At UC Berkeley, It Pays Well to Worry About Inequality

[Geee]

American Spectator:

Former Clinton-era Labor Secretary Robert Reich, now a public-policy professor at the University of California at Berkeley, has warned that “we are heading back to levels of inequality not seen since the Gilded Age of the late 19th century,” invoking the term applied to a society festering in poverty but covered by a veneer of gold. “The dysfunctions of our economy and politics are not self-correcting when it comes to inequality,” Reich added, stepping up the sense of doom.

 

It would be easier to admire Reich’s commitment to equality if the University of California hadn’t paid him $327,000 in total compensation in 2015. Obviously, professors at top universities tend to earn big bucks, but U.C. Berkeley also is home to the Center for Equitable Growth, which produces “research toward achieving economic growth that is widely and fairly distributed.” And as the California Policy Center’s Marc Joffe explains, it really pays to be concerned about inequality.

 

Transparent California data finds that Center for Equitable Growth Director Emmanuel Saez received a total compensation package of $412,000 in 2015, with its three advisory board members each earning between $365,000 and $525,000 in total compensation as University of California professors. Furthermore, Joffe reports that the City of Berkeley has an international inequality rating approaching that of Haiti. Think of it as Port-au-Prince with more aggressive homeless people.