I had no idea Scott Walker was so popular

[DaShi]

Still how do you determine what's natural inequality?

[Kuciwalker]

i don't consider you an authority i'm afraid. the consensus in the UK, among academics, politicians and the general public is that the minimum wage has been a success. the evidence supports the view that it has raised the living standards of the low paid with few negative consequences.

Only one of those groups could possibly be considered an authority, and I doubt you have an accurate survey of them anyway. The fact is that we are unlikely to ever be able to directly estimate the effects of the minimum wage from econometric data.

and how are you going to do that? it's a political question and it needs a certain political environment to achieve such an end.

Oh, right, we can only create a political environment receptive to helping poor people by doing a bunch of things that don't actually help poor people.

[Kuciwalker]

of course that's important, but it's not the only thing. there's a fair amount of research which tells us that greater equality is better for societal cohesion. people are happier when they live in a more equal society.

Why wouldn't a society with more equality of consumption not be such a "more equal" society?

well sure, but i find it harder to to imagine why there would be big differences between 1st world industrialised nations.

There are fairly dramatic differences between them in other respects - GDP/capita, hours worked, etc. - so it's a reasonable proposition.

[giblets]

Still how do you determine what's natural inequality?

I think you would go by the income distribution before taxes and transfers. Although calling it natural is kind of silly.

[giblets]

I'm not the one who set up the false dichotomy; kentonio was the one who originally asserted the "race to the bottom" hypothesis.

Why do you think workers should be paid their marginal product?

I wouldn't mind if they were paid even more than their marginal product, but then it would make sense to fire them.

[Kuciwalker]

Still how do you determine what's natural inequality?

"natural". I'm not trying to attach a value judgment here; it's just intuitive that when you talk about the effectiveness of redistribution programs in reducing inequality, you mean the difference between inequality with the program and inequality without.

[Kuciwalker]

I wouldn't mind if they were paid even more than their marginal product, but then it would make sense to fire them.

But why does it worry you if they are paid less?

[regexcellent]

Median household income:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_household_income

Norway is virtually tied with the US

Norway is a country of between 4 and 5 million people and it's ****ing loaded with oil. Why do you think Alberta is twice as wealthy as Nova Scotia?

[giblets]

But why does it worry you if they are paid less?

Because it makes them worse off? And if they have relatively low income increasing it is a priority. I don't care too much if actuaries get paid less.

[DaShi]

Why is it rent-seeking if an employee demands more pay than the value of his work, but not if the employer demands more work for pay less than its value?

[giblets]

Norway is a country of between 4 and 5 million people and it's ****ing loaded with oil. Why do you think Alberta is twice as wealthy as Nova Scotia?

Norway is also a ****ing cold and mountainous place so the cost of living is no doubt higher.

[Kuciwalker]

Because it makes them worse off? And if they have relatively low income increasing it is a priority. I don't care too much if actuaries get paid less.

OK, so your objection isn't really related to their marginal product. You just want them to have more money. Why do you want to use wage controls to do this?

[regexcellent]

Norway is also a ****ing cold and mountainous place so the cost of living is no doubt higher.

Not really.

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=CPI+norway%2C+CPI+united+states

[giblets]

OK, so your objection isn't really related to their marginal product. You just want them to have more money. Why do you want to use wage controls to do this?

Giving people more earned income is politically easier, and probably better for their sense of self worth, than giving people more unearned income.

[giblets]

Not really.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i...+united+states

The PPP GDP of Norway is a lot lower than its nominal GDP. I'm not sure what that website is trying to say but it seems to be saying that Norway and the US have had roughly the same amount of inflation since 2005.