The Rich Getting Richer - That's Not A Bad Thing

"The rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer" is a resounding argument from the Left Side of the political spectrum.  They have turned it into a catch-phrase that college professors recite as a mantra to college students in hopes to get them to read Marxian and Keynesian theory documentation.

A pretty powerful statement isn't it?  What kind of picture does it put into your head?  Like most people, it paints the mental picture of a covetous business man with a monocle and top hat greedily sucking the last dollar bill from a working-man's wallet.  That's exactly the picture that phrase tries to paint.

However, like most things we can analyze this and completely debunk it.  First, we'll start with the first part of the sentence: "the rich getting richer".  Yeah, we need to put some restrictions on those slick salesmen; keep them from swindling the Proletariat too much.  Except there's one problem; the rich getting richer is not a bad thing.  It's a phrase that can be directly translated into "the productive keep producing".  In fact, it's essential to Capitalism and the overall health of the Economic Model.

Take Bill Gates for example.  He's been one of the most famous and richest men for over two decades.  He didn't get rich by swindling the poor of their money a la Ebeneezer Scrooge, he made operating systems that people - almost everybody wanted to buy.  He built a vast empire that employs thousands of highly-skilled highly-paid workers in the tech industry, that services millions of people and business entities throughout the entire globe.  And we are all better off for it.

Bill Gates isn't the only person in American history to gain wealth from ingenious production.  Many others have done it including Henry Ford, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg.  Many more people will do the same thing.  A downside to the wealth that comes from creating, will come the stigma and demonization from a group of people that hate rich people.

Now for the other half of the sentence: "the poor keep getting poorer".  This carefully crafted piece of psychological jargon is designed to make the working man or women constantly struggle at ominous odds and always lose.  No matter how hard he or she tries and struggles, will only be financially beaten down by the man.  The irony is, that if the Left gets their way, it will always be a self-fulfilling prophecy.  In an attempt to make sure that no one ever has "too much", they will make sure everyone has too little.

This is far from the truth.  In our modern market, anyone can work their way up from nothing.  All it takes is perseverance  and the ability to learn and adapt.  There is always an opportunity; the myth that the poor will always just get poorer is just that, a myth.  The poor as a group, will only get poorer when an outside force presses on them to take the products of their labor - and it's never going to be Bill Gates.

Push for Consumption, Demonization of Production

The economic theory that has dominated Western Culture for about the last 50 years is called "Keynesian Theory Economics".  As an over-simplification theory basically states that government can fine tune the economy by increasing spending during times of recession.  The theory also advocates "easy money" which makes the claim that printing press inflation is a good thing, and condemns the Gold Standard.

Many problem exist with the theory, but the largest problem is the slippery slope that allows the lawyers that dominate the political structure in Washington to get their hands into every sector of the economy.  Some economists believe that this would eventually degenerate into pure socialism.

In the very recent history of the United States, a recession hit many people very hard.  The people hit the most were people in their twenties and thirties.  Unemployment within that group is the highest it's ever been, leaving Generation Y extremely frustrated and for good reason.

An unfortunate outcome of this event has led people to look for government for answers.  Even though the government itself was the cause of the recession, the lawyers did what lawyers do best and push blame to a group of people that were totally innocent - the entrepreneurs.  Successful businessmen were demonized and given the image that they take as much money as they can get and don't pay their fair share into society.  This is despite the fact that these very people create jobs, sign paychecks , and provide health insurance for their employees.

Since the people that cause production are under serious siege in America, production is going to slow down, which will cause the recovery to continue to happen at a very poor pace.  While government is pushing for consumption, it is demonizing the very industry that allows it to happen in the first place.  

Since the Federal Reserve is operating its printing press at full pace, inflation is running rampant in society as the price of everything increases while wages stagnate and savings are destroyed.  Consumption is an important part in the economy; but just like it cannot be someone's sole job to eat, the American people cannot simply consume.  This will make US currency very unappealing on the global market - just ask Zimbabwe.  

In order to consume, America must also produce.  Punishing the people that make this happen by over-taxing and over-regulating them will cause them to simply pack up and take their production to other countries, as we see this happening already.  The claim that millionaires don't pay their fair share is completely absurd.  Their activities benefit society in every way, they should not be punished for being successful.