With all respect due him, I regard pg's essays as I do Malcolm Gladwell's books: they are often entertaining, occasionally insightful, and never something that I would cite in an argument. (And for all the same reasons.)
So, I predicted this response. In fact, I even said,
> There is a counter-argument that this also leads to better living conditions for the poor, and it's true, but that doesn't resolve the much greater economic divide between the various socio-economic classes.
I've been waiting almost all day for someone to come along and say, "but the poor are so much better off!" So, I apologize in advance ...
What do you think of slavery? I have a somewhat unconventional view of it. I think it was a necessary component of human progress for a long time, until technology could gradually supplant it. I don't think it was inherently evil (except of course in abusive conditions, which it usually was).
What was truly awful about slavery was that there was usually no way for a slave to have any chance at all of improving their class. There were exceptions, sure, but as a rule, once a slave, always a slave. That is where slavery is really bad, IMO.
Similarly, as the class divide becomes progressively wider in modern society, there are more and more people who will find it impossible to markedly improve their socio-economic status. As a rule of thumb, if you're homeless in the U.S. today, you're not likely to be sending your kids to college 20 years from now.
Part of the reason that I'm so passionate about the problem of poverty is because I've lived a small bit of it. I've made the transition from being quite poor to being -- at the moment -- less poor, and with a chance of being in pretty good shape in a few years. It takes a long time, and it takes vast amounts of energy. And, I had good luck on my side: I got to play with computers when I was very young, so I have useful skills.
While I gratefully concede that a poor person today has much better chances of being able to eat cooked food and enjoy the basic comforts of cheap entertainment and toys, I do not agree that having really really poor people and really really rich people is an indicator of a healthy society. Rockefeller, Carnegie, Gates, and others have chosen to do good things with their amassed fortunes, but I'd still rather see larger numbers of people attending secondary schools and learning trades -- things which are much harder to do when they're extremely poor.
I regard pg's essays as I do Malcolm Gladwell's books: they are often entertaining, occasionally insightful, and never something that I would cite in an argument. (And for all the same reasons.)
I'm curious what your reasons are.
... but that doesn't resolve the much greater economic divide between the various socio-economic classes
Your statement implies that you believe an economic divide is bad in some way. Can you elaborate on what you believe is bad about it?
pg's essay postulates reasons why people think an economic divide is bad. Then he gives a logical argument why each reason is incorrect.
It's bad because wealth is finite.
No, wealth is not finite, you can create it. You can
build your own house for example and you've created wealth.
It's bad because you have to do something immoral to get rich
No, while true historically, it is now possible to get rich by creating wealth.
And he also suggests that while the gap in bank accounts is growing the gap in life-style is shrinking.
PG does a good job of explaining why this is not true in his essay, "Mind the Gap"
http://www.paulgraham.com/gap.html
The poor get richer too. Just at a slower rate.