Inequality Talk Is About Grabbing
24th August 2013
Just in case you didn’t know.
I suggest that most talk about the problems of inequality actually invokes this ancient hypocritical ability to covertly discuss where to find lots of nice easy-to-grab stuff. We don’t discuss inequalities across time, because it is hard to grab much more than we do from the past or the future. We don’t much discuss the inequality of rich foreigners, because it is much harder to grab their stuff. We don’t much discuss inequality of those with unusual artistic abilities or sexual attractiveness, because we can’t directly grab their advantages and while we might try to grab their material goods to compensate, they don’t have that much, and the grabbing would be hard. (Also, such folks have more social status to resist with. For foragers, status counted lots more than material goods for influence.)
A few people within our nation who each have lots and lots of material goods, however, seem to make a great target for grabbing. So people discover they have a deep moral concern about that particular inequality, and ponder what oh what could we possibly do to rectify this situation? Anyone have an idea? Anyone?
And you’ll notice that the people who talk trash about inequality aren’t in a hurry to find somebody less well off than they are and split their stuff with them (yeah, I’m looking at you, Hollywood), just as the people who complain about not being taxed enough never seem to understand that, hey, you can just write a check to the IRS that they won’t hesitate to cash.