From: de5@ORNL.GOV (Dave Sill)
Subject: 1% has 90%? (was Re: My thoughts on Clinton's character)
Organization: Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 16:48:53 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.155637.13459@mksol.dseg.ti.com>, mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:
>In article <1992Jul22.125353.10363@ornl.gov> de5@ORNL.GOV (Dave Sill) writes:
>>In article <1992Jul22.051939.726@mksol.dseg.ti.com>, mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:
>>>
>>>Sorry, but this doesn't seem to be the case.  Now, for the first time,
>>>the top 1% have more than the bottom 90% (NPR earlier this evening).
>>>Now, if we also buy that the top 1 % have 90% of everything, that says
>>>that the bottom 90% must also have something close to 90% of
>>>everything (since the two groups just crossed over each other).
>>
>>That's bizzare reasoning!  If the top 1% has 90% of "everything", that leaves
>>10% of "everything" for the remaining 99%.  Regardless of how the two groups
>>"cross over each other", whatever that means.
>
>Not at all.  Just sit down and think for a second.  The statement on
>NPR was that, for the first time, the top 1% have more than the bottom
>90%.

Okay.  That also means that until this year the top 1% had less than the
bottom 90%.

>Now, let's go back to last year.  Even if we assume that the
>folks from 91%-99% have NOTHING, that says that the bottom 90% had at
>least 50.1% or so of everything and the top one percent had the
>remaining 49.9%.

Why would we assume the 90-99% group have nothing?  All we know is that last
year the bottom 90% had more than the top 1%.  Hypothetically, the bottom 90%
could have had 40%, the 90-99% group could have had 30%, and the top 1% could
have had the remaining 30%.

>Now, no matter what part you decide to put into that
>'middle' 9%, last year the bottom 90% had more than the top 1%.  With
>me so far?

With the exception of the above assumption for the 90-99% group, yes.

>Ok, this year they 'crossed over each other'.  In other words, the top
>1% now has more than the bottom 90%, not less.  Still with me?

That was the original statistic.  Yes, I'm with you.

>Now let's examine this other statement, that the top 1% have 90% of
>everything.

Which we don't know to be true--you just made it up.

>Either the top 1% acquired about half their wealth in the
>past year

What leads you to that conclusion?

>(unlikely in the extreme), what I heard on NPR (and others
>have heard elsewhere) was wrong, or the statement about how the top 1%
>have 90% of everthing is bullshit.

I suspect the latter.  You pulled it out of thin air, as far as I can tell. 
(See the first paragraph quoted in this article.)  We started with the
statistic that the top 1% of the population has more wealth than the bottom
90% of the population.  You somehow think that means the top 1% have 90% of
everthing.  What makes you think so?

>So let's see which of those make sense.  Too many people have heard
>the "for the first time, the top 1% have more than the bottom 90%"
>statement to reasonably believe that it's bogus, so that eliminates
>the middle one.  Change from 1 year to the next is likely to be a
>matter of small percentages, when talking about aggregates of wealth
>like this.  That says that the likely change in state going from State
>A (where the bottom 90% have more than the top 1%) to State B (where
>the bottom 90% have less than the top 1%) is a matter of a small
>change in the wealth of those two groups.  Still with me?

I followed that.

>Ok, now assume that the statement that the top 1% have 90% of
>everything.

No, dammit.  Where do you get that?

>That says that the bottom 90% must also have pretty close
>to 90% of everything, because the two groups just 'crossed over' each
>other.  That's almost 180% of everything, even assuming that the
>middle 9% have nothing.

Clearly absurd, but the problem is the assumption that the top 1% have 90% of
everything.

>Conclusion?  The statement about how the top 1% have 90% of everything
>is bogus.  No 'bizarre' reasoning required at all; merely a little
>thought, common reasoning, and basic arithmetic.

Okay, I agree.  But it was *you* that made that assumption.  Here it is again
for those to lazy to read it from the beginning of this article:

In article <1992Jul22.051939.726@mksol.dseg.ti.com>, mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:
>
>Sorry, but this doesn't seem to be the case.  Now, for the first time,
>the top 1% have more than the bottom 90% (NPR earlier this evening).
>Now, if we also buy that the top 1 % have 90% of everything, that says
>that the bottom 90% must also have something close to 90% of
>everything (since the two groups just crossed over each other).

-- 
Dave Sill (de5@ornl.gov)	   For every Bill Joy there is a Kirk McKusick.
Martin Marietta Energy Systems     For every Bill Gates there is a Richard
Workstation Support                Stallman.                     --Paul Graham
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns