Dear Mr. Wright-The thrust of your article was spot on, as usual. However, in your intro you happened to hit not one, but two of my pet peeves, "unfettered capitalism" and "disappearing middle class". I'm not sure if those are tropes, cliches, platitudes, or just overused phrases. Where is an area of unfettered capitalism? Historically, maybe you know of some areas that met this description, but there is no modern economy/society that is remotely close to functioning in a state of unfettered capitalism. You can slice and dice income statistics over cherry picked time periods and make a case for a disappearing middle class, but you need to ask the next question: where have those people gone? The answer (at least in the US, I haven't looked at other countries) is that they have predominately "disappeared" to the upper class. Keep up the great work!
Thanks for this thoughtful reply! I have to say: I hadn’t given the term “unfettered capitalism” enough of an examination. It is pretty darn vacuous, isn’t it? Good call.
As to disappearing middle class, I think you’re probably right. Most have moved up! I think what I was critiquing there, more than anything, was socialism. The poor get poorer and the rich get richer. But I suppose this has less to do with “class” and income and more about lower purchasing power.
Dear Mr. Wright-The thrust of your article was spot on, as usual. However, in your intro you happened to hit not one, but two of my pet peeves, "unfettered capitalism" and "disappearing middle class". I'm not sure if those are tropes, cliches, platitudes, or just overused phrases. Where is an area of unfettered capitalism? Historically, maybe you know of some areas that met this description, but there is no modern economy/society that is remotely close to functioning in a state of unfettered capitalism. You can slice and dice income statistics over cherry picked time periods and make a case for a disappearing middle class, but you need to ask the next question: where have those people gone? The answer (at least in the US, I haven't looked at other countries) is that they have predominately "disappeared" to the upper class. Keep up the great work!
Thanks for this thoughtful reply! I have to say: I hadn’t given the term “unfettered capitalism” enough of an examination. It is pretty darn vacuous, isn’t it? Good call.
As to disappearing middle class, I think you’re probably right. Most have moved up! I think what I was critiquing there, more than anything, was socialism. The poor get poorer and the rich get richer. But I suppose this has less to do with “class” and income and more about lower purchasing power.
Good points all around!