The Gilded Age

A successful economy is perhaps the most key ingredient leading to a successful nation. An economy is a delicate balance of many different conflicting and coexisting elements. Naturally, an economy's success can often be measured by the amount of wealth is contains, not to mention the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of its distribution of the wealth. Effective distribution of wealth is no easy feat. Wealthy and poor people will always need to coexist- this is an inescapable truth. The government's job in many cases becomes that of a referee. Naturally, perfect peace and harmony between to totally different classes would be a utopia, and probably will never be completely achieved. A government must, therefore, regulate economy so that one class does not overrun the other. "The real struggle is over a vastly more important issue: who owes what to whom. This most hoary and basic of all social debates usually afforded reverence and inattention of great art: People know its there and mostly they ignore it"(Wines238). Society will constantly debate this issue. By very definition, however, there will also always be a wide spectrum of opinions because of social status. Naturally, the poor will always feel cheated because they feel as if opportunity never has and never will pass them by. The rich, conversely, will always feel as if they are doing society a great favor simply by having their wealth. Poor versus rich debates will never go away no matter how much change is done to government and society. The "just deserts" theory of poverty is one that best describes American society. "For many, the logic of the mobility ideology led to a ‘just deserts' rationalization. The matter was simple, according to a local editor: ‘We declare it a vice and a sin for a man to be poor, if he can help it.' And the typical poor man in America could help it"(Thernstrom33). More often than not poverty can be helped. Perhaps poverty is what is deserved for laziness in American society.