Why Decry the Wealth Gap?

[Daniel F. Vukovich]

At 12:24 PM 1/25/00 -0500, you wrote:
>I have a hypothetical question, relating to some of Brad's comments on
>China as well as this discussion.  Suppose that a society had an equal
>distribution of income.  Real GDP per capital could increase X% by
>throwing Y% into poverty.  Much of the debate about globalization, the new
>economy, .... seems to reflect thinking about this question.
>
>Michael Perelman
> >>>>>>>
>
>The answer is 124.316
>
>mbs

Max,  You are way off here.

  We have shown that the answer *is* 123.416.   As the TNR put it (in re. 
WTO), do the math over, or take it on faith!

I like numbers and unpleasant facts (and also EPI  for that matter), but I 
also like pleasant facts and  "things which cannot be quantified."  (I 
don't like neutral facts at all though).

It is not epistemology (nor "Dialectics"!),  but politics which is about 
knowing the differences b/w all these things, and also about 
"prioritizing"  and adjudicating them.  Perhaps we agree.   bradley has his 
way of doing this, the self-professed cyber -bolshevikii have theirs, but 
there is lots of space to work in here.  No reality without representation.

--dfv

------------------------------------------------------
Daniel F. Vukovich
Dept. of English; The Unit for Criticism
University of Illinois
Urbana, IL 61801
------------------------------------------------------