re: #116 lawhawk

Companies were quite profitable when the ratio of typical worker salaries to those of the CEO were 10-1 or 20-1. In the 1980s, it was 58-1.

Now? The ratio is over 1000-1 or more in many instances. And in some cases, it’s for companies that the CEO has essentially run into the ground (like JC Penny).

Precisely. Modern income inequality is, quite provably, a function of the top X% very literally siphoning ALL of the profit-gains of the last several decades for themselves, and leaving nothing or almost-nothing for the rest of us. And they do this even when it is well established that they have destroyed their company. A CEO comes in, gobbles up all that he can over a ~5 year period, then bails out as the company crashes and burns. Finds a new company, repeats over 20 or so years, and now has a nice 8-figure nest egg to sit back on.

The only thing that trickles down is piss.