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Inequality, tax incidence, and AP survey

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Ellen's replacement of the very long-standing (by several years) housing development image with yet another politically-motivated inequality graph needs to be discussed first. The image is long-standing because it is neutral and cannot be disputed, and this graph does nothing but continue to over-emphasize inequality issues in the country.
• The removal of both graphs in Government finance (including the ITEP one) as a compromise has gone uncontested for weeks. The re-addition of just one of the graphs threatens to stir the pot once again on an issue that had been settled.
• "Four out of five U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives." This has already been described as a frivolous, highly vague statement that is not elaborated on at all, and does not add anything valuable to the other details in the section. Its removal weeks ago was not contested by anyone, except now EllenCT.

In Ellen's 2-3 week-long absence this article has remained relatively stable, and changes made weeks ago had been agreed on or uncontested, and it shows that there are only a couple of users here that catalyze edit disputes and article instability. Cadiomals (talk) 08:22, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Regarding your deletions:

• The housing image is not an image of housing development, just suburban subdivision-style ranch housing which is neither unique to or particularly illustrative of the United States, given that such style of housing exists on every continent except Antarctica, nor illustrative of the section it is in. The article is filled with uninformative photographs. Replacing a photo of suburban housing with an image showing the rise of the top 1% of incomes, as was specifically requested in other comments above, objectively improves the article and the section. There is no evidence that inequality issues are over-emphasized in the article. There is abundant evidence that inequality issues are not given the weight due their importance in economics.
• The Heritage Foundation income tax incidence graph is objectively and mathematically incorrect, and was rightly removed. Even VictorD7 admits that corporate taxes are borne in large part by low income consumers. The ITEP graph is supported by the many sources which correctly attribute corporate tax incidence, even if a few recent think tank sources do not do so correctly. Pretending that there is no objective mathematical truth is the worst kind of abuse of the NPOV policy, tantamount to "he-said-she-said" journalism in the face of obvious factual accuracy of one side and inaccuracy of the other, or the view from nowhere which is rejected by reputable editors with reputations for fact checking and accuracy. I will continue to replace the accurate graph in accordance with the comments about it from the majority of respondents concerning it in the sections above.
• I will not be bullied because I turned my attention to other work for half a month. The AP poll indicating that 80% of Americans must deal with joblessness, low income, or welfare is not reflected in any other statements in the section or the article. There is no evidence that it is either frivolous or vague, and the assertion that it is not elaborated in the source cited is objectively false as anyone reading the source can see. I strongly object to such falsehoods being used to try to bully editors.

The comments above indicate that the article has been losing editors because they are exhausted dealing with an editor who chooses to draw inferences from what he admits are contradictory premises. Who wants to read an encyclopedia by those who know they are harboring falsehoods, but allow their ideology to guide them down mathematically incorrect paths anyway? Not me, and I refuse to turn my back on this article just because one such person willingly edits with an admitted competence deficit. EllenCT (talk) 11:20, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

• When a long-standing image or piece of info is removed and subsequently disputed, it should be discussed first based on WP:BRD. The image is illustrative and follows relevant guidelines and recommendations, and no one has disputed it until now. You think there are a lot of "uninformative photographs" in this article because they are not all conveying the message you want them to.

• If your proposed replacement image is added there will then be two graphs portraying growing economic divides in the country. That is placing too much emphasis and weight to inequality in this summary section and article. And if you add your proposed graph, the graph showing the growing divide between "productivity and median incomes" ought to then be removed. Drilling it into the readers' heads that the US has inequality problems through multiple paragraphs and two graphs is placing undue weight and is a form of soapboxing and advocacy when there are many other aspects of the economy that are only brushed upon. Your argument that it is "crucial to current political debates" has absolutely no relevance in this summary article. Go nuts in Income inequality in the United States.

• I don't know as much about the ITEP tax graph. I just know that both graphs that used to be in the Government finance section were disputed, the section was trimmed and they were both removed as a compromise, and that this change had gone uncontested for weeks despite continued activity and discussion by many editors on the talk page, which also refutes your claim that it was uncontested because editors were driven away. Nevertheless, this will be put to a definitive vote and I of course will respect consensus if many really want it re-added.

• That statement is vague. It's the same as saying 95% of people have had either a headache or breast cancer at some point in their lives, or that 90% of Americans own either a car or an airplane. 80% of Americans deal with joblessness and low-income at some point in their lives? I'm surprised it isn't 95% percent. It is no surprise that most Americans have likely been jobless at some point if they are laid off or look for a new one; that is typical of almost every country. And who hasn't been low-income at some point in early adulthood, when one is still in an internship or entry-level job? Very few readers are going to check the source for clarification. The statement conveys nothing of educational value to the reader, except for furthering the biased tone in the section you wish to convey: that Americans somehow experience undue hardship relative to other countries.

The best way to resolve this of course is to bring in other editors' opinions for the survey below. Cadiomals (talk) 13:31, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

EllenCT just told multiple outright lies. I already corrected her mischaracterization of my views on corporate taxation here (diffs , , , , ) so she has no excuse for invoking my name and repeating that falsehood here. I've always consistently said that corporate tax incidence should be attributed to owners since they're the ones most directly paying them, that they're only borne by others (not just consumers) in the same way all taxes are borne by others, and that we shouldn't cherry-pick a single tax type for political reasons and treat it differently when determining tax incidence. And what "Heritage Foundation income tax incidence graph" is she referring to? The graph was drawn by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation based on Tax Policy Center numbers, not the Heritage Foundation, and she hasn't shown it's "inaccurate" in any way. The Tax Policy Center is far more widely cited and mainstream than ITEP (and its liberal lobbying arm, CTJ), and, as my link to the archived discussion shows, she was unable to answer my basic questions about how her graph even got its numbers, how it attributes corporate incidence (or anything else), or why its internal federal rates are such an outlier compared to the TPC and CBO, both of which corroborate each other and contradict ITEP over time. A single editor bent on soapboxing should not be allowed to destroy this article's fragile stability with loads of massive, undiscussed, contentious edits, or get away with outright lies about other editors and content. We can't let this article be hijacked into becoming a platform for one sided partisan propaganda. Even her flimsy edit summary justifications betray her partisan POV agenda, repeatedly citing things like "material central to recent political debates" or "campaigns". She's a disruptive talking point spammer with no regard for the Talk Page process or encyclopedic quality. VictorD7 (talk) 20:47, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

You have not exactly been helpful in the progress of this article either, Victor, so I would advise you be more mellow this time and also keep your responses more concise. In my opinion your full revert of Ellen's changes as opposed to my partial revert was uncalled for and catalyzes edit wars. Both you and Ellen's insistence on fully getting your way has been a roadblock in achieving a balanced and stable article and frustrating for the majority of editors who are less politically motivated and more willing to compromise. Both of you will need to respect consensus no matter which way it goes. Cadiomals (talk) 22:51, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Actually I'm one of the primary reasons this article has improved over the past year and in particular in recent weeks, and I have a right to correct outright falsehoods, especially when my name is invoked. I didn't fully revert Ellen's changes as I left the one proposal that had been specifically discussed. The other changes are controversial and opposed. I obviously haven't gotten my way on many things, but one difference between me and Ellen is that I respect the Talk Page process and have shown that I'm willing to participate in it. Significant changes should be discussed here before implementation, especially to the politically sensitive sections. A return to mass, unilateral, undiscussed edits will undo everything that's been accomplished in recent weeks, sparking off new waves of continuous counter editing, bloating, and likely edit warring. VictorD7 (talk) 23:51, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Survey

There is currently a dispute (and a discussion above) about whether a few pieces of information are fit to be added to the Government finance and Income, poverty, and wealth sections. Please see the arguments in the thread above and indicate with "support adding" or "oppose adding" as well as your opinion:

Income inequality

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should EllenCT's proposed image to the right be added to Income, poverty, and wealth, replacing the long-standing (by several years) housing development image and alongside a similar image also showing growing economic divides? Or should it be traded out with the other graph while keeping the housing image? What do you think of the emphasis the section currently places on income inequality?

