I'm watching this show on Netflix called The Men Who Shaped America and right now we're going through the period where Rockefeller was brought to court for his oil monopoly. This made me wonder, how does the wage gap today compare to the gap between the richest and the average of that time?
I realize we don't have the same issues as that time (work conditions are safer, we have social programs, etc.) but I see so many similarities between then and now. Are we headed for a similar dismantling of those who are most wealthy, or will this continue?
The most simple way to frame it is thus . . . until the most recent economic downturn of 2008, the Gilded Age (roughly 1880s-1900) represented the high water mark in economic inequality in the United States. The average wealth of the richest Americans and the poorest Americans came slightly closer together throughout the twentieth century. Under President Dwight Eisenhower, the wealthiest Americans paid a tax rate of 91%. Subsequent administrations, but especially Nixon, Reagan, and George W. Bush - sought to bring that number down with new tax regulations. It's therefore neither and accident nor a surprise that income inequality in the United States has grown, rather than shrunk, in the 21st century.