Indeed, falling wages would generally indicate a worsening situation, and in all cases indicate relative immiseration. But where the prices of consumer goods fall faster, then relative immiseration coincides with absolute improvement. I realise that comparisons are difficult, but I find it hard to believe that you are unaware of the greater range and amount of consumer goods available to our generation, compared, say, to our parents'.
I know, for example, that when my parents were growing up, food and clothes were still officially rationed in Britain. The appearance of bananas in the British diet was such a talking point that many still remember the first they ever saw. In Hull, when my father was a boy, the sewage system still relied upon men emptying cisterns, known, euphemistically, by the scent they used to cover up the stench as 'lavender men'. Sorry to be anecdotal, but it seems strange to me that anyone could have so little sense of historical change - or do you think that there were always micro-waves, freezers, sound-systems, family cars, televisions, central heating etc etc etc.
In message <v02130500630bd2ed4c16@[128.112.70.26]>, Rakesh Bhandari <bhandari at phoenix.Princeton.EDU> writes
> However, as I
>searched the WB website, I was having trouble finding data that
>disaggregated by income group (much less class)--where did you find your
>data (website please).
Sorry, I used the urls that Doug posted a few days ago now. I haven't kept them. As a very broad sample the WB data is pretty sketchy, but they do include such things as life expectancy of the lowest (or highest) income quintile so that you can trace the digressions caused by inequality, rather imperfectly.
> I looked up the Dreze and Sen book as quoted by
>Dasgupta, and here they take the approach that while there has been
>progress on key social indicators over the last several decades, it has
>been piddling compared to China and Kerala in particular and marred by
>great inequality. The World Bank predicts stagant income for India, by the
>way, it is obviously too optimistic about China. Throw in Indonesia's
>stagnation. And there's--what?--over 50% of the world's population.
Well, I have no crystal ball and am not saying anything about what might happen, only about what has happened. You - and the world bank - might be right that things will get much worse. -- Jim heartfield