This is a fact that is not widely known or appreciated.
1/OK, let's take a little break from Coup Twitter, and think about an economic issue:
How can we build up the wealth of the middle class?
This is a fact that is not widely known or appreciated.
https://t.co/rcRHSHkTMd
Yes, these numbers don't include things like Social Security, just privately held wealth. They're not an attempt to capitalize every possible future income stream.
— Noahtogolpe \U0001f407 (@Noahpinion) January 10, 2021
Then the housing crash came, and all that changed. Suddenly the rich were still doing well but everyone else was seeing the end of their American Dream.
Because the American middle class has its wealth in houses -- specifically, in the houses they live in.
It's the rich who own stocks.
Well, the option we've apparently chosen so far is just to tell people "Suck it up. Start at the bottom, and save it all back."
Seems a bit inadequate, no?
Can we still use housing to generate broad middle-class wealth? Should we?
As long as people and companies keep moving to cities, the value of urban location (i.e. land) will appreciate.
Doing so presents some obvious problems. It invites NIMBYism -- homeowners leveraging local government to push up the prices of their homes, even at the expense of the economy.
For one thing, most people SUCK at stock investing, but most people kinda-sorta understand homeownership.
It's hard to completely revamp our wealth-building system. We may simply be locked in.
That's a tricky trick to pull off!
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More from Noahtogolpe 🐇
It looks like decolonization just took a few decades to start
Basic econ theory says poor countries should grow faster than rich ones.
But for much of the Industrial Revolution, the opposite happened.
https://t.co/JjjVtWzz5c
Why? Probably because the first countries to discover industrial technologies used them to conquer the others!
But then colonial empires went away. And yet still, for the next 30 years or so, poor countries fell further behind rich ones.
https://t.co/hilDvv0IQV
Why??
Possible reasons:
1. Bad institutions (dictators, communism, autarkic trade regimes)
2. Civil wars
3. Lack of education
But then, starting in the 80s (for China) and the 90s (for India and Indonesia), some of the biggest poor countries got their acts together and started to catch up!
Global inequality began to fall.
One thing I've been noticing about responses to today's column is that many people still don't get how strong the forces behind regional divergence are, and how hard to reverse 1/ https://t.co/Ft2aH1NcQt
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) November 20, 2018
See this thing that @lymanstoneky wrote:
And see this thing that I wrote:
And see this book that @JamesFallows wrote:
And see this other thing that I wrote:
This explains why immigration is now at the center of partisan conflict.
Why did California turn Blue?
— Sen. Eric Brakey (@SenatorBrakey) October 28, 2018
Why is Texas turning Blue?
The left has failed at selling socialism to the American people for decades. We have rejected it.
Their new strategy is mass importation of new voters to transform our political culture.
Of course, the belief in ethnic bloc voting becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
When a slight Dem tilt among Hispanics and Asians caused the GOP to turn against them, Hispanics and Asians shifted more toward the Dems. Etc. etc. A self-reinforcing cycle.
Bush's 2006 amnesty attempt, and the 2013 intra-GOP fight over immigration reform, were two moments when the GOP could have turned back to the approach of Reagan, and courted Hispanics and Asians.
But they decided against this, and...here we are.
What will disrupt this bad equilibrium, and save American politics from being an eternal race war?
Either:
A) More white voters will grow disgusted with the GOP approach and defect, or
B) The GOP will find some non-immigration-related issues to attract more Hispanics and Asians.
As long as both parties see elections in terms of racial bloc voting - where the only way to win is to increase turnout among your own racial blocs or suppress turnout by the other party's racial blocs - American politics will not improve, and the country will decline.
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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the U.S. is quickly approaching \u201ca moment of crisis\u201d because of the \u201crecord number of migrants\u201d spilling into the country https://t.co/QuiWPcXswA
— POLITICO (@politico) October 20, 2018
Facts.
Facts!!
FACTS FACTS
Moar
More from Economy
Most Western countries are already starting to reconsider whether Hong Kong will remain a viable trading centre.
— Isaac Cheung | \U0001f1ed\U0001f1f0 | (@SoAlive0513) February 15, 2021
When the entire world stops trading with HK, how will HK be the financial center of the world?
I doubt tourism would be any better in the next few years either lol
https://t.co/6wuRzXGkYZ The West propaganda seems to make people think we are cracking down on 🇭🇰 people because we no longer need them and we will inevitably suppress their rights. Every now and then, I talk with people in 🇭🇰 who think the Great Firewall will extend to 🇭🇰
🇺🇸-led liberal order is very strong to come across 🇭🇰 people and make them believe what they want. Brainwashed people don't think rationally and fall for the lies and propaganda. This guy is one among so many others I met in 🇭🇰 who told me the same thing, that the city is doomed
They couldn't be more ignorant ! Unfortunately they will end up leaving the city and missing out on incredible opportunities... But they don't know that nothing will eventually change after 2047 ? 🙃Let me explain you why
I bet even after 2047 🇭🇰 will still enjoy a high degree of autonomy and freedoms that its mainland counterpart can’t enjoy : an independent legal and financial system, English as one of the official language, an access to the West internet, its traditional medias, etc.