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Comment by msghacq | Hacker News Reader

"America’s political climate is changing; among other things, the 2016 presidential election brought up the issue of wealth inequality in this country and made people consider more closely the structural forces that define class here."

What on earth does the 2016 election have to do with wealth inequality (or unions for that matter)? Inequality has been on the rise for decades and Clinton was also a member of the 1%. This seems like a non-sequitur.

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They're probably mostly referring to Bernie Sanders, who ran a campaign very focused on wealth inequality. The union link is that when people become more aware of inequality and by extension class, they become more likely to participate in class-based politics and organizations such as unions, in theory at least.

The part I seem to be missing, is that most of the people working at Kickstarter are the top 2-5% of the U.S.. Their business caters to many people who want to start projects, who aren't living pay-check-to-pay-check anyway.

I don't really understand the purpose of the unionization effort, beyond the facade of just wanting to in some way "fit in" with a social movement.

> I don't really understand the purpose of the unionization effort, beyond the facade of just wanting to in some way "fit in" with a social movement.

It's pretty naive to think unionization is just a social fad. It's a path towards job security, safety, good pay, and control over the direction of your own labor. Trendiness is pretty low on the totem pole.

Collective control over the collective direction of the collective labor. Unions, at least in practice, are only good for the majority of the laborers and definitely not good for independent control over your own work.

> Collective control over the collective direction of the collective labor. Unions, at least in practice, are only good for the majority of the laborers and definitely not good for independent control over your own work.

The alternative is complete control by the employer. Sure, a union, as an institution with power, can likely limit some of your independence, but an employer can limit all of it.

>They're probably mostly referring to Bernie Sanders, who ran a campaign very focused on wealth inequality.

Sanders is in the 1% as well.

> Sanders is in the 1% as well.

Just because someone belongs to a group, doesn't make their criticism of the unjust advantages of that group invalid. Similarly, a white person arguing for civil rights is not a hypocrite either.

Yeah inequality has been in play for decades but heavily since 2000s.

The Great Recession and subsequently Occupy Wall Street were early reactions to the symptoms that started heavily in the 2000s but really has been in play since the 70s. Share of GDP is a steady downtrend [1]. Velocity of money fell of a cliff in 2000s [2]. US GINI coefficient has increased steadily [3]. Inequality definitely became more of an issue in 2016 election but not much has been done to help it, it will continue to be an issue until UBI or GDP share changes.

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/W270RE1A156NBEA

[2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2V

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_eq...

The 2016 election had very clear wealth inequality consequences where tax policy is concerned.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/2/16720952/s...

There are a lot more socialists in the US than there were 5 years ago. Some attribute that to Bernie Sanders and his run for the dem's nomination.

The globalist vs anti-globalist thing is a way to capture the "wealth inequality" vote for conservatives - our town hasn't been doing well but those damn dirty urban liberals seem to be doing great!

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