in modern Britain are getting poorer then it is from a position of relative strength compared to the past.
At the very least it ought to be clear that far fewer people are in real, dire poverty than you would need for a "revolution" of the sort Hanauer or that other person was envisaging, and if the poor are taking a hit then it's a short-term one that bucks the trend of the previous several decades or so when people did as a whole get richer. If the same number of people stay in relative poverty that's due to redefinitions of the poverty line.
In absolute terms, the definition of "international poverty" is defined as an income of about $1 a day (it may have been revised upwards). By contrast, in 2006 before the Recession, one report in the UK spoke with abject horror about "5 million people... earning less than £6.67 an hour." It's a different and 'better' class of poverty that we have in this country, markedly, from most other places. In virtually every other metric you can think of there's the same sort of picture, of living standards improving as a whole, and the result is that there is just not enough anger, and not enough angry people, for large-scale revolution to be at all likely.
The closest we got was in the August Riots of 2011 -- but even then, if it started off due to anger it quickly became overtaken by simple opportunism as people saw the change to grab stuff free of charge. With signs that the economy is improving, that was probably the last chance for a Hanauer-esque revolution to have any real support for a generation or so, at least in this country.
At the very least it ought to be clear that far fewer people are in real, dire poverty than you would need for a "revolution" of the sort Hanauer or that other person was envisaging, and if the poor are taking a hit then it's a short-term one that bucks the trend of the previous several decades or so when people did as a whole get richer. If the same number of people stay in relative poverty that's due to redefinitions of the poverty line.
In absolute terms, the definition of "international poverty" is defined as an income of about $1 a day (it may have been revised upwards). By contrast, in 2006 before the Recession, one report in the UK spoke with abject horror about "5 million people... earning less than £6.67 an hour." It's a different and 'better' class of poverty that we have in this country, markedly, from most other places. In virtually every other metric you can think of there's the same sort of picture, of living standards improving as a whole, and the result is that there is just not enough anger, and not enough angry people, for large-scale revolution to be at all likely.
The closest we got was in the August Riots of 2011 -- but even then, if it started off due to anger it quickly became overtaken by simple opportunism as people saw the change to grab stuff free of charge. With signs that the economy is improving, that was probably the last chance for a Hanauer-esque revolution to have any real support for a generation or so, at least in this country.
jno,
I do not think the riots of 2011 were due to wealth inequality. There were many factors, but the original spark was the police shooting a citizen. The riots in other towns had a criminal element to them and were largely copy cat.
That is not to say that there isn't a growing element who see the political solution as beyond them because the politicians are corrupt and favour the rich rather than help the poor. The very poor who need political change are the ones who are not voting (maybe they have something else in mind?).
I do not think the riots of 2011 were due to wealth inequality. There were many factors, but the original spark was the police shooting a citizen. The riots in other towns had a criminal element to them and were largely copy cat.
That is not to say that there isn't a growing element who see the political solution as beyond them because the politicians are corrupt and favour the rich rather than help the poor. The very poor who need political change are the ones who are not voting (maybe they have something else in mind?).
The rich get rich at the expense of the poor. Whilst societies can tolerate a certain proportion of reasonably rich people that contribute at least something to society, they cannot support a large proportion of overtly super rich parasites who exploit the poor. Many of the richest people in the world live in India, home to many of the poorest. If something is going to give, my guess is that it will be there first.
If the pitchforks aren't imminent, why has Boris bought some water cannons ?
If poverty isn't increasing, why are so many soup kitchens opening up ?
The economic recovery is only from George's slamming of it in his first budget - deliberately fostered in order to give him the headroom for a pre-election expansion four years later.
If poverty isn't increasing, why are so many soup kitchens opening up ?
The economic recovery is only from George's slamming of it in his first budget - deliberately fostered in order to give him the headroom for a pre-election expansion four years later.
yes good points above the "poor" are immeaurably richer, not sure what kvalidir is looking at. These days even the dole dossers have all the comforts of home, I can remember my grandfather telling me about scratching around for veg under the market stools, they were really starving on occasion. These days you are poor if you haven't got 50inch plasma! There are very few people starving in the western world these days, for real poor you have to look at Africa and Asia. India and China are producing a lot of Billionaires these days and they certainly have some very poor so if rebellon is to start thats the sort of place. I don't think the western "poor" are anything like poor enough to revolt.
Do you mean to say that none of you have bought one yet, Amazon are doing a good deal in them, there are even four pronged ones on offer to the more upset rioters.
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