Given comparative advantage is basically a tenant of economics I'm intrigued. I'm not denying that a certain degree of equality is a good thing. In the case of the 1800's USA it was presumably caused by the rich of Europe not seeing any reason to migrate while very few had been lucky enough to accumulate a fortune during their time in America from a fairly small starting capital. A completely different system than enforcing equality through taxation and government where I'm of the opportunity and your of the outcome camp. And remember mass production method were largely the product of a free market. (Although tariffs were rife in the 1800's domestic competition still existed.)
Yes, complimentary and competitive (comparative) advantage in economics isn't as much a "theory" as much as an observation. It's really just a matter of crunching numbers and comparing productivity among groups of people (available resources dictate advantages more than anything). Mucgoo makes a good point about early America. Many economists and historians have pointed out that much of what made America in its formative years was it was considered a "decapitated" society. People who had something to lose elsewhere, rarely immigrated to the States. Elitists judged America as a frontier devoid of any great literature or art for that very reason. It was the 1920's that caused everyone to finally stand up and take notice of the more "lofty" accomplishments made by the US. Interestingly, a LOT of those contributions were from first-born descendants of those "wretched refuse" that came here in droves earlier that century. It's also worth noting that the wealthy in Europe (primarily England) got wealthier by living the UK but sending their money here in capital investment. Our railroad system was overwhelmingly funded by English private investment. Nearly the entire economy of the Southern US in the 19th century was dependent on English-based brokers of tobacco and cotton. When English cotton brokers saw the oncoming civil war and purchased massive amounts of cotton fearing being cut off from the market. It cause the price to skyrocket giving the confederate states confidence they could fund a war only to come crashing down when the UK market was flooded with cheap cotton afterward dooming the confederacy financially.
“If all the money and property in the world were divided up equally at, say, three o’clock in the afternoon, by 3.30 there would be notable differences in the financial condition of the recipients. Within that first thirty minutes, some adults would have lost their share, some would have gambled theirs away, and some would have been swindled out of their portion … After ninety days the difference would be staggering. And I’m willing to wager that, within a year or two at the most, the distribution of wealth would conform to patterns almost identical with those that had previously prevailed.” Jean Paul Getty, oil magnate (1892–1976), As I See It (1976)
Ah the old, "The poor are poor because they just aren't clever enough to hold on to it" chestnut. Very reasurring when you're sitting on piles and people in the street are starving. Why give to them if they'd just waste it? Wouldn't it be better if you, someone of stature and intelligence, looked after it for them? It amazes me how deep rooted within the American national conciousness this rot is. Those who are less well off have even been shown to believe this of themselves.
Do you honestly believe that it doesn't present a good analysis of the outcome? As I've said before I believe in the idea of equality of opportunity precisely because variability in human nature make equality of outcome an impossibility. This hypothetical scenario is a good explanation of why.
The analogy Mucgoo shared was simply an observation of the facts of human nature and the mechanics of modern economic activity. That people have a wide spectrum of desires, priorities, talents and capabilities. The fact that if you gave equal amounts to me and my brother, I have no doubt in my mind that within a year, he probably would have doubled that money from the sheer fact that he is single and money minded, whereas I have a family and producing wealth for wealth's sake is not a priority of mine. If you pick apart the exercise and think about the world and the people participating in it today, this is not a difficult premis to hash out. If you gave everyone $10,000, they would handle that money differently but some distinct patters would emerge almost immediately: People would put gas in their cars and heat their homes, sending some of that money in the direction of fuel companies. Everyone would also buy food benefiting most those who provide most of the food and so on. There are billions of people but only several tens of thousands of entities that provide everyday products. Even if you were able to break away with your new found money and spend it in ways that you normally wouldn't, those people have the same common needs. That proportion alone will start sending money in predictable streams. The wealth that exists, where it does to day for a reason. Resetting the clock doesn't change any of that. Wanting society to be organized and people valued by a subjective construct created and enforced by elites is as old as Plato's The Republic and Thomas Hobb's Leviathan - those are some old chestnuts as well, only they haven't sprouted nearly as much in the world we actually must live in.
