Brief: Robert B. Reich: Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor, Poorer
Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor, Poorer
Rhetor: Robert B. Reich
Credentials:
Influential policymaker
Civil rights activist
Oxford University scholar
B.A. Yale Law School
Ph.D. in economics John F. Kennedy school of government at Harvard.
Presuppositions:
Advocated better economic health of the American nation
Strongly believed in trade and unlimited expansion
Proposed the reduction in government taxes to support business enterprises
Denounced higher taxes
Organized groups to adopt conciliate to identify problems and resolve them.
Audience:
Robert Reich targets ordinary citizens and the overall public as the major audience. He informs us about the widening gap between the most affluent and the poorer members of society. His assertions expound how the rich continue getting richer while the poor get further downwards. He metaphorically expresses this idea by explaining how Americans currently sail in different boats, a situation whereby the poor work for any amount of money. However, the middle class citizens are stagnating at the same position although their boat is financially going down the tide slowly. Furthermore, he emphasizes the need to adopt new technology and machinery to increase the rate of routine production. He informed the audience that the new technology will promote quicker, efficient, and inexpensive methods of production. Therefore, when the middle class adopts the new technologies the production volume will increase; thereby resulting in a flourishing national economy.
Presuppositions
Symbolic analysts rise up the tide due to the ability to identify problems and provide possible solutions.
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Focused on the expansion of the world market and the reliance on the global web that depends on the pattern of corporate structure to change the shape of the American economic structure
Purpose
Reich divides the American social classes into three boats, one sinking slowly, one sinking gradually, and the other rising quickly. Therefore, his work explains how technology limits job opportunities for routine employees and how the concept of supercapitalism facilitates business transformation. The increased automation and unfair competition from other countries that invest in larger businesses for lower wage rates keep the lower class poorer. This is symbolically represented by the rapidly sinking boat although the middle class moves slowly down the hill. The latter scenario occurs due to elevated social security among the retired groups and increased automation that economically suppress their progress. The middle class sinks slowly but the affluent who sell their ideas to wealthy developing nations are rising higher in regards to economic prosperity. Therefore, Reich’s explanations purposefully express the existence of many job opportunities overseas. This happens amidst the diminishing opportunities for white collared jobs evidenced in the rapidly declining growth of the American workforce.
Exigency
Reich emphasized the need to adopt new technology to facilitate easier and quick information transformation on a global perspective. By so doing, American companies can acquire cheap labor that voraciously seeks jobs in other countries. Consequently, American citizens will secure jobs with better working conditions that diversify their economies. Additionally, the dire need to form unions and a collective bargaining power was important in Reich’s sentiments in regards to the possibility of protecting workers from exploitation and the decline in traditionally unionized industries.
Reflection
Most of the American industries, especially those owned by foreign investors rely on automation and there is a possibility that they will reap abnormal profits in the future. Routine productions of employment are associated with reduced costs of production. The quantity of goods produced by physical manpower is reducing sharply due to the emergence of computer-integrated robots that facilitate timely, mass production of industrial goods. Therefore, the outsourced workforce takes over the employment opportunities that could have been available for local personnel.
