Wealth gravity

* The following MotherJones article summarizes some important policies, trends and dynamics that could be the basis for some interesting ethics discussions: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/01/matt-yglesias * Reagan believed increasing wealth of the already rich to be good, as do contemporary Republicans. For whom? How? Why? * Unbridled imbalances in an organism are deadly. Far too many Americans lack access to legitimate jobs with apprentice potential. Far too many Americans are becoming hopeless, demoralized and disaffected. That is nothing to celebrate. Can the earth support macroeconomic solutions to such problems? * Was the transfer of wealth from middle class to rich and to other destinations inevitable regardless of policies, eg owing to production technology and international competition? Even if so, government taxing and spending should not be designed to exaggerate and accelerate the trend. * Imagine an economy in which the burdens and opportunities are more widely shared. Imagine a society in which joys and satisfactions are more scattered throughout the socioeconomic pyramid.

Moon's legacy

* Back in the '50s there was a pea cannery in Walla Walla, WA, where I worked the night shift on the can line, living in a bunk house with 70 other workers in one room. There were guys of all races, prospects and getting-by strategies. There was a black man, older than most of us, with a background in heavy construction and pimping, nicknamed Moon because we admired his rendition of "Blue Moon".
* One evening while walking the quarter mile from bunk house to factory, after recounting a couple of brothel stories, Moon pontificated that society is like a bucket of crabs -- only a few can be on top; the vast majority must struggle down below and can rise only by climbing over and displacing others downward. That analogy saddened me then and has haunted me since.
* Moon messed up my mind. I can't forget that the comforts of my status derive from the efforts of others with less comforts today and historically, often unjustly. I can't stop wishing for more satisfaction lower in the bucket, examining how my choices affect those looking up, wondering what I could share that would spread some happiness throughout the bucket.
* This reminiscence is in reaction to several recent letters repeating sentiments of Fox Talk Radio, where there is a daily diet of white entitlement, resentment, contempt, self righteousness and hate. Grinding down the less fortunate reduces happiness throughout the bucket.
* PS: I haven't eaten a canned pea since 1956.