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A small adage: the poor of yesterday are not necessarily the poor of today. Immigrants arriving in the US are usually at the bottom of the ladder. As long as the US receives immigrants, it will have a somewhat bottom-heavy income distribution (more than otherwise).

Also note that while it may be tempting to "soak the rich", they are the most mobile segment of society. Arguably too, they are the most productive private users of capital. (I'd make a distinction here between real private capitalists and bankers/financialists etc)

Finally, technology allows individuals today to be vastly more productive than their potential peers. The differences are much more stark in a high division of labor society. Whereas, if you are a great hunter your productivity could be maybe 2-3 times better than average, a guru programmer can be a few orders of magnitude above the otherwise average skilled professional.



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