From here (Page 12):
The Occupy movement began as—and, fundamentally, continues to be—a protest against the growing gap between rich and poor, the increasingly appalling concentration of wealth in the hands of a few at the expense of many.
And here is Bishop Philip Poole giving his pictorial illustration to the occupiers in St. James Park on the increasingly appalling concentration of wealth in the hands of bishops who earn over $100,000 per year. While the poor soul puffing on – well, whatever he is puffing on – can’t even afford a chair to sit on.
I don’t want to belittle the conversation. But $100K’s – while it sounds like a lot – really isn’t. I make $110,000 and, quite frankly, don’t know how families do it with considerably less. My wife and I have three kids, a mortgage, 2 aging cars and we just get by. We tithe – which is almost like a savings plan cause you get nearly half back at tax time. After all the bills are paid, there doesn’t seem to be an aweful lot left each month. We it not for my company pension plan and health benefits – I don’t know how I could afford the extras.
Well, that’s the case for Toronto – I would still be renting if I lived in the GTA, I’m sure.
That’s an not a bad point and I really don’t begrudge anyone earning a comfortable salary.
Nevertheless, the average Canadian salary is just over $44k, less than half of the salary of the bishops who piously intone about the inequality of income distribution. I have no problem with unequal earnings and if bishops had no problem with it, then I would have no problem with them – at least on this issue.
As it is, if they really believe what they say, they could give away half their salary; at least that would be honest.
How do you know they don’t? They probably don’t, but still…
Here is something to think about…
Let’s say that you are running a business that employs 1,000 people with the average pay per person of $44,000 per annum. That would equal an total annual payroll of $44,000,000.oo! If you as the President of such a company screw up, than those 1,000 people would loose their jobs and the $44,000,000.oo in pay! Alternatively, if you do a really good job the business would grow and create potentially 100 more jobs and an additional $4,400,000.oo in pay. Now ask yourself this. How much is such an business executive worth?
Amp
Other than the lunatic fringe, no-one begrudges CEO’s a fair wage package.
The problem is two fold. First, the ratio of average workers’ salary to CEO pay has exploded. Secondly, CEO’s who drive their companies into the ground are still taking huge bonuses. That’s not right.
If the Occupy folks could get past the Marxist drivel and their entitlement rights, they have a point. They just haven’t made it.
Got that right!
I am presently reading a book called “The Reckoning”. Only a few chapters into it and so far it is covering some history (late 1800’s to WWII). Somethings that are already coming through is the concept of supply and demand. For example, Henry Ford would not have been successful if there were no people earning enough money to be able to afford to purchase his cars. The point being that as supply increases the purchase power of the public must also increase.
I think what we have happening today is a situation where certain supply and demand ratios are changing. Our ability to produce stuff is increasing at spectacular rates but our wages are stagnent. We are producing more stuff with fewer people, people who are making no more (and often less) money than they used to. The result is the current economic trouble that we find ourselves in today.
Yet even for all of this capitalism has resulted in the greatest amount of wealth, the highest standard and quality of living that humanity has ever experienced. That we are going through these difficult economic times is simply not sufficient reason to abandon capitalism. Any other economic system that can be tried has already been tried and been proven to be worse.
At the end of the day we have to ask ourselves a few straightforward questions, such as:
Which is better? To have a system where a few are thilthy stinking rich with the fewest number of people living in poverty, or a system where everyone is poor?
Amp,
With respect, you are proferring a false choice: either a class of “stinking rich” or “a system where everyone is poor”.
One of Ford’s stated reasons for paying his auto workers so well was so they could purchase his products.
We are rapidly approaching the point where, in the absence of government wealth redistribution, that the lower third of society won’t be able to afford consumer products. In the US they are now beginning to talk about a reapidly growing class of permanently unemployed workers. Poverty is upwardly mobile.
What’s worse is that there appears to be no end in sight to the accumulation of capital in fewer and fewer hands.
Some have said that in a democracy the majority can just enact legislative controls on capital. That would be nice if elections were fought in a vacuum insulated from the corrupting influence of capital -but they aren’t. In politics money is still the best predictor of victory.
As a Christian I am very thankful that the world is not the kingdom I operate in. Still, very troubling.
Hello Jim
I agree with you statement about H Ford. Indeed how much he was paying his workers made him extremely unpopular with other leaders of industry at that time.
I guess you and I will disagree on the other point. From what I remember of my economics class at university it was pretty obvious that all other economic systems had considerably worse results than the capitalist system. If we are going to change our economic system than we will end up in a situation that is worse for even more people.
What we are going through today is very similar (although thankfully not as extreme) to what people went through in the dirty 30’s. Thus it is no surprise that the same denouncements of capitalism and demands for change to something else are once again being made.
Finally, any suggestions about “wealth redistribution” realy entirely on the assumption that wealth will continue to be produced. But this is a false assumption for only the capitalist system produces the most wealth. You also run into the problem of determining how to distribute what little wealth there will be. If you do a Robin Hood type thing and take from the rich and give to the poor than the question become “whe is rich”. Suppose we arbitrarily set the line at $100,000.oo income per year. That would include many schoold teachers, electricians, and CAW members. I seriously doubt that they consider themselves to be rich. Set the line any higher and there are simply not enough rich people left with enough wealth to make any real difference.
Amp,
I am absolutely not advocating for communism. I am advocating against unfettered greed. The boundary of what used to be acceptable in business used to be rooted in a shared social responsibility. With the moral collapse of the Western Civilization, the only check on business is a bought and paid for justice system.
(Even Obama sets the line at $250,000.)
If we are looking for a tax solution, a formula could be developed ramping up our current progressive tax rate based on a percentage of wealth concentration. But in the real world this won’t work because “capital” is free to flow globally. And a loss of capital in the host country, means a hobbled economy.
I don’t see any good solutions.
Hello Jim
I accept that you are not advocating communism. But many within the occupy protest are, along with many who are advocating marxism and other socialist systems. They have simply forgot or chosen to ignore the lessons of history that any socialist economic system is even worse than what we have now.
I also agree with you that the moral collapse of our society has directly resulted in the mess that we now find ourselves in. Many of those who take advantage of others simply do not consider the consequences that they shall face on judgement day. Perhaps many of these people do not believe that there will be such a day. After all, the current message that seems to be coming from the revisionists now running the ACoC is “you’re ok, I’m ok, everything is ok”.