Beware the bad air

By Ashley Bean Thornton

I recently read an article that went into great detail about the concentration of wealth in the United States and argued that it was bad for so much wealth to be concentrated in the hands of so few. To tell you the truth, I don’t understand economics well enough to know if that is true or not. Reading the article did make me think, though, about what I care about in regard to wealth distribution.

I don’t begrudge super rich people their wealth. I’m not sure I really care if the super rich control a high percentage of all the wealth available. What I do care about is whether the amount shared by the people at the other end of the spectrum is enough for most to afford a “decent life.”

It’s tough to agree on a definition of “decent life,” but for me it includes being warm when it’s cold and cool when it’s hot; having a roof over your head, clothes on your back and food to eat; being able to get help when you are sick or when disaster strikes; being able to educate your kids; having some savings for old age; being able to take a little time off every now and then; and having the time and money to afford a little fun, a little beauty, and a little edification.

I wouldn’t call a decent life a “right” that everyone “deserves,” but I do think “percentage of people who can afford a decent life” is a key indicator of the overall health of the economy.

When the needle on this indicator is moving in the wrong direction we all need to care, and we need to be care-ful about how we diagnose the problem. Certainly individual cases of “not being able to afford a decent life” might be the result of some individual problem – laziness and lack of motivation are some I hear tossed around frequently. But — when the percentages are moving in the wrong direction we need to be wary of focusing too much on individual weaknesses. We need to start looking toward the environment. Did you know that sluggishness can be a symptom of carbon monoxide poisoning? What if what gets diagnosed as widespread laziness is really poisoning from bad economic air? When the air is bad it affects the most vulnerable first – but eventually it will affect us all.