Study finds wealthy Americans have different idea of what makes a just society

[pbrower2a]

Did you expect differently? I always wonder about zhivagos who support policies that result in the government literally stealing their things.

...

What?

From Boris Pasternak's novel, Dr. Zhivago. The title character supported revolutionary left-wing movements who completely destroyed his style of life once they entered power. (There's a lot more to the novel than that; it won Mr. Pasternak a Nobel Prize in Literature; but it's part of the irony of the work.)

Imperial Russia was a great place to live -- so long as one was filthy rich. Otherwise it was a Hell.

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Such would have precluded the abolition of slavery because the abolition of slavery would have impaired the ability of extant elites to enrich themselves on the unpaid toil of their 'property'.

Government by wealth is government of thieves because it allows the super-rich to get whatever they want from everyone else. 

The sad thing is not that these people hold these views. The sad thing is that the US political system, as it is constructed, allows this tiny minority of douchebags to effectively hold all the political power at the expense of the vast majority.

Let's just keep in mind 1% of the US as a whole is 3 million people, so keep that in mind when you look at the right column of the chart (both when you look at the % who agree and the % who don't). I don't know what their definition of 'affluent' is, so I can't testify for the left column.

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Extreme plutocracy denies the opportunity for profitable activity by those not already in the entrenched elite.

[pbrower2a]

Hard work and intelligence are not the sole predictors of success in my opinion. Capitalism makes winners and losers in a variety of ways, but is certainly not a meritocracy based system. Greed and cunning, ingenuity and efficiency, emotionless drive towards profit, this is capitalism. Having these traits makes one man rich and another desolate. And each result feeds back in to itself.

Precisely. A parish priest ordinarily does far more good for his community than a numbers racketeer, yet we well know which one will have more disposable income.  The numbers racketeer does not visit the sick in the hospital, doesn't serve as a bridge between the economic establishment or political machine and the common man, doesn't encourage troubled kids to change their ways, and doesn't encourage learning that might help kids get out of the slum. Nobody enters the Catholic priesthood without knowing the limitations of worldly reward, and nobody starts a numbers racket except for the money to be had.

A healthy society rewards people to do good for others and smites them for doing harm. A good society reward people for creating opportunities and smites them for constricting those opportunities. A sick society, in contrast, rewards people for doing bad things to people and getting away with it. Not surprisingly a sick society degenerates into economic cruelty and political chaos.  

But that said, a healthy market-oriented society rewards people for behaviors that keep the economy running well and creating wealth for people who are not already filthy-rich. Does anyone question that working more hours at the same job, developing rare but desirable skills, maintaining integrity in relationships with others, adapting well to customer needs, conserving scarce resources, putting up with danger and unpleasant conditions, and generally making life satisfying for others merits reward? Of course one expects people who work 45 hours a week in a fast food place to earn more than people who work 25 hours a week in the same place. Of course we expect coal miners and loggers to earn more than receptionists.    

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We do not elect the economic elites. Most are born into it or succeed at bureaucratic gamesmanship as ruthless as any turf struggle in the jungle. The law of the jungle makes tigers what tigers are. But we aren't tigers; we are on a different level of existence than some giant predator who depends upon holding a territory in which he has a chance to catch and eat plenty of prey and that if he loses that territory he starves.

Of course our economic elites owe something to us. Our infrastructure allows their commerce to flow. Our military defends the security of their investments abroad. Our educational system provides their employees. Our courts and prisons exist in part to deter offenses against their property and to enforce contracts. Our economic elites have far more at stake because they own more and grab more. Many have made their fortunes off government contracts, especially for lucrative wars. And those economic elites want us to pay for all that? We never could. But even without the public sector, the economic elites owe us some basic dignity so that we have a stake in doing what is good for humanity as a whole. We need pay that we can live on. We need to feel good about ourselves for doing good.    

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If I were young and all that I could hear from the economic elites was "Suffer for my holy greed!" and I had a conscience I would either emigrate or rebel. Just think of the heritage of about anyone who connects to Russian Jews who emigrated to the US about a century ago. If you don't understand that, then contemplate Fiddler on the Roof, in which any one can observe that Imperial Russia was a horrible place in which to be Jew -- and that it was not such a great place for any Russian worker or peasant, either. We need incentives other than those that reward people for being born into an elite family or -- perhaps worse -- being the nastiest jungle-fighter in an economic order that rewards little else among the common man.

For good reason decent people rightly recognize any institutional injustice as a grave sin. Yes, bad things can happen to good people, but if the common man has no chance at a reasonably good life, then something is terribly wrong with the system.

Taxation is part of the cost of civilization. Civilization has its virtues.