The Myth of the 1 Percent

Posted 28 November 2012

The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement began on 17 September 2011 with the occupation of Zuccotti Park in New York City. The movement continues but has faded from the public spotlight. There is an aspect of the movement that has retained a popular appeal, namely, the movement’s contention that 1 percent of the population is rich and has excessive income.

But why 1 percent? Why not 20, 30 or 50 percent? The claim that only 1 percent has gratuitous income is a myth because the accurate number is vastly more. The myth is based on the OWS movement’s conception of who constitutes the rich. The movement has failed to provide any adequate definition of the rich. The movement’s assertions that the top 1 percent holds far more than 1 percent of all income and that the wealth of the 1 percent provides its members with disproportionate political influence are accurate. However, it does not follow from those claims that the rich are confined to 1 percent.

What if the rich were defined as all those having more income or wealth than they require? If the possession of unnecessary income were to be the criterion employed to designate the rich, then not merely 1 percent of the population, but a far greater percentage, would be classified as wealthy.

Why do so many people, particularly those who regard themselves as leftists or progressives, continue to utilize the figure of 1 percent to refer to the wealthy and refuse to challenge or even question this premise of the OWS movement?

First, the depiction of the rich as the 1 percent is self-serving. It conveniently avoids scrutiny of everyone’s income and confines the examination to that of a minute minority.  This portrayal of the rich as the top 1 percent enables the vast majority of the population to regard themselves as devoid of superfluous wealth and income, with the implication that they are not part of the problem of inequality. It gives the impression that only a small minority should be targeted for tax increases, not those in the middle and upper middle classes.

Second, most people, including leftists and progressives, refuse to consider themselves as rich because this would produce guilt and embarrassment. Moreover, the OWS movement states that those belonging to the 1 percent feel entitled to their income but neglects to add that so does almost everybody else. The overwhelming majority of wage earners do not believe they are entitled to earn only what they need; they believe they are earning, or should be earning, to what they are entitled, and they do not regard entitlement as synonymous with need. 

Third, many progressives and leftists have a view of the world that is derived from 19^th century works of non-fiction such as Karl Marx’s Capital, or fiction such as Charles Dickens’s Hard Times. These books justifiably portrayed society as comprised of an oppressing corporate elite and an impoverished, oppressed majority. In Canada and other highly industrialized societies, this picture is no longer accurate. Despite the wickedness of capitalism, it is dishonest and absurd to contend that it bestows extravagant income only upon corporations and that the majority of Canadians are economically disadvantaged. The affluenza of Canadian society is not relegated to a coterie of immensely wealthy CEO’s. Nevertheless, progressives and leftists focus, often obsessively, on corporate greed and the discrepancies in income between employers and employees, and largely ignore the problem of non-corporate greed and the differences in income between employees.

Fourth, there has been a renunciation among many progressives and leftists of the belief that economic equality is desirable.  They support the OWS movement because its notion of economic justice also rejects economic equality, or anything even resembling that state. The movement has refused to state the degree of economic inequality it would find as acceptable. The movement has made no demands for rigorous ceilings on permissible income and wealth or for the imposition of limits to wage differentials (such as 4:1 in which no person’s income would be more than four times that of another). The anti-egalitarian movement does not contest the purported right of people to own and earn more than they need.

The OWS movement is often portrayed as an attack on wealth, but as the great majority of wealthy people do not belong to the 1 percent, it is more correct to regard the movement as a defense of wealth. The movement’s claim that that only 1 percent of the population has excessive income is not leftwing or even progressive; it is conservative populism.