Comment by fluoridation
7 hours ago
>Nicely done subtly shifting the conversation from wealth to income.
I don't see the data on absolute wealth in your link, so I went with what I had.
>I guess it shouldn't matter that the bottom 90% of Americans have seen their share of wealth decrease since that started being measured in 1989. The median worker should be thrilled as long as their real wages have increased.
Well... yes? I mean, should I care that there's a multibillionaire I don't know somewhere in the country amassing an obscene fortune, if I'm living a little more comfortably every year? Most everyone is living better, isn't that fine?
>Who cares if inflation numbers fail to account properly for more nuanced changes to cost of living
How is that my fault? It's the data you used. Why are you using it if you think it has flaws?
The conversation started with the question of who captures the wealth generated from this new tech. I pointed to numbers that show the ultra-wealthy have captured almost all the new wealth generated in the last 50 years.
The page I linked also having income numbers does not mean I agree they are a good analog for were this value is captured. I don't believe income increasing at slightly under 1% a year actually indicates that "Most everyone is living better" today for the reasons mentioned above. You're free to offer counter evidence and I don't know why you're acting like you were limited to only referencing the source I provided.
>The conversation started with the question of who captures the wealth generated from this new tech.
Regardless of how the conversation started, the statement I questioned, and which you chose to defend, was
>I'm skeptical of the idea that the financial wellbeing of the average American has been improved by computers.
I won't simply grant that relative wealth is equivalent to absolute wealth. That's like saying that if you have a dollar in each pocket, putting another dollar in your right pocket makes your left pocket poorer. No. Maybe it's really true that the rich have captured the productivity gained from personal computing. I don't know. But what you said was that you don't think personal computing has contributed to the financial wellbeing of Americans, on average. Even if you had data showing that most households are financially the same or worse since the dawn of personal computing, I don't know you would get from there to attributing it to personal computers (beyond post hoc ergo propter hoc, which I don't need to say is rather flimsy).
>You're free to offer counter evidence and I don't know why you're acting like you were limited to only referencing the source I provided.
I appreciate the offer to do work for no reason, but I'm fine, thanks. Why would I need to present any evidence to refute you when the evidence you presented doesn't back you up?
>Maybe it's really true that the rich have captured the productivity gained from personal computing. I don't know.
Well, we'll leave it there then. I don't know why you felt the need to debate a point you admit to not having any actual insight about, but I'm going to stop entertaining your devil's advocacy.