Sir, – Paul Gillespie’s column on the writings of Thomas Piketty (“Inequality grows as world’s rich get much richer”, April 12th, 2014) was both timely and incisive.
It seems that “the average income of working-class Americans around 1920 doubled in real terms by 1955 and tripled by 1970. In the four decades since 1970, there has been almost no improvement on average for the lower 90 per cent of American households. By 2007, the top 1 per cent of households had almost five times the real income they had in 1920; the top 0.1 per cent had about six times; the top 0.01 per cent nearly 10 times. Piketty’s research shows similar tendencies in Europe ...”
Well surprise, surprise: isn’t that where we live?
Among US economic writers suggesting that these conditions amount to an emerging oligarchy are Simon Johnson, Paul Krugman and Jeffrey Winters, “who all analyse how the rich have captured the political process, making necessary taxation and redistributive reforms virtually impossible in a dysfunctional Washington”.
Substitute “Ireland” for “Washington” and not many among those struggling to cope here would quibble. The gap between rich and poor has increased, lower-end taxpayers have been hammered, private pension funds have been raided, pensioners have had their waivers and allowances slashed while facing a raft of new taxes without any additional income. Well, those low-income folks did all party, didn’t they? So they had it coming.
Fine Gael gave us exactly what it says on their tin but Labour ought to be ashamed. The successors of James Connolly, while looking to their inflated salaries and pension pots, have spent the past three years making Ireland safe again for this kind of capitalism.Yours, etc,
BERNARD KEOGH,
Dollymount Park,
Clontarf,
Dublin 3