• Oppose adding based on my arguments above. Cadiomals (talk) 13:30, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose, for reasons given. Also the graph is intentionally skewed in appearance by 1% of the pop. which was disproportionately boosted by the bull stock market of much of the period. Ellen's own past inclusion observes that real median income rose over most of that period, but the skewed graph hides the increase by featuring an infinitesimal portion of the country. VictorD7 (talk) 21:41, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support per the ability to reason correctly when contradictions are eliminated. The proposed graph is more informative than the graph proposed above which only shows one variable (proportion of incomes in top 1%) instead of three (the middle 60% and lower 20%) -- who speaks for the lower 20% on Misplaced Pages? EllenCT (talk) 00:03, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Ellen is referring to the "graph proposed above" that was rejected by most respondents, so to be clear this isn't a choice between those two options. VictorD7 (talk) 00:48, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

• Support, per ellen. Pass a Method talk 20:37, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose A graph showing this might be useful, but this graph is not satisfactory. It tries to show three different line with widely varying magnitude on the same linear axis, which means the actual values of the two lower ones cannot be determined. It would probably be better to use a single line for the top 1%, but if all 3 are really wanted a log scale would be needed or separate graphs--these would, though, be less dramatic. DGG ( talk ) 00:15, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Why not have a graph that shows the change in incomes for the population as a whole, rather than choosing certain sections of the population? Its just confusing this way. Rwenonah (talk) 23:55, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

So do you support or oppose adding this particular graph? This is the specific issue right now; we can discuss possible alternative graphs afterwards/separately. Cadiomals (talk) 01:54, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

• OpposePer objections above.Rwenonah (talk) 12:22, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose per above. Graph needs adjusting. →Davey2010→→Talk to me!→ 21:43, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose excessive detail for this specific article. Any arguments on the merits are irrelevant as far as I am concerned. If this information has merit as claimed, it would be perfectly appropriate in a different article (not saying it does, though, I have not evaluated it as such) but it simply is too esoteric for this overview article --Jayron32 18:22, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support The general rule is that more information is better than less, and people looking at Misplaced Pages for information on the United States will most likely use Misplaced Pages as their sole source. The information is relevant and valid so it should be included. Remember: Misplaced Pages seeks to be encyclopedic, and the information is relevant and informative. Damotclese (talk) 19:01, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
• Qualified Support I think the graph could be improved (as has been noted, scale obscures information about the two lower categories), but failing that, there are no disputes about accuracy and it is a good graphical summary of an important issue. I've seen variants of this in blogs that are generally considered right and left of the political spectrum and do not believe graph is POV. As to those who believe too detailed, this summary graphic seems appropriate to overview article. Note: Here from WP:FRS Haven't previously been involved with this article. --Federalist51 (talk) 18:34, 13 December 2013 (UTC)
• Qualified Support As above, it'll always be seen as a "dodgy" graph when the Y Axis is skewed like that. If that issue was fixed, I'd fully support the inclusion of that graph. But until the graph is fixed, I don't support it. --HighKing (talk) 11:36, 16 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose. Aside from rounding errors, any graph showing this kind of data absolutely needs to account for 100% of the people. Because it leaves out 19% of the population, I'm suspecting that someone's begging the question. Bring in a graph showing the average incomes of the bottom 20%, the middle 60%, the upper 19%, and the top 1%, and I'll be much more inclined to support it. I also note that Jayron's got a solid argument about this kind of graph being out of place in such a broad article; Damotclese's argument fails on WP:SS grounds. More is better than less, but we can get to the "too much" point like any other encyclopedia; the only difference is that our virtually unlimited space means that we split extra details out to a more specific article instead of removing them entirely. Nyttend (talk) 01:36, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose The original source (which is specifically a blog estopped by WP:RS) states: Income inequality in the United States has been rising since the 1970s. What is the most effective way to succinctly convey this fact? Here is my choice which rather clarifies that the purpose of the graph is to accentuate the "income inequality" claim. The heading of Kenworthy's blog post is "The politics of helping the poor Politics and rising income inequality" and as a blog post it does not meet WP:RS for any purpose of making a claim -- and a graph is, indeed, a "claim" here. Collect (talk) 01:49, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
• Strong Support Speaking from a social scientist standpoint, income inequality is one of the primary indicators for what is happening in a society - much more so than housing. It should definitely be included. LK (talk) 04:10, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose This looks like it was pulled from a "We are the 99%" pamphlet. What about the top 5%, 10%, top 20%? Why just the bottom 20% and 60%? Why the 1%? This looks like it was created to make a specific point regarding inequality and highlight a distinction to push a POV, which I don't think is appropriate. If we're going to include something, it should try to include a more full range and not cherry pick the figures that make the most shocking graph. Morphh 14:50, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose per RfC comment: I oppose this particular graph. Each of the following flaws would need to be addressed: DGG (needs log scale on y-axis); Collect (source issues); Morphh (choose most relevant deciles, with justification as to why they're relevant). Also, I noticed that the time interval runs from 1979 to 2007. It is now nearly 2014. There IS more current data, from highly reputable sources, that include 2011. I know of one such chart from a recent OECD econometrics publication (October 2013) which is public domain. There are others. There's the issue of relevancy to the U.S.A. as well, in considering inclusion of a chart like this. The Emmanuel Saez charts compare the U.S., Germany, and Japan from 1910 to 2011. I would also suggest that income isn't even the most relevant information to present, but rather, asset holdings. Yearly income varies widely, especially for the very wealthy. Net asset value does not, and a chart with assets on the y-axis instead of income would be more meaningful. It is a trend that is unique to the USA in comparison to many other developed and even some developing nations. We need a good chart here, or nothing at all. Otherwise, our credibility will be diminished or possibly be considered political advocacy, which is entirely unacceptable.--FeralOink (talk) 21:14, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Tax incidence

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should the ITEP tax graph to the right be re-added to the Government finance section or should the section remain without an image?

Oppose adding based on my arguments above. Cadiomals (talk) 13:30, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Oppose, for reasons laid out above. Graph is from a partisan lobbyist and its accuracy is disputed by multiple reliable sources. VictorD7 (talk) 21:41, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Support per Ostry and Berg (2011). EllenCT (talk) 23:20, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

That link doesn't appear to mention the graph (unless I missed it) or be pertinent to this topic. VictorD7 (talk) 00:48, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Can you think of the reason that I think it supports it? EllenCT (talk) 01:03, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

I'd hate to presume. VictorD7 (talk) 01:12, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Your best guess? EllenCT (talk) 16:36, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

• Support per reasoning cited by ellen Pass a Method talk 20:39, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose a graph that tries to lump state & local (which can vary wildly) and federal taxes (a combination of over 100 tax systems) along with mixing different tax bases (income & consumption) is not appropriate. You can't even measure these the same way. Any such graph is filled with tons of assumptions and heavily modeled for tax incidence and considering the source, highly partisan. It's not even clear how they came up with these figures. If you're going to include graphs on taxation, federal taxation should be a different graph than state taxation, and consumption taxation should be separate from income taxation when showing distributional effects in order to make any logical sense out of the graph. Morphh 14:31, 19 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support Oppose until an alternative source is found for the same information. The graph shows an important reality of local and state taxes for education including property taxes and sales taxes, for instance. Nearly a flat tax ideal by income distribution, with breaks in the aggregate for the most disadvantaged? The reality of American economic life-as-taxes is perhaps a conservative ideal? Where's the beef? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:54, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Virginia, where were you when I removed both of the graphs from Gov't finance weeks ago as a way to finally stop the bickering over it? If you really wanted to include this graph, why didn't you raise an objection on the talk page? Cadiomals (talk) 04:39, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

• The beef is it's inaccurate. It was cooked up by a far left lobbyist group and it's internal federal component is massively contradicted by the far more prominent Tax Policy Center (a joint Brookings and Urban Institute project), especially (but not only) for the top 1%, where there's around a 10 point difference. The CBO also tracks closely with the TPC over time, with the federal only top 1% tax rate around 30%, not around 20% (where ITEP has it), from year to year. By contrast the ITEP chart has no corroboration whatsoever, and an opaque methodology we can't examine. The differences aren't a one year fluke, but are consistent over time, as the link in my above post lays out. Doesn't any of that bother you? Shouldn't we hold off on making such a controversial chart the section image in a country summary article? The graph is disputed, unverifiable partisan propaganda. VictorD7 (talk) 19:54, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
• Here's a Tax Foundation piece criticizing the ITEP chart and showing a very different one for total taxation, with a bottom quintile rate of 13% and the entire top quintile (not just the top 1%) averaging 35.6%. VictorD7 (talk) 22:25, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

That "piece" is neither accurate or in agreement with the peer reviewed literature. EllenCT (talk) 04:14, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Hogwash. So far I'm the only one between us actually backing up what I say. Whether you agree with it or not, it's just one more prominent source disputing your chart. VictorD7 (talk) 04:57, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Oppose The CBO and Tax Policy Center are far more mainstream and reliable sources for this kind of information. It's absurd to include such a heavily disputed partisan graph in a country summary.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 22:38, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Indeed, and as a solution and compromise we opted not to add any graphs to that section at all, including the one added by VictorD7. That was fine for everyone, but now EllenCT wants to stir the pot again, insisting we re-add just this one and drawing our attention back to a tired debate that had already been settled. Cadiomals (talk) 01:49, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Your characterization of the issue which has played very if not most prominently in recent election cycles as settled lacks accuracy. Deleting both graphs was obviously not "fine for everyone". EllenCT (talk) 04:16, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

I meant everyone except you, because both graphs were removed three weeks ago and no one said a word about it despite continuous discussion on the talk page, mostly because people wanted to finally move on from that issue and the bickering over those graphs that had been occurring weeks prior. As such, the issue of including those graphs was settled, and it showed that you were really the only one insistent on advancing your political agenda. I couldn't care less about your babble regarding "election cycles". Cadiomals (talk) 04:39, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Settled it may be, but the editor opening this string sought multiple editor input regarding adding information to the encyclopedia. Could someone repost Victor's chart? (Is there really a question as to whether corporations are people too? I thought I was the only one in the country who disagreed with the Supreme Court at Citizens United.)

It seems to me that Ellen might agree to Victor's chart now for the sake of presenting something on total effective tax rates, as the information conveyed is a relatively flat tax rate compared to national income tax, and that is informative to the general international reader unfamiliar with how federal regimes tax their populations in actuality. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:48, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Are you referring to the Heritage Foundation's chart which doesn't apportion corporate taxes to consumers? Are you aware of how few sources agree with that? Victor frequently cites all three. Meanwhile in reality.... EllenCT (talk) 16:35, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't know, does it show a relatively flat tax for total effective tax? If so it is of much the same utility to the general international reader, the difference in sources is a wash. ITEP, Heritage, CBO and Tax Policy Center were alternate sources mentioned above. To date in this string, I only see ITEP which generally corresponds to my earlier study, a relatively flat tax for total effective tax in the U.S. -- which is why I support ITEP until another source can be agreed to... which Cadiomals informs me cannot be done... for now ?? Might you allow something from CBO or Tax Policy Center, are their charts readily available at commons? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 18:20, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

There is no "Heritage Foundation" chart. Ellen's confused (or lying again) and apparently referring to this PGPF chart of TPC numbers for federal tax rates. Note how its top 1% rate is a few points higher than ITEP's purported total rate. There are no good overall tax incidence charts, because it's notoriously difficult to study local/state taxes with precision. The only one I know of is the ITEP chart, but we know that's problematic because its internal federal component is contradicted so dramatically by the CBO and TPC, the two most prominent and widely cited outfits that do tax incidence. It was also lambasted by the Tax Foundation, which actually produced its own using TPC federal and ITEP state/local numbers, not that ITEP's state/local figures are necessarily credible either. It would be better to have no chart than to post misinformation cooked up by a partisan lobbyist. The relative flattening you mention (still nowhere near a flat tax) is already described in the text, which is a perfectly fair way to handle it. This also isn't about corporate taxation. That's a dishonest smokescreen tossed out by Ellen as a diversion. She has no idea how ITEP even attributes corporate taxes. Unlike the CBO and TPC, they don't provide component breakdowns and their methodology is opaque. Their chart says they count it, but even if they attributed zero to the top 1%, which would be ludicrous and would contradict a statement I found and posted by their spokesman, it still wouldn't account for the discrepancy. BTW, while Ellen's link has absolutely nothing to do with this topic, I have to say I'm shocked, shocked I tell you that liberals' predictions scored better in a cycle where Democrats won. It's a shame the "study" only looked at one election, and didn't examine if conservatives' predictions were better in a year Republicans won. VictorD7 (talk) 18:52, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

The U.S. tax regime is highly regressive unless one takes into account federal and state and local taxes. That is the best picture of the actual effect on the individual. This is mostly attributed to local property taxes for education funding education, not national or state funding sources, leading to wild inconsistencies of funding levels from place to place and over time for any one place.

Here is something from an VictorD7 sourced as generally unbiased, Wall Street Journal's the Tax Policy Center. It shows effective payroll tax rate in a manner which I find consistent with prior study. But for the first quintile progressive feature, the curve fitted to the bar graph is generally flat until the regressive tax structure for the richest incomes.

The effective tax rate including state and local taxes is more like a flat tax. Do we have an alternative to the ITEP chart which shows the federal, state and local together in a federal system? I believe that would be instructive for the general international reader living in a centralized form of government. --- and lacking an alternative to the ITEP graph for now, we should use it because it does not show the statistical inequity that federal income taxes alone would in error. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 12:03, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I just posted an alternative by the Tax Foundation above that gives a radically different total overall breakdown. ITEP has zero corroboration and its internals are disputed by the TPC, CBO, and Tax Foundation. Misleading people with misinformation is not in Misplaced Pages's interest. TVH wants to use a hotly disputed, extremely partisan chart.....just because? We aren't obligated to have any image. If you don't want an alternative, then we don't have to add one. No one's seriously proposing a different image. And to my knowledge the TPC (which I never said is unbiased, it leans left but is the most prominent tax incidence outfit and produces reliable data) has nothing to do with the WSJ. Perhaps TVH is confused. I'm not sure what the point of the payroll tax chart is (the TPC chart he apparently objects to already showed the federal breakdown by component, including payroll), but in terms of international comparison (if that's what he was getting at) the US is more progressive than Europe in every tax type. I encourage TVH and anyone else here to actually read the sources posted. VictorD7 (talk) 22:06, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Lol; the reason VictorD7 uses the Tax Foundation source is because he can't find a real source supporting his argument (don't take my word for it, just ask him). More nonsense from a hardcore right winger. -- Somedifferentstuff (talk) 22:17, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

LOL! I've just irrefutably made my case on every point using sources that include the Tax Policy Center, the CBO, the Tax Foundation, and even ITEP. And that lame, substanceless reply is all the hard core left winger Somedifferentstuff can muster. Telling. VictorD7 (talk) 22:38, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, you've provided ZERO SOURCES other than TF. -- Have you applied for a job with the Koch Brothers yet??? -- Ahhhhhhhhhhh, the boy with the broken mirror. ---- Somedifferentstuff (talk) 23:07, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

^Ad hominem drivel. I've posted sources all over this section and page. Stop trying to disrupt the discussion process. VictorD7 (talk) 23:13, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Your reply is, "I WILL PROVIDE NO SOURCES HERE!". Brilliant right-wing garbage. -- Somedifferentstuff (talk) 23:27, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I suppose until Somedifferentstuff is condemned by other editors and/or banned for trollish disruption, I can repost sourced evidence every time he repeats his lie.

Effective Federal Tax Rate for the Top 1% in 2011

TPC - 30.4%

ITEP - 21.1%

No reason his presence should be a complete waste of time. VictorD7 (talk) 00:12, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

But Victor, I like the linked chart, it shows increases in property tax which is my point, and the steeply regressive corporate tax which is Stuff's point. Two problems. First, it does not aggregate the changes by income segment, second and more importantly, you have not downloaded it into the Wikicommons for our use in this article. Is there not a blanket release for online publication with attribution?

My point is that taxes are effectively flat when incomes are arrayed low to high on an x-axis, not 45-degrees slope positive (progressive), not 45-degree slope negative (regressive). Most local schools are mostly funded by local corporate taxes, regardless of the effective income tax on them, so the aggregate taxes of federal, state and local show a nearly flat tax in aggregate, not the regressive outrage if income taxes were taken alone, and the ITEP chart shows that overall effect, regardless of the corporate tax detail variances that you have successfully pointed out. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 10:08, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Not sure which "linked chart" you're referring to, but maybe you missed when I checkmated Ellen. Her own graph source calls corporate taxes "very progressive" and attributes them to shareholders, completely refuting what she'd been claiming (guessing). No meaningful variation in corporate incidence has been shown, much less by me. ITEP's huge discrepancy with multiple reliable sources remains unexplained. Stuff doesn't see corporate taxes as regressive (and he had no point; he was trolling). I'm not sure where you got that idea. I haven't seen a chart showing property taxes, but income taxes are progressive (not "regressive"), and you keep making unsourced claims. Yes, there's flattening effect when total taxes are considered, but it's nowhere near as much as ITEP shows (side point - even they call overall taxation "progressive", not "flat"; doesn't have to be a 45 deg. slope). ITEP's 2011 top 1% rate was 21.1% federal + 7.9% state/local = 29% shown in graph. If the federal component is off by around 10 points, then so is the overall number. ITEP's openly stated purpose is to agitate for higher taxes on "the rich". If casual, uninformed readers see that chart, showing the top 1% paying a lower rate than the preceding percentiles, then they'll likely think "Yeah! We should raise taxes on the rich!" However, a more reliable chart properly showing the top 1% paying the highest rate wouldn't have that impact. It was 30.4% federal in 2011 (per TPC), a few points higher now, and in the ballpark of 40% if state/local taxes are added. ITEP's chart isn't harmless misinformation we can tolerate to illustrate a broad principle. That's a meaningful difference.

If you're saying you like the Tax Foundation chart combining TPC federal rates with ITEP state/local ones, then you're free to try to add it to the commons. Wiki rules forced me to go through a lengthy process to get the PGPF chart added, though PGPF itself was great and instantly granted permission. I'm sure the Tax Foundation would too, if permission is even required. I haven't explored their copyright situation recently. My only concern would be relying on ITEP's state/local data, which, while not explicitly contradicted, is uncorroborated and may be as wrong as their federal data. But it wouldn't hurt to add the graph to the commons so it's available during future discussions. VictorD7 (talk)

• Oppose excessive detail for this specific article. Any arguments on the merits are irrelevant as far as I am concerned. If this information has merit as claimed, it would be perfectly appropriate in a different article (not saying it does, though, I have not evaluated it as such) but it simply is too esoteric for this overview article --Jayron32 18:25, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support The general rule is that more information is better than less, and people looking at Misplaced Pages for information on the United States will most likely use Misplaced Pages as their sole source. The information is relevant and valid so it should be included. Remember: Misplaced Pages seeks to be encyclopedic, and the information is relevant and informative. Damotclese (talk) 19:02, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose adding Too detailed for this overview article. Including it gives undue weight to a graphic which, at the least, is open to challenge as being POV. Note: Here from WP:FRS Haven't previously been involved with this article. --Federalist51 (talk) 18:39, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

@VictorD7. When y-axis numbers are close together, the curve of the x-axis is flat. A curve through the ITEP top shows progressive but flattening across the first 80% under $68,700, @ 17, 21, 25, 28. The curve kinks at the top 40% over $68,700 becoming relatively flat, @ 28, 29, 30, 30, 29, because 28, 29 and 30 are close together (reported increments at truncated percentages).

That is, effective income rate is pretty flat overall across federal and state and local taxes, because regressive state sales taxes on the poor and regressive local property taxes on the rich counter both federal and state progressive income tax effects. And the general international reader will not be made aware of that phenomenon in a federal republic such as the U.S. without a chart of net tax incidence including federal, state and local taxes.

The ITEP chart including federal, state and local taxes is more nearly comprehensive than federal income tax charts alone which show huge regression in the top 20% tax levels in the case of your TCP income tax incidence chart, -- which I believe is misleading as a single source of taxation information in the U.S. for the summary article. Did you find an alternative to the ITEP chart to post here? If so, would you be so kind to do so for the sake of the discussion? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 03:53, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I guess you missed all the stuff about ITEP's accuracy being dramatically disputed by multiple sources. If you don't understand at this point that the contradiction is in the internals, so it doesn't matter that the TPC and CBO are federal only (it's still apples to apples with the ITEP federal component), then I don't know how else to walk you through it. I even linked to an alternative overall taxation chart by the Tax Foundation after you made the same request earlier that clearly illustrated these concepts by combining ITEP state/local numbers with TPC federal numbers, showing a very different slope, and explicitly criticizing ITEP's methodology. The text already discusses the more regressive nature of state/local taxes, which change neither the fact that overall US taxation is progressive (per even the ITEP outlier's wording) or that it's more progressive than European systems (the difference is even starker when heavily regressive European consumption taxes are compared with US sales taxes). The findings are robust enough that precision isn't necessary to make the general observation. The section currently has no chart, so there's no danger of readers being misled by one either way. We shouldn't add a hotly disputed, partisan chart just for the sake of having a chart. VictorD7 (talk) 19:45, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

I noticed that ITEP is used as a source in the combined federal, state and local tax incidence for the link you gave me. Okay, agreed to no chart at this time. Simpler is better in the summary article. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:52, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't like incidence graphs that try to combine sales taxes and income taxes, because sales taxes are often misrepresented as being overly regressive (which is what is happening here). Partisan sources often consider savings as untaxed income as they try to measure for a single year, instead of tax deferred (they'll spend it during retirement, in a couple years when a child goes to college, or donate it). They distort the definition of measuring incidence by calculating the tax on something other than its tax base - mathematically invalid. As if any money saved is instantly tax free forever, making any measure of that tax burden completely false. Another one, are commercial property taxes born by the property owner, the renter / consumer, or split? Then you got the fact that your combining 50 different tax structures (some that have no income tax, some that have no sales tax, different corporate tax rates) with different exemptions on each into a single graph. It would certainly be nice to have a single graph that just "summed it up" but any such attempt will include lots of assumptions and manipulation - difficult to do fairly. Morphh 14:14, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

AP survey

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Ref.: Yen, Hope (28 July 2013). 80 Percent Of U.S. Adults Face Near-Poverty, Unemployment: Survey. Associated Press and Huffington Post Retrieved July 28, 2013. EllenCT (talk) 00:07, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Should the statement "Four out of five U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives" be added to the Income, poverty, and wealth section? Is it adequately precise or too vague of a statement?

• Oppose adding based on my arguments above. Cadiomals (talk) 13:30, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose as a hopelessly vague and pointless lumping together of categories that's solely designed for emotive impact and mood setting. VictorD7 (talk) 21:41, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support per the original Associated Press sources. EllenCT (talk) 00:07, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
• Support. Pass a Method talk 20:39, 2 December 2013 (UTC)
• Oppose until a scholarly source is found to put the information into a larger context...good argument for a safety-net society, though. And the U.S. practice obviously more nearly approaches the European welfare state model than many suspect, even in the midst of a fierce national cult of individualism and reliance on family first. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:03, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

How do you feel about "While racial and ethnic minorities are more likely to live in poverty, race disparities in the poverty rate have narrowed substantially since the 1970s, census data show. Economic insecurity among whites also is more pervasive than is shown in the government's poverty data, engulfing more than 76 percent of white adults by the time they turn 60, according to a new economic gauge being published next year by the Oxford University Press" then? EllenCT (talk) 03:56, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

There will be no more non-summary details added to those sections, that's it; Income, poverty, and wealth is at its peak in terms of detail. If it isn't already there you can add such information to articles like Income inequality in the United States, Poverty in the United States or even Race in the United States. But it has no place here. And if all you're going to say is that such details are "crucial" and "central to debates in election cycles" don't even bother responding. Cadiomals (talk) 04:13, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

• Support; if the source backs up the material I find it to be relevant. -- Somedifferentstuff (talk) 18:26, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

The following is copy-pasted from my response to Ellen so you don't have to look for it, as to why this piece of information is useless:

"That statement is vague. It's the same as saying 95% of people have had either a headache or breast cancer at some point in their lives, or that 90% of Americans own either a car or an airplane. 80% of Americans deal with joblessness and low-income at some point in their lives? I'm surprised it isn't 95% percent. It is no surprise that most Americans have likely been jobless at some point if they are laid off or look for a new one; that is typical of almost every country. And who hasn't been low-income at some point in early adulthood, when one is still in an internship or entry-level job? Very few readers are going to check the source for clarification. The statement conveys nothing of educational value to the reader, except for furthering the biased tone in the section you wish to convey: that Americans somehow experience undue hardship relative to other countries."

This statement does not express any truly relevant facts. Cadiomals (talk) 04:06, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

The facts are relevant because they prove governmental assistance is not universally and permanently disabling as opponents sometimes argue. We just need a scholarly source in context of the fact that assistance is overwhelmingly of short duration. The outlier long duration "culture of dependency", the problematic 15%, can often be addressed with literacy education and trade education as has been found effective in various state programs. Scholarly context is what is required for the WP article. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 12:53, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

I just have a problem with the way the statement is worded. Saying that 80% of Americans have either been reliant on welfare or unemployed at some point in their lives is like saying 80% of Americans have either had breast cancer or the common cold at some point in their lives. Can't you see how useless such a statement would be? A scholarly source could provide less vague and more specific information as opposed to sensationalist news reports. Cadiomals (talk) 13:01, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose excessive detail for this specific article. Any arguments on the merits are irrelevant as far as I am concerned. If this information has merit as claimed, it would be perfectly appropriate in a different article (not saying it does, though, I have not evaluated it as such) but it simply is too esoteric for this overview article --Jayron32 18:26, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
• Comment. The direct quotation is almost certainly political propaganda. Lies, damned lies, and Mark Twain. 99% of adult americans at some point in their lives have murdered their spouses with an assault rifle, stolen from their neighbors with a sawed-off shotgun, or watched television on which the gun debate sometimes comes up -- ban guns today! 99% of americans, at some point in their lives, have been unemployed for nine consecutive months -- counting newborns! 99% of americans believe the moon landing was a hoax, or the twin towers were a federal plot, or that someone who borrows a writing utensil from them may never return it to them -- you just don't realize how deep the conspiracy goes!

  This POV-pushing *in* the sources themselves is inherently a problem, of course; Reliable Sources are *not* required to be NPOV, themselves. So the question is, since wikipedia *is* required to be — or at least strive to be — neutral, is there a way to make use of the HuffPo data, which is illuminating for the readership, without pushing the HuffPo POV on the readership? In other words, does the "relative to other countries" additional data exist that Cadiomals mentioned? If so, then maybe a relative-to-other-countries-chart would be useful, especially if we have historical data, showing the trend over time. Maybe 80% is good compared to other countries. Maybe the triplet-category is a new-fangled yet highly-explanatory statistical mechanism invented by some brilliant sociology PhD, and HuffPo is just reporting one portion of the research team's groundbreaking new results.

  But I suspect that no such datasets for other countries, let alone historical, exist... and if so, that itself indicates the x-or-y-or-z nature of the cobbled-together summary was intended to advance an agenda. Now, even if the the quote itself is still worthy of being included in wikipedia somewheres... perhaps Ariana Huffington#Political Positions? 74.192.84.101 (talk) 16:19, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose adding Host of reasons this doesn't belong in this article. Tone is not encyclopedic. Lumps together a number of different facts in a way that ends up being POV and, without elaboration, isn't very informative. To explain in detail would not be appropriate for this overview article. Note: Here from WP:FRS Haven't previously been involved with this article. Federalist51 (talk) 18:59, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Corporate tax incidence text

Discussion

We should wait at least a couple of days at least until several opinions pile-up before deciding whether or not to add the specific pieces of information, and there ought to be an over two-thirds majority. Any consensus gathered should be and will be respected. Cadiomals (talk) 13:24, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Why not a week? EllenCT (talk) 23:20, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

Well, I said at least a couple of days so a week is fine.

