Between 1947 and 1967, this was a somewhat accurate image, as the distribution of income made the population look more and more like a bell curve with each passing year. Yet since 1967, this story has reversed course. For more than 40 years, income has been distributed less equitably. As we consider the policy remedies to crises that are of immediate impact--such as the crisis in health care or in our financial system--it is critical to understand the larger arc of this socioeconomic narrative. How we think of distributing the costs of reform should be informed by this larger story. http://www.slate.com/id/2223734/

Read the entire article. In thirty years that top tier, the top one percent, went from 'earning' twenty percent of all income in this country to almost thirty percent.  Slate is tying this all into our tiered health care system.  But the article really underlines how things have become unbalanced.

We need a new definition of 'earned income'. We need changes in our income tax regulations that treat bonuses and extraordinary pay to management differently from 'earned income.' Again a 90% tax rate for certain levels of 'income' would send a message that enough is enough.

Nobody 'earns' ten million bucks a year, NOBODY.  Earning has nothing to do with it. Period. End of discussion.

And these 'bonuses' are given out to a few hundred in the top tier of a failing corporation when thousands of people IN THE SAME COMPANY are fired.  'Laid off' sounds so much nicer does it not?

But I came across some interesting articles today (and yesterday) that really get into this problem of the redistribution of wealth that has taken place in this country. Supposedly the term is Marxist in nature. But this redistribution went the other way. From the middle classes to the upper classes, leaving the rest of us in the lurch.

Lady Huff has revamped her book from 2002 and discusses this new economic 'recovery':

The problem is, this victory dance is being done on top of the same shaky financial system that nearly toppled over, sending us all plummeting into the economic abyss. And while the market is over 9,100 (with another 10 percent gain predicted by the end of the year) and Goldman, Citi, and Bank of America are reporting multi-billion dollar profits, unemployment is heading to 10 percent, foreclosures continue at a rate of 10,000 a day, credit card defaults are hitting record highs, and states all across the country are cutting vital services to the bone.

Two days before Enron went bust, the company gave senior employees $55 million in bonuses while simultaneously coming out against any financial assistance for the 4,500 workers who had just been fired. There was outrage and recrimination. But we quickly moved on. And a little over seven years later found ourselves once again outraged, this time by AIG's plan to pay $165 million in bonuses to the same people who had driven the company to brink of collapse and the need for a $180 billion government bailout.

Similarly, in 2002, on the same day WorldCom stunned the world with the magnitude of its accounting fraud, the company's inner circle began an extravagant, all-expenses-paid vacation in Maui. There was outrage and recrimination. But we quickly moved on. And six years later were outraged by the $443,000 luxury spa retreat executives of AIG took just days after the government unveiled the first $85 billion of the taxpayer-funded bailout package for the insurance giant.

See some of this is symbolic and some of it really cuts to the core of a rotten system. A sleazy economic system rewards the upper tier just for being in the upper tier and then just steps on the lower tiers.  4,500 workers without jobs in the Enron mess while 55 million went to the pigs who caused the mess in the first place.  As far as the spa retreat, who cares? It just demonstrated a symptom of a much more serious problem.

And instead of holding the Horsemen of the Financial Apocalypse who are still in charge accountable, those in the financial media are ready to move on, searching for the next superstar cover boys.  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/more-pigs-at-the-trough-w_b_245940.html

Supposedly there is hope that things might change. There has been some movement to change things by our elected representatives:

Daily Beast: A House panel passed a broadly worded measure today regulating financial executives' compensation, The Wall Street Journal reports. The bill, approved in a 40-28 vote by the House Financial Services Committee, authorizes restrictions on "inappropriate or imprudently risky" pay packages--specifically Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and other financial companies--with the exception of firms with less than $1 billion in assets. The legislation also guarantees more input from shareholders, as well as requiring that independent directors are included in board compensation committees. Opposing Republicans worried that "federal bureaucrats" would be setting pay levels for employees, but Democrats argued that the government wouldn't be responsible for the task--shareholders would weigh in. "There's nothing in this bill that allows the government to set compensation," said Rep. Mel Watt, a Democrat from North Carolina. "Quit trying to hide behind the government as a big, bad entity." Read it at The Wall Street Journal

This does not do enough but at least somebody is attempting to do something.  We need some real checks and balances in this country. And things are so bad, maybe we should take a look at how they handle things like this in other countries.

How do others, under different governments, provide needed checks to the terrible behavior of our managerial class? Maybe we could learn something from how others deal with these problems:

Chinese state media confirmed Monday that a steel factory executive was beaten to death after thousands of workers gathered to protest the takeover of their company. Chen Guojun, an executive at Jianlong Steel Holding Co., died Friday after an angry mob in the northeastern rust belt city of Tonghua beat him and then blocked ambulances from reaching him, according to the China Daily.

The protesters worked at the state-owned Tonghua Iron and Steel Group, which was going to be sold to Chen's privately owned Jianlong Steel. Chen sparked the riot by announcing 30,000 workers would be laid off, the newspaper said. They dispersed later only after they were assured by authorities the sale would not go through.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-china-mob27-2009jul27,0,3235364.story