2012. 5. 30

Great Divide

/TIME Magazine. May 14, 2012. Page 38-42./

Introduction

     Growing inequality is a global phenomenon. London’s case from today’s article seems to cover various couses of economic gap between rich and poor people; therefore, analyzing it may be helpful when thinking about other countries’ unequal economy, including Japan. In the case of London, it is important to focus on three main factors which have drived the city to unique inequality, and which can be applied in understanding grobal inequality. 

Briefing

     First factor is permanent and drastic. London’s economic scale to that of the national economy is relatively high among developed countries, and high-end income earners are concentrated in the city; also, the city is very popular for foreign millionaires’ immigration and investment. Accordingly, inequality index, such as the Gini score, is comparatively higher than any other OECD countries. 

  In addition, within London’s economic scale, quite large percentage is accounted for by the financial sector, which is traditionally dominated by wealthy people. Although Wall Street has larger scale, London is more dependent on the financial district than New York is on Wall Street. 

     Finally, British government’s financial program at the 2008 crisis has widened the economic gap in the city of London. The financial deregulation has benefited wealthy people more than the working class because they could increase profit by utilizing their properties; in contrast, nothing was available for poor people except cheap credit. 

Conclusion & Opinion 

   In conclusion, the first two factors describes London’s economic structure which works as basement of its inequality; then, the third is clearly a government controlled factor which resulted in intensifying the economic gap in London’s case. This article suggests that every country suffering from aftereffects of the economic crisis needs to pay special attentions to the financial program against the depression, especially for the countries whose capital city is as economically dominant as London. In this context, Tokyo is a potential city of great inequality, so how do you feel like working in Tokyo with great divide?