economy

Inequality for All

Inequality for All (2013) is the title of a new documentary film on the financial plight of middle class America and the historic disparity in wealth between the rich and the poor. Two sets of numbers in the really popped out for me:

  • The richest 400 Americans have more wealth than 1/2 of the US population combined. 
  • The two countries that get the most money from the sale of each iPhone are Japan and Germany (both high wage economies). The US only gets 6%. 

The film is based around the ideas of Robert Reich, the former secretary of labor in the first term of the Clinton administration. Reich also anchors the documentary and it is his surprisingly (for me) engaging personality that keeps the film a fairly easy watch. 

These economic documentaries are hard to make because the arguments and the data can be pretty abstract and dry. So hats off to the director Jacob Kornbluth. (My favorite in this genre is still the Oscar winning documentary Inside Job (2010), Director Charles Ferguson.)

 

Growth without justice - a film about China

At the New York Film Festival I watched a new film by the Chinese director Jia Zhangke, called A Touch of Sin. It was a strikingly honest and up to date film about corruption, inequality, and what rapid economic transformation can do to the social fabric in China. There are four interconnected stories. The first one is a bit bloody - but bear with it if you are violence averse like me.  

If you get the chance to see any of Jia Zhangke's films, take it.  The Financial Times (September 20, 2013)  calls him one of the top 25 Chinese movers and shakers to watch.