Income, Taxes, Regulations, Trade
Goals
- To introduce participants to each other and to get a sense of their histories and concerns.
- For participants to get a broad overview, and to reflect on, the facts of current inequality and its many facets.
- For participants to get a glimpse of recent scholarship on the fundamental role of inequality in the sweep of history and of global differences in inequality and its impacts
- To generate a range of possible actions, both short term and long term, and of possible collaborations.
- For participants to get a preview of the moral and social powers, as well as economic strengths, of a more egalitarian society.
Prior Readings
- “Introduction to Inequality”, pp. xi to xv, from Divided: The Perils of our Growing Inequality by David Cay Johnston. Or Inequality 101.
- Very short videos: Distribution of Wealth and What Happens When We Raise the Minimum Wage.
- “Introduction”, pp. 5-11, from War and Peace and War – A Radical New Theory of History with Implications for Nations Today by Peter Turchin. Or the 16 minute video Turchin on History.
- “The End of an Era”, pp 2-14, from The Spirit Level – Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. Or the 17 minute video Wilkinson on Inequality.
- “A Land of Promise”, pp. 5-12, from Land of Promise – An Economic History of the United States by Michael Lind, or the 6-minute video Lind on US Economic History.
- “Bold Rule Changes to Break Up Concentrated Wealth”, pp. 97-118, from 99 to 1 – How Wealth Inequality Is Wrecking the World and What We Can Do about It by Chuck Collins, or the 8-minute animation Why Tax the Rich.
- “Introduction”, pp. xi-xviii, from How Much Do We Deserve – An Inquiry into Distributive Justice by Richard Gilbert.
Activities
5 min: Welcome and Chalice Lighting
So distribution should undo excess, and each man have enough.
William Shakespeare
Optional in-depth participant story.
20 min:
Minimum & Living wages. A Maximum Wage?
What is the difference between a minimum wage and a living wage? What are they in your area? Are there any local wage campaigns, and, if so, who is involved? What are the facts on how different kinds of employment and businesses would be affected? There’s only so much you can do to reduce inequality at the bottom, so how about at the top? What about a maximum wage (or compensation package)? How could this be implemented, either directly or indirectly? What should be the limit? What are the facts on how relative pay affects performance?
20 min: Progressive Taxes
What are the arguments for more progressive taxes, especially income and wealth taxes? What are ideal versus currently feasible tax rates? What special taxes might help reign in Wall Street? Besides the “bad” of inequality, what other “bads” (= “negative externalities”) might be taxed to benefit society? What “tax expenditures” (= tax breaks or subsidies) should be removed to benefit society? How should government use the additional tax revenue? For example, which regressive taxes to lower? Which investments in people, infrastructure or technology to benefit future generations?
5 min: Break
An optional in-depth participant story.
20 min: Regulatory Capture, Deregulation, Monopoly Power, Union Busting
What is “regulatory capture”? Did it play a role in the financial crash of 2008? Contrast the government’s response to the 2008 crash with the Savings and Loan scandal of the 1980s. What was the role of financial deregulation in the crash of 2008? Where else do you suspect regulatory capture today, and with what consequences for inequality? What do you think about modern companies that have of monopoly power, such as Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Walmart? What are the issue involved, the winners and losers, short term and long term? Perhaps no factor is more closely associated with the vast redistribution of wealth to the 1% than the drastic decline of unions. What do you see as the causes of this decline? Remedies?
15 min: Free Trade, Outsourcing, Race to the Bottom
What was the role of protectionism versus free trade in the industrial development of the United States? Of the Asian “Tigers”? What has been the role of global free trade pacts like the World Trade Organization in the de-industrialization of the United States? Why has this globalization, or offshoring, of the economy been linked to escalating inequality in many countries, besides the US, both developed and developing? What is the “the race to the bottom”? Can it be stopped before the world hits “bottom”? That is, are there practical ways to ensure fair trade and outsourcing that do not escalate inequality or damage the environment or resources?
5 min: Debrief
“The man of great wealth owes a peculiar obligation to the state because he derives special advantages from the mere existence of government.”
Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)