Re: how to compare living standards


"Jim Blair" <jeb@xxxxxxxx> wrote

Once most people achieve a high income, they tend to retain it.

Tony:


Very true.



Hi,



And except for athletes, geek whizkids, rock stars and such, most don't

get there until well along in their careers.





The rest of us are then left to fight amongst ourselves for the
remaining, i.e. lower, incomes.



You talk as if there was only so much income and if A gets more, that leaves

less for the rest. You think economics is a Zero Sum game?


My guess is that most who leave the top quintile do so by dying.


Also very likely. And if their replacements in that top quintile are
mostly
their own children, that's just more evidence of "income mobility", right?

-- TP



It would be if their children started with a low income and then moved up

over the time period of measurement.



But that raises some interesting questions. Would it be BAD if the children
of

the top income quintile were to also occupy that quintile? And would it be

unexpected?



If you believe in bio-sociology (that behavior characteristics are inherited
as well

as physical ones like eye color), and that high incomes result from
behaviors, then

it would be expected that the children would end up where their parents did
even

in the absence of any other help from them than the genes they received.
Note that

would be the case for the bottom quintile also.



I read an article several years ago claiming that the growing
wage-income-wealth

gap is driven in part by the fact that US "elite" colleges and universities
now admit

on the basis of merit rather than connections. Thus their students really
are the "best

and the brightest", who then meet and marry each other, and produce children
who

are even better and brighter.



But there are sociological factors which work in the opposite direction.
The Hippie

Movement for example (is that still around?).



http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/4834/blue.txt





and



http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/4834/bluing.htm





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jim blair (jeblair@xxxxxxxx) Madison Wisconsin USA.

This message was brought to you using biodegradable

binary bits, and 100% recycled bandwidth. For a good

time call: http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/4834



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