>But how ordinary people think about inequality, or if they think about
>it, is what I was getting at, and that's a separate matter.
Well, what do we know about what they think? Polls I've seen show that people think that welfare benefits are about twice as high was they are (were?), that white people think black incomes are equal to white, and that the poverty line is about twice as high as it really is. I haven't seen polls on average incomes, but I suspect that most people think average incomes (and wealth) are much higher than they already are - so, thinking about distribution would force them to confront the "fact" that they're below a fantasized average.
Maybe average perceptions aren't as out of whack as former North Carolina Congressman Fred Heineman, who famously said in 1995: "When I see someone who is making anywhere from $300,000 to $750,000 a year, that's middle class. When I see anyone above that, that's upper-middle class." The "lower middle class" was the $100,000-200,000 income bracket. His "middle class" was in the top 1% of the income distribution, and his lower-middle the next 3%. It wouldn't surprise me if lots of people in DC think like this, but have enough sense not to say it out loud.
Doug