To: Elroy who wrote (364497 ) 12/27/2007 7:57:27 PM From: tejek Respond to When one group acquires more wealth and resources of that pie at the expense of other groups, the other groups naturally suffer. In recent years, the rate of accumulation by the richest has accelerated considerably, meaning more wealth than normal has accrued to the elite and been taken from the lower classes....hurting them significantly in the process. The problem with your thinking is you then put them in the "elite" category that is now allegedly hurting the lower class. I don't think Warren Buffet came from any elite group, and Bill Gates might have been comfortably middle class in his youth, so they illustrate the opportunity to move up into the elite class in the USA, but you are counting all of their wealth accumulation as if they began as elites and just took from the poor. They didn't. Class Mobility: Is the American Dream a Myth? A New York Times poll found 80 percent of Americans still believe it's possible to pull yourself up by the proverbial bootstraps. But a recent mobility study suggests the American Dream may be more style than substance. According to the study, the lower classes of Canada, Britain, Germany and France have an easier time moving their way up the social ladder than their American counterparts. News & Notes conducts a poll of its own. For generations of African Americans, race has played a key role in determining class. But does it still? To help answer that question and take a closer look at class mobility in America's communities of color, host Ed Gordon is joined by Elizabeth Cole, a psychologist and associate professor in the Women's Studies Program and the Center for Afro-American and African Studies at the University of Michigan, and Jennifer Hamer, associate professor of sociology in the African American Studies and Research Program at the University of Illinois. npr.org Well the more wealth in the hands of fewer people means we become less of a democracy. Fewer people control what's happening in the country. It becomes rarer and rarer for one of the non wealthy to get elected to national office. It still happens......see Bill Clinton. However, most people running for national offices......particularly the Senate and the presidency are millionaires. Unfortunately, in a capitalistic society, wealth equals smarts and competence.....which isn't necessarily true at all. And what do you think about the well educated getting a larger and larger slice of the economic pie than the less well educated? Is that also a problem, since the well educated are getting wealthy "at the expense of the ignorant"?