Thank you. EllenCT (talk) 00:07, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Consensus is mixed at best, so let's accept Legobot's month. 180.158.95.3 (talk) 06:43, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I have submitted a request for full page protection of the article for a few days until this issue is resolved in a civil manner to prevent further edit warring. Cadiomals (talk) 00:55, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't consider accusations of edit warring civil. I am happy to wait a week, as long as other editors understand that you tried to revert more than you included in your RFC. EllenCT (talk) 01:08, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

"Accusations" of edit-warring when there have been several reverts over the past 24 hours, including ones made by you? The concept of an RFC for consensus also seems to have completely gone past your head as you still chose to restore your changes anyway. That's not how it works. Keep in mind that you are the one who sparked all this by making many sudden changes after two weeks of article stability, and the article's edit history testifies to this, so there can be no disputing that fact. I will admit I inadvertently reverted more than I intended and VictorD7 was of no help, but SomeDifferentStuff's restoration should more than suffice for now. No more changes ought to be made to the article until we have several other users contributing their opinion on the above issues, it's as simple as that. Have some patience, and if others agree with you, it will manifest itself here. Cadiomals (talk) 01:13, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

No significant, undiscussed changes should have been allowed. The remaining ones have lowered article quality and consensus should have been sought for them one at a time. Flooding the page with multiple simultaneous edits renders meaningful Talk Page discussion difficult at best and tends to dissuade most observers from participating. VictorD7 (talk) 01:52, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

• Query.

on income-inequality. The housing image should stay and a graph should be displayed, --- as is allotted to other sections. Can the "Dual image" convention be used to pair both graphs side by side -- right justified iaw WP:ACCESS for visually impaired? The general reader will know to click on the image to enlarge it were they concerned to read each graph in greater detail than the format allows, supporting narrative provides the context. The two graphs together show two distinct aspects of the same reality, and the two graphs together I would support. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:39, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

At this point it would be a lot of images to cram into that significantly shortened section. If the two graphs were to be placed side by side, both would have to be small enough not to squeeze the text next to it, basically forcing the reader to click the image to clearly see it. Another problem is that the 1% graph is significantly taller than the median income graph. I believe we should keep the housing image and choose one of the two graphs; any more seems like cramming too much into one section. And don't you think illustrating the same phenomena with two images is redundant? Cadiomals (talk) 10:41, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

They do not illustrate the same phenomenon, although they are related. Which is more than one can say for the photograph of a ranch house subdivision and anything unique to the U.S. EllenCT (talk) 11:09, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I took the liberty of making a trial run of the two images above. I am surprised at how poor the resolution is, but I thought it was worth a try. Other editor reaction? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 20:34, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I like it, but I would prefer the data plotted on the same x-axis with different y-axes. What program can produce .svg charts directly? EllenCT (talk) 01:36, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

I wish there was some way to combine this one. EllenCT (talk) 21:15, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

• RfC comment Don't know about how good the graphs are, but I can say the tract house picture is so bland and uninformative that one might as well link to a random picture. victor falk 10:49, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Is that not the point, the blandness of a majority of the population which is in suburbia tract housing, large square footage for the common man, better constructed than Latin American shanty towns, but nevertheless built with balloon framing, plywood and drywall instead of better European materials of stone, lathe and plaster, --- roofs that last only 20 years, not the 200 years of thatch or slate? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:36, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

You might think it's bland but it isn't uninformative because it is a fairly good representation of how the majority of suburban middle-class Americans live and a portrayal of the average standard of living in the country. The sprawling, uniform suburban style shown here is also fairly unique to Northern America, as Europe is more densely packed. More important than this though is that it is a long standing image that not everyone agrees on removing, and that Ellen had planned on replacing with yet another redundant graph which gives undue weight to representing inequality. The dual graph above might be more tolerable. Cadiomals (talk) 12:07, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Why do you say that inequality is over-weighted in the article, given ? EllenCT (talk) 05:13, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

As it currently is, I think inequality has just enough weight in the article and in this section in particular. You were planning on replacing a long-standing photo with yet another graph, which some obviously did not agree with. Like I said, the dual image above might be a compromise, though many still disagree with how the info in the 1% graph is presented. Also, the article you linked to, while interesting and informative, ultimately has no relevance when determining what is sufficient for a summary article which is meant to have a limit on details. I don't know how many more times you have to be reminded this article is not and will never be your soapbox. Cadiomals (talk) 07:24, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

There is a way that all three graphs can be combined, because the categories are shared along with the y-axes. There is no support for trying to trick people in to believing that taxes are more progressive than they are or that the top 1% of income earners have gained less than they have. Elucidating those points in the face of an active effort to obscure them is hardly soapboxing. And it's right to show how the difference is offset by incomes failing to keep pace with productivity. Why aren't you going after the source of inaccuracy instead of the people who want to improve the article? EllenCT (talk) 15:08, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict) This picture does not represent the characteristics of sprawling American suburbia particularly well. At first glance, it could be from anywhere in the western world. Also, the habitat of a particular segment of the population is not illustrative of "Income, poverty, and wealth" in the US in general. victor falk 05:33, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Housing is an indicator of income, poverty and wealth. The image is typical of where a majority of the population resides in every region of the country in the U.S. And while there may be such places somewhere else in the western world such as France or Belgium, I did not see any such places in my brief visits there observing by plane, train, bus or taxi. Is it true that a majority of French now live in tract housing in suburban Paris, Cherbourg and Marseille, or is tract housing in fact distinctively American for a majority in every region only in the U.S. in their millions? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:13, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Agreed on all points; this image is an accurate indicator of the general standard of living of the majority of the population and fairly unique to North America, though the bottom line remains that it is long standing by years and there are people against its removal. No one ever argued over it until Ellen proposed its replacement with an even more contentious image. If people really thought it was a useless image I imagine it would have been replaced long ago. Cadiomals (talk) 11:53, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

"It's been there for years" sounds like a rather weak argument. If people can't agree upon an image of certain minimum quality, then there should be no image. And saying "it would have been replaced long ago", after first saying "it can't be replaced for it's been there for so long" strikes as a... rather circular argument. victor falk 12:09, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Insert @ victor falk. Okay, the image of tract housing in suburbia is uniquely typical of where a majority of the population live for the U.S. as a whole and for a majority within every region of the U.S., -- it is typical in a way distributed in the millions, which is found in few other countries, though perhaps some provinces of Canada? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 13:01, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

The arguments for why the image is effective and ought to stay (beyond just being long standing) are already here, so don't just ignore them. And an image that is long-standing in a highly visible article that is always evolving could be interpreted as implicit approval of its value to the article. Ellen has been the only one raising hell about issues that have already been settled. We should actually be sticking to the subject of whether the image she wants to replace it with is agreed on, and so far it doesn't have widespread approval. Cadiomals (talk) 12:53, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

I still object to the graph on the right, since its use of data for only parts of the American population is both confusing and seems to be clearly trying to present a POV.Rwenonah (talk) 17:16, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

I like the housing picture but object to both the above charts as inappropriate POV and shoddy construction in the income breakdown case. The current graph erroneously implies that income should necessarily correlate precisely with productivity (apples and oranges), cherry-picks a potentially aberrational starting place where this is depicted as having been the case for a few years, and makes no mention of the impact of technological progress or globalization, the obvious factors likely driving the recent divergence if it in fact exists (I haven't seen anyone verify EPI's claims). It's based on a single section sentence that was only added ex post facto as a flimsy excuse for adding the graph by an editor who had spent weeks trying to add the graph first back when the section didn't even mention the word "productivity". As bad as that is, the new proposed income breakdown chart is even worse for reasons I and others have already laid out. Adding both of them would be abysmal. Both graphs are essentially niche, political talking points. Why not something more neutral, like showing a breakdown of income by age over the course of an average individual American's life? Not that the SUBsection needs more than a single image anyway. Of course amid all the "inequality" increase talk, there's currently no mention of the nation's changing labor force demographics, due to things like the influx of millions of low skilled illegal immigrants in recent decades or women entering the work force in huge numbers from the 1980s onward. The historical comparison omits the fact that the top 1%'s share was at its record low point in the 1970s it chose to start its comparison in, that said share is largely driven by the stock market, and that the top 1%'s share more often than not increases during economic growth periods while sharply declining during economic downturns, raising questions about its significance. VictorD7 (talk) 00:38, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I support both graphs. The 1% material carries significant weight as the 1% has been widely reported on and the "Productivity and Real Median Family Income Growth" is significant in terms of economics as it shows a pronounced divergence beginning around 1979. In other words, as an example according to the graph, if a family built 2 bicycles a week and was paid $50 in 1979, they built 6 bicycles a week in 2011 and made only a little more income. Have a look at the graph. This is highly relevant in terms of economics and has been studied. The tract housing photo isn't real interesting but many Americans live in this type of housing so I don't have a significant objection to it. -- Somedifferentstuff (talk) 19:13, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

You're assuming the same "family" was making bikes in 1979 and 2011, and at roughly the same income level, ignoring that the individuals making up each quintile have changed over the years, as has the manufacturing process. If the process is more mechanized now, then one would expect greater productivity with labor being cheaper per unit, greatly benefiting consumers. There's no reason to assume income and productivity would or should necessarily mirror each other indefinitely. VictorD7 (talk) 22:26, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

• This entire discussion misses the forest for the trees here. This article is meant to be an overview article on the country in question, and ALL of these items represents a level of detail which is not normally expected in an overview article such as this. No one is arguing per se that Misplaced Pages shouldn't cover these topics at all, just that this article may not be the appropriate place for them. By putting such detail into this article, it throws off the balance by presenting far too much detail in an article of this type. It's WP:UNDUE purely because this specific article can't be long enough to present a complete picture of these highly detailed subtopics, so by presenting single surveys, or studies or whatever in this article, it puts the perspective of THOSE specific surveys into too much prominence. Those surveys can be covered in more appropriate detail in other articles at Misplaced Pages. They just don't belong here. --Jayron32 04:27, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Teen declines in reading, math and science

PISA scores released today are very disappointing. U.S. 15 year-olds dropped from 25th to 31st internationally in math, 20th to 24th in science, and 11th to 21st in reading since 2009. How should the article reflect this? EllenCT (talk) 10:53, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Why should it? We have subsidiary articles for minutiae like this. I'm not aware (I could be wrong) of any other country article that touts how smart or dumb its students are. We don't need to include every possible thing about the U.S. in this. --Golbez (talk) 13:35, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't think it's minutiae, I think it's central to the future economic and social viability of the nation. EllenCT (talk) 14:10, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

At the absolute most, I suppose the article could note the rankings as they are, and not make any note of the shift. That's how you could do it - simply say "According to one study, students in the U.S. rank 31st in math etc etc". No further commentary is needed unless it can be conclusively tied to a particular policy. --Golbez (talk) 16:27, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Hard to gauge comparisons. Many nations split student populations to study Algebra at age 14, tracking college bound for Algebra classes, and dropping those destined for trade school, whereas many U.S. states require Algebra for an unmodified high school diploma for all students, regardless of academic potential. Poor states are included in U.S. statistics, poor Chinese provinces in the west and north are not formally included in official "national" tallies. U.S. engineers used to score lower than British right out of college, then higher five years later because of the continuing education from an "education for life" work ethic to stay current in their field. I'd like to see something of academic scholarship in a controlled study, rather than merely reposting AP headlines. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 19:59, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

After the sentence in the Education section "The US spends more on education per student than any nation in the world" we could add "Despite this, American students tend to lag behind other OECD countries on international measures of mathematics, science and reading proficiency" and attach the sources. That is the absolute most I would be willing to support in mentioning this. International comparisons of educational achievements are already debatable topics, as TheVirginiaHistorian articulated. Cadiomals (talk) 01:43, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

Here is a link to the report. I think we should mention how U.S. students rank internationally. However, I think that any commentary should be left to other articles. This is not a new story btw. Educational achievement in other countries has been improving since WW2 to the extent that they are catching up with or exceeding the U.S. TFD (talk) 20:23, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

I agree with the replies above and ask that the recommended edit be made. EllenCT (talk) 10:13, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

The template asks for a complete and specific description. Please state the specific phrase you want added to the article. --Golbez (talk) 13:14, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Not done for now: Agreed - we need the exact text you want included, complete with references, and the exact text you want it replaced with. Please reactivate the {{edit protected}} template when you have an agreement on the exact wording to be used. Best — Mr. Stradivarius 01:13, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Golbez, why do you think the change in ranking is less noteworthy than the absolute rank? The absolute rank will change over time, but the drop from 11th to 21st in reading among OECD countries from 2009 to 2013 will remain true without needing to be updated to maintain accuracy. EllenCT (talk) 05:05, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Because it says nothing as to whether or not it was because the U.S. got worse, or the rest of the world simply got better. --Golbez (talk) 05:11, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Fair enough. Which facts from do you think are most appropriate to include? EllenCT (talk) 05:15, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

And to add to my previous comment, it also doesn't include the degree. Let's say the U.S. dropped ten spots, but the distance between the top and bottom of those ten spots was smaller than the distance to the next spot down. In other words, a very tiny improvement could cause a massive change in ranking. I'm not saying that's the case here; I'm saying, it's a potential interpretation without all the data, and we aren't going to give all the data here. --Golbez (talk) 05:20, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

"Which facts ... do you think are most appropriate to include?" – Read my response above. That is the absolute most I think is appropriate to add to the Education section. Also read Virginia's response. We cannot go too deeply into a single set of data by a single organization, especially since there are factors involved that make it debatable. Cadiomals (talk) 07:07, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

I think we should state the basic facts. "According to ............. in 2012, U.S. 15 year-olds ranked 31st in math, 24th in science, etc. Somedifferentstuff (talk) 02:39, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Why mention just one stat from one organization when there are other organizations with similar stats? If we made a more general statement it could better encompass a broader range of sources. Besides, the stats the OECD came up with are already debatable given that methods, selection, and education systems vary amongst different countries. For example, the educational achievement in Shanghai is not representative of China as a whole, especially its less developed provinces which are not tested. Meanwhile, the US tests all students and gives free secondary education to all, while many countries require you be accepted to such schools. A more general statement could potentially allow us to provide more sources. Cadiomals (talk) 12:44, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Proposal

I propose including the U.S. results as both relative and absolute scores, in that order, and also noting the changes in public school class sizes over the past several decades. Perhaps with a graph. EllenCT (talk) 01:24, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

1-2 sentences max on US international education rankings? Sure why not. I had already expressed my agreement with that. Noting changes in public school class sizes? A random detail with zero relevance to this article. Perhaps with a graph? Not enough room. Cadiomals (talk) 09:22, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

And let's get the proposal wording here first for feedback before you actually add it to the article. VictorD7 (talk) 09:55, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

It's time to call these issues settled and move on

On the three issues that have been discussed over this past week, these are the conclusions that have been drawn based on looking at the votes and arguments in the surveys:

• The line graph displaying income growth for the 1% has majority disapproval, so it will not be added. Anyone could add it to Income inequality in the United States if they want as it is more directly relevant there. Otherwise, it is not of utmost importance to this article, as salient summary information regarding growing inequality is already covered in several sentences in the Income, poverty and wealth section, along with a graph showing the growing divide between productivity and income. If someone wants to instead replace the productivity/income graph with the 1% graph, that's another discussion; otherwise the section has reached its peak in terms of appropriate detail and no more images should be crammed in there.

• The statement "Four out of five U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives" has majority disapproval and will not be re-added. Also, no one supporting it has actually provided a rationale for why the statement is of critical importance, neither has anyone refuted opposing claims that it is frivolous, vague, and poorly worded, especially in a section that already dedicates most of its information to issues of unemployment, poverty, and inequality. As User:TheVirginiaHistorian said, until more scholarly sources with specific, clarifying data can be found, this statement is of little educational value to the reader other than trying to get a biased point across.

• The taxation graph is more of a draw, but if we can't all agree on an accurate and non-controversial graph, why add one at all? How big of an impact will this really have if it is left out? May I remind you all that for three weeks before Ellen returned, no one complained about the graph's removal. The fact of the matter is almost no one visits this specific article to get detailed information on how taxation works in the country. If they were looking for just that info they would either do a Google search or visit Taxation in the United States. Speaking of which, anyone who wants to is free to add the graph to that article. The graph really shouldn't be added here as long as we can't all agree on it.

In conclusion, it's high time for us to call these issues settled and move on to other, preferably non-political, issues so the article can gradually improve instead of being in a constant deadlock. Maybe then this article will have a chance to become Good again. We should not allow certain people to keep us in the same rut, as it is counter-productive; neither should any editors selfishly turn to childish methods of edit-warring and creating deadlock to try and get their way. Unfortunately I don't expect certain people (...) to just be mature, concede, and move on; and it would be a huge shame if this article is constantly being locked, as there are many innocent editors who actually want to make constructive, non-politically motivated contributions to it. Anyone who tries to add this information without/despite consensus and cause another edit war is only being selfish and immature. Cadiomals (talk) 05:26, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

I would like the opportunity to produce a combined graph in line with what TheVirginiaHistorian has proposed before there is a "final" decision on whether the information should be included in general. Furthermore, since this is a wiki, I will take as much time as I like to try to make one, whether that be three days, three weeks, three months, or three years. Silence is not consent. EllenCT (talk) 07:46, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

The taxation-graph is important data, methinks. I have often wanted to know whether overall the USA has a regressive tax per Ellen, a progressive tax per Victor, or effectively a flat tax per VirginiaHistorian. But due to all the variables involved the question is devilishly complex, and of course political dynamite, so I doubt we can get something with a single chart-line that everyone agrees to. Point in fact, the Reliable Sources disagree! Wikipedians cannot decide that conflict amongst the RS's, but we can describe it. Perhaps a unified graph, which superimposes the admittedly-POV datasets published by the various places, and pushed as WP:The_Truth by various groups, would be most useful? The readership would then know 1) that the total tax burden apportioned to various social-classes-by-income is important, and 2) that the mere calculation itself is controversial/politicized, plus finally 3) have a pretty good idea of which political camps push which kind of message. Does that sound reasonable?

  If so... we can have at least one line on the combo-chart which reflects the "data story" preferred by democrat-leaning-RS's, plus another line on the combo-chart which reflects the "data story" preferred by republican-leaning-RS's... though ideally I would like to see at least four lines, the green-party-leaning-dem, economic-centrist-dem, economic-centrist-repub, and libertarian-party-leaning-repub. Such a chart would give readers a clear idea of which groups are pushing what story, and in the prose-caption (or footnote or something) we can briefly explain why, then refer the readership to Tax policy in the United States and Taxation in the United States and 16th Amendment#Repeal Efforts and VAT#United States and similar things. Hope this helps; please drop a note on my talkpage, if somebody would like to work on such a combo-chart, I'll be glad to help. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 16:41, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

  p.s. Forgot to explicitly mention... my suggested combo-chart would *not* be for the wealth-subsection, but rather, for this other section which currently has no chart: United_States#Government_finance. Thanks. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 16:51, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

No, I like where you're coming from, but in practice even Ellen's outlier source calls overall taxation "progressive", and most of my sources are liberal leaning too or government agencies, so it doesn't fall neatly into ideological boxes. This particular dispute was over the degree of progressivity, and the fitness of a chart that was contradicted by multiple other sources (the others closely tracking each other). I suppose we could add a bunch of different charts as you suggest, fully explaining the disputed data, but that seems more appropriate to a different, more topically focused article than one already widely seen as too bloated. VictorD7 (talk) 19:10, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Obviously I mostly agree. There is still the issue of political bias, but I raised that so editors would have it mind over the long term going forward, maybe not worsen the problem through blind, piecemeal editing, and maybe help pull it back some toward neutrality over time. There's also the problem of low quality sources (e.g. Huffington Post), which isn't necessarily strictly political. And there's the problem of skewed emphasis on certain details, like private savings when far more notable items like the Social Security crisis aren't mentioned, but those don't have to be political either, regardless of the initial poster's agenda. VictorD7 (talk) 19:10, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Quality of sources on corporate tax incidence

I object that my statements were hidden/collapsed above: The peer reviewed literature review summarized in Table 1 on page 17 here clearly indicates that corporations pass from 57% to 75% of their taxes on to their consumer customers. VictorD7, who is on record as saying and never denying that corporations pass some of their taxes on to customers, refuses to say in what proportion, and insists on including five non-peer reviewed sources which say 0%, because that makes taxes appear more progressive than they are, which supports the false assertion that U.S. taxes are progressive for the top 1%, an admitted editing goal stemming from VictorD7's self-described political position.

That clear contradiction is the source of the disagreement on these topics, and has been for the better part of a year.

Could we please have other editors survey the peer reviewed literature to provide a greater range of estimates for the figure? Because some editors, who claim to share my perspective, have been insinuating that I am the one being dishonest here, and I take offense to that. I expect it from editors who admit they proceed while harboring contradictions, but other supposedly neutral observers should have no illusions about exactly what is happening. EllenCT (talk) 06:36, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Falsehoods on multiple levels, as anyone can see by reading the collapsed discussion or just this post. Corporate incidence was a red herring all along. Ellen's failed to demonstrate that it has anything to do with the various topics being discussed. Since the source of the graph she's pushing even contradicts her on this, it's not clear what she's even proposing (opposing ITEP now?). Looks like it's just Talk Page disruption. VictorD7 (talk) 19:48, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Again, VictorD7 doesn't deny any of my specific assertions, while claiming that they are false in general. I am proposing that a third party survey the peer reviewed literature to answer whether VictorD7 or I have been producing the higher quality sources on the proportion of corporate tax incidence borne by consumers. I am also considering proposing a general topic ban as a trial for this specific instance, e.g., anyone who admits to harboring a contradiction is prohibited from editing on topics related to that contradiction. EllenCT (talk) 07:03, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Everything you said was false, as people can read through my link. That's more efficient than repeating myself every time you lie. You really should be banned for trolling, bad faith editing, and disruption. You didn't even bother to say what precisely you're proposing, since your own old graph source joins the CBO and TPC in attributing corporate incidence to shareholders. Talk about a contradiction. You have no point. VictorD7 (talk) 19:44, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

"Everything"? Let's take this one by one.

1. Have you claimed that corporations pass some taxes on to consumers, yes or no?
2. Have you refused to state what proportion of their taxes corporations pass on to consumers?
3. Have you been inserting multiple non-peer reviewed sources which claim that corporations pass 0% of their taxes on to their customers?
4. Have you been inserting graphs which make it look like taxes are progressive for the top 1% because they assume that corporations pass 0% of their taxes on to their customers?
5. Are you politically opposed to more steeply progressive taxation?
6. Have you found any peer reviewed sources which agree with the sources on corporate tax incidence you have been inserting?
7. What does