This seemed to present the picture of inequality in a different light: the group that seemed responsible for the

recession was not the group that seemed to bear the burden of the decline in output. A burden shared can bring a
380 15 • Poverty and Economic Inequality

society closer together. A burden pushed off onto others can polarize it.

On one level, the problem with trying to reduce income inequality comes down to whether you still believe in the

American Dream. If you believe that one day you will have your American Dream—a large income, large house,

happy family, or whatever else you would like to have in life—then you do not necessarily want to prevent anyone

else from living out their dream. You certainly would not want to run the risk that someone would want to take part

of your dream away from you. Thus, there is some reluctance to engage in a redistributive policy to reduce

inequality.
{"creationdate": "2022-12-07T14:15:44-06:00", "source_file": "downloads\\business\\economics\\Microeconomics3e.pdf", "creator": "PDFMiner", "upload_timestamp": "2026-02-07T15:24:38.309401", "uploaded_via": "batch_uploader", "producer": "Prince 14.2 (www.princexml.com)", "moddate": "2022-12-07T14:23:05-06:00", "file_type": ".pdf", "title": "Principles of Microeconomics 3e", "file_name": "Microeconomics3e.pdf", "file_hash": "830b81f41611ac67a490444dbb5d6aed292224606965b06965b914443c93331a", "batch_upload": true, "total_pages": 597, "file_size_mb": 26.99, "source": "downloads\\business\\economics\\Microeconomics3e.pdf"}