WW Chapter 20: Power, Wealth, and Inequallity

I liked the first personal story with which the author starts chapter 20. I have always felt that often a simple anecdote can speak volumes, and in this case I believe it did. The author showed, through this simple story about how the English who remained in Kenya refused to use English when speaking to the native people of Kenya exposed the large divide that still separated the people who had superficially declared their relationship to have changed.

I also liked the picture found on page 596 which portrays England as a giant octopus with it's hands in a number of different countries. A negative consequence of the industrial revolution was the power disparity it created between the heavily industrialized nations and those that were not. It allowed these more "advanced" nations to exert their milliard superiority over these other nations, exploiting their people and controlling their resources.

In order to maintain this massive inequality which was in their favor, Europeans often seemed to instigate political positions which seem to be intended to prevent any kind of "power grab" by these exploited people. This includes things like limiting the education which colonial subjects received and excluding them from most jobs which came with money and/or power.


In some ways, you can see systems like this in place even today. The groups in our society who tend to be more powerless or disenfranchised often receive the kinds of education and then jobs which do not afford them the ability to rise in the ranks. At the same time, people with money are afforded more avenues to increase their wealth and power and maintain their elevated social status. An example is the fact that in the USA capital gains are only taxed at 15% while income tax is much higher. Honestly, how many people who are below middle-class have stock portfolios which net any kind of real money that they would pay capital gains tax on? Instead this favorable tax status which capital gains has really only serves to make it easier for richer people to make even more money off of their money. So while it is easy to read chapter 20 and think of many of the actions of those in power against the oppressed as horrible things that used to happen, it is much more accurate to think of them as past permutations of the type of actions which continue even today.