And maybe someday you will actually offer up an example of where this has been accomplished, or even some economic theory offered up by creditable economists of how we might be able to go where no man has gone before. Don't you find it odd that the standard of living in most of the industrial democracies is about the same no matter what the details of their economic policies are, and when some push the envelop, like some have in Europe, they are teetering on the edge, and are having to retrench on a rather Draconian basis?
Not at all, Torie - the US from 1945-1973 was the perfect example. And anyway, the point is to compare within a society rather than across societies - they'll be higher if most people are unionized, there is a generous dole limiting supply of workers, high minimum wages, etc. In other words a social democratic Keynesian paradise.
In the end of course, the only thing that can accomplish it is an increase in per capita worker productivity overall. And that means restructuring our secondary school system from top to bottom.
Not at all, Torie. What you say bears no relation to reality. Worker productivity has shot up rapidly over the last decades, while worker incomes have declined in relative terms. This is because pay is about distribution, and is
political. Productivity only means more wealth is being produced than would be at a lower productivity level - without political redistribution nearly all increase in production will flow to the owners. (I might add that it would almost certainly be the case that productivity would be markedly greater under the social democrat Keynesian regime I hypothesized above, but that is a plus unnecessary for my argument).
