Oligarchy (from Greek ὀλιγαρχία (oligarkhía); from ὀλίγος (olígos), meaning "few", and ἄρχω (arkho), meaning "to rule or to command")^[1][2][3] is a form of power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of people. These people could be distinguished by royalty, wealth, family ties, education, corporate, or military control. Such states are often controlled by a few prominent families who typically pass their influence from one generation to the next, but inheritance is not a necessary condition for the application of this term.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oligarchy

Oligarchy

I read a lot in the papers these days about inequality.  Thomas Piketty, French Economists wrote and interesting book "Capital in the Twenty-First Century".  Even if you are a capitalists and you throw-up when socialists (like Piketty) attempt to discredit capitalism, the book is in the process of changing the world as we know it.  

The basic argument is that the richer are getting wealthier while everyone else is not only struggling, but going down hill.

We know Dr. Krugman and President Obama have been on the band-wagon to stop the slide to inequality. (Makes good political rhetoric.)   President Obama has sort-of (kind of, maybe) introduced a strategy (if you can find it) to address opportunity (dropping the term income inequality).    

I believe both Piketty and Obama should read Princeton's paper on the fact that the USA has become an Oligarch. http://www.princeton.edu/~mgilens/Gilens%20homepage%20materials/Gilens%20and%20Page/Gilens%20and%20Page%202014-Testing%20Theories%203-7-14.pdf  

If that paper makes sense to you, then any program implemented by the President is hooey, unless we can prove the oligarch wants it (like they did with ObamaCare). 

President Obama:

• "Today, after four years of economic growth, corporate profits and stock prices have rarely been higher, and those at the top have never done better.  But average wages have barely budged.  Inequality has deepened.  Upward mobility has stalled.  The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by – let alone get ahead."
• "the White House just organized a College Opportunity Summit where already, 150 universities, businesses, and nonprofits have made concrete commitments to reduce inequality in access to higher education – and help every hardworking kid go to college and succeed when they get to campus"
• " They believe, and I believe, that here in America, our success should depend not on accident of birth, but the strength of our work ethic and the scope of our dreams.  "
• "  But I will act on my own to slash bureaucracy and streamline the permitting process for key projects, so we can get more construction workers on the job as fast as possible."
• " it’s not enough to train today’s workforce.  We also have to prepare tomorrow’s workforce, by guaranteeing every child access to a world-class education."

You can read into the President's message anything you want.  Basically at that point in January 2014, he was talking about income inequality.  However, with elections coming up, the Democratic Strategists, we are told, that talking to much about income inequality is  NOT a smart strategy.   (Don't you wonder why?  Is it because of the Oligarchy?) 

When addressing the Democratic National Committee recently, the President did not mention income inequality at all. His speech seems to be more about job creation than "Opportunity for All".  Well, it seems that way to me.  He is not discussing a progressive tax code (or major changes to the tax code) such as Thomas Pikketty would suggest.  http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/01/31/fact-sheet-opportunity-all-president-s-call-action-give-long-term-unempl

I pray that the President will be able to move on this ambitious agenda forward without raising taxes.  You really should read Picketty's book, where he wants to implement outrageous taxes on anyone making over $250,000 per year.

As the President states, jobs are important.  They are way beyond important to most of us, because our very survival is based on them. 

Picketty (and others) have a point.  Some people have become very rich.  However, modern inequality is not about that gap between the ultra-rich and everyone else.  The Princeton Report says it well, but the reader needs to think much more deeply about this issue than a one-paragraph summary in that paper.

"Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence."

" The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence. Our results provide substantial support for theories of Economic Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism."

" In the United States, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule -- at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organized interests, they generally lose."

The USA is being ruled by an Oligarch - a power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of organizations, but the USA is not likely controlled by one (or three or five) ultra-rich people.  

Recently,  Alpha magazine came out with a report on the top 25 earners in hedge-funds.  Hedge-fund managers are not entrepreneurs nor are they innovators.  They are speculators.  In behavioral finance, we might say they are good at convincing people who invest in their fund, that the fund managers can anticipate the average opinion about everything.   (Life, the Universe and Everything - Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy) - answer 42. 

At this point conservatives and liberal political leaders might agree (probably not, though)  that there is no evidence to support that the financial elite of this country are providing services commensurate with rewards.  

High Frequency Trading, Investment Banks (TBTF), and hedge-funds are looking more and more like a bad deal for everyone except their super-star manager.  They are a major source of economic instability - even if they do not admit it. 

We , the People are still living in economic crises brought on by an out-of-control financial industry.  We, the People, avoided total catastrophe (and we may still see a catastrophe) by bailing out these folks at the expense of the taxpayer and their future children.  

Of course, the financial industry often (or always) caused financial crises in the history of the USA. Just review (even at the surface level) every depression the USA has entered, and at the heart of it was the banks. The financial crises perpetuated by banks was the reason given to We, the People, for creating the Federal Reserve.  How has that worked out?  Surprise... The leadership from of the Federal Reserve is always (not an exception) surprised by crises; which crises are often (if not always) started by out-of-control financial institutions that the bureaucracy (including the Federal Reserve) is suppose to stop.

President Obama knows that as of May 11, 2014 (and everyone else as well) that we are nowhere close to producing jobs for the millions out of work that are part of the statistics of Labor Participation Rate (rather than unemployment). 

However, do not expect the Democrats to really take on the oligarchy, because the richest people in this country are Democrats. And the Democrats make up the majority of the wealthiest people in Congress and the Senate.  Yet, the Republicans must take responsibility for the top earners (not the ultra rich) who are in the financial industry making so much money at the expense of us all. 

Now, that makes it very difficult for me.  I do not agree with either the Tea Party or the "Occupy Wall Street" people.  I guess what I would like to share; it is time for a new party that ousts Republicans first and Democrats second.  Yet I detest the obfuscation and lying of the most powerful Democrats in Congress and Senate more than Republicans.  Sigh...

And yet if such a party and leader existed, I wonder if any party or leader can change the government bureaucracy created over the years.  No matter who is elected, the bureaucracies  remain.  They are the writers of the rules that govern the country.  They are the executors of the rules.  The most powerful of them are ungovernable - going their own way no matter what.  They have godlike powers in what they perceive their domain of control; while always looking for ways to gain more power.