Study: Most Americans want wealth distribution similar to...

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Sweden.


92 percent prefer Swedish model to US model when given a choice

Americans generally underestimate the degree of income inequality in the United States, and if given a choice, would distribute wealth in a similar way to the social democracies of Scandinavia, a new study finds.

For decades, polls have shown that a plurality of Americans -- around 40 percent -- consider themselves conservative, while only around 20 percent self-identify as liberals. But a new study from two noted economists casts doubt on what values lie beneath those political labels.

According to research (PDF) carried out by Michael I. Norton of Harvard Business School and Dan Ariely of Duke University, and flagged by Paul Kedrosky at the Infectious Greed blog, 92 percent of Americans would choose to live in a society with far less income disparity than the US, choosing Sweden's model over that of the US.

What's more, the study's authors say that this applies to people of all income levels and all political leanings: The poor and the rich, Democrats and Republicans are all equally likely to choose the Swedish model.

But the study also found that respondents preferred Sweden's model over a model of perfect income equality for everyone, "suggesting that Americans prefer some inequality to perfect equality, but not to the degree currently present in the United States," the authors state.

Recent analyses have shown that income inequality in the US has grown steadily for the past three decades and reached its highest level on record, exceeding even the large disparities seen in the 1920s, before the Great Depression. Norton and Ariely estimate that the one percent wealthiest Americans hold nearly 50 percent of the country's wealth, while the richest 20 percent hold 84 percent of the wealth.

But in their study, the authors found Americans generally underestimate the income disparity. When asked to estimate, respondents on average estimated that the top 20 percent have 59 percent of the wealth (as opposed to the real number, 84 percent). And when asked to choose how much the top 20 percent should have, on average respondents said 32 percent -- a number similar to the wealth distribution seen in Sweden.

"What is most striking" about the results, argue the authors, is that they show "more consensus than disagreement among ... different demographic groups. All groups – even the wealthiest respondents – desired a more equal distribution of wealth than what they estimated the current United States level to be, while all groups also desired some inequality – even the poorest respondents."

The authors suggest the reason that American voters have not made more of an issue of the growing income gap is that they may simply not be aware of it. "Second, just as people have erroneous beliefs about the actual level of wealth inequality, they may also hold overly optimistic beliefs about opportunities for social mobility in the United States, beliefs which in turn may drive support for unequal distributions of wealth," they write.

The authors also note that, though there may be widespread agreement about income inequality, there is no agreement on what caused it or what should be done about it.

"Americans exhibit a general disconnect between their attitudes towards economic inequality and their self-interest and public policy preferences, suggesting that even given increased awareness of the gap between ideal and actual wealth distributions, Americans may remain unlikely to advocate for policies that would narrow this gap," the authors argue.

Norton and Ariely's survey was carried out on 5,522 respondents in 47 states in December of 2005. The results are to be published in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/09/poll ... ar-sweden/

Most Americans probably can't even find Sweden on a map let alone want to live there

It's the one next to Germany, right?

this working-class person would cast his lot with sweden any day of the week.

I'm skeptical of wealth distribution. I'm far from wealthy, but I'm working on a long term plan to get ahead (meaning probably upper middle class) and I don't want government red tape screwing that up.

Its interesting, so many people look to Sweden and denmark for the vision of an ideal social society, with the wonders of fiscal equity and high government assistance. Everyone is happy.

Unfortunately the sting in the tail of this wondrous model is that the very high income taxes (try 52% in Denmark) required to make this model happen serves as massive demotivators for the average person, where most do nothing but the bare minimum in life. Theres no point as any effort is taxed to death. Now these countries are faced with a massive brain drain of professionals who are heading overseas to earn money without being taxed to death. This is acknowledged by the government and compamies as a serious problem. Its a slow death for any country.

Sure, they get free education, health, and fantastic welfare should they not have a job, but its these things that stifle the drive and creativity of a country. If one visits these countries the glaring thing that is noticed is the flatness from the people, as nice as they are theres not much life there, theres a sameness about it all.

Be very vareful when aspiring to this social utopia, theres a big price to pay, and I can guarantee you it will kill the very thing that gives the US its greatness, the drive and reward for making oneself.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIMi7fBA6e4[/youtube]

the u.s. of a. exists as a safety valve to drain off these greedy gifted ones from countries they don't want to contribute to, and frankly don't deserve to live in anyways. for a wealthy person, 52% is not being taxed to death, especially when in this country several decades back, there was a 70% rate and the filthy rich were not jumping off roofs over it. [especially since they were largely sheltered from most of it in the first place]



i am not knocking what many europeans have, i wished i was one of 'em. one man's dystopia is another man's heaven on earth. i WANT their "sameness." i envy them. and i seriously disbelieve you when you say such communitarian societies are devoid of "life" and "creativity" unless you mean exclusively the freedom to engage in "creative" financial shinanigans.



then you are welcome to the rampant individualism that is rotting america from within, as i want no part of it. i would cast my lot anyday with a more egalitarian society, if i could. not all of us are capable of "making oneself." IOW we all can't be "great," so there is a continuing need for places where ordinary folk can live above abject poverty. you mention the safety net as being a "demotivator for the average person" yet i can tell you even though you are turning a blind eye as i "speak", that i am plenty "demotivated" in the total absense of any safety net as is the status quo here in the land of the fee, home of the slave.

LOL!! !


Sadly...there is probably some truth to this though idk about "most".

What you are claiming is that most Americans are stupid and ignorant. A glance at the present political dynamics of the country tends to confirm this and also the eagerness of so many to strive uselessly to become billionaires. Lottery tickets are always popular amongst people like that. And Las Vegas.

Nah....judging from all those godless commies there...it has to be next to North Korea. I know this is a fact now cuz though I can't remember the exact name of the country right next to North Korea.... I know it begins with an S. I learned all about geography in Sarah Louise Palin Elementary skool after all.

I'm not necessarily convinced of that auntblabby. Many working class and "blue collar" people I know are bigger supporters of supply-side economics than Milton Friedman ever was. The fictional Archie Bunker character wasn't too much of an exaggeration when it comes to many of these people.

auntblabby~

Case in point. ^ Right or wrong.....this is the general mindset of millions of working class/blue collar Americans regardless of whether John_Browning actually falls into those categories or not.

Just because people may like having a union job doesn't mean they like the unions supporting the democrats' policies. My dad is a truck driver and he is almost as far right as me. Most of the other truck rivers and even dispatchers are very right wing too and would never approve of wealth redistribution.

Can I assume, then, that you're against the Welfare Program and any other sort of government assistance, and you think that everyone on any of those programs (including all of the autistic people and Aspies on those programs) should just have to starve to death, since they're unable to actually provide for themselves and many of them don't have family members or friends who could afford to provide for them? Seriously, stop pretending that wealth redistribution is always a bad thing, and that it's not helping anyone at all. (Oh, and by the way, your greed and selfishness are appalling. The fact that you'd rather have more money than have that money go towards helping people who need it is seriously sick and twisted. Do you have any empathy at all for others?)

While I consider myself a libertarian socialist in the ideal sense....I admit that socialism is very difficult to work out in a practical sense. There always seems to be these tricky unintended consequences for one thing. We also might want to keep in mind that Sweden spends roughly 1.50% of their comparatively tiny GDP on national defense. The U.S. spends over three times that amount in terms of it's % of GDP on defense. Thus....Sweden enjoys the protective umbrella of American military power. If the US disappeared tomorrow, the Swedes would likely be speaking Chinese in no time. I don't think anyone in their right mind would consider the sort of governance that has existed in China for well....centuries....to be an improvement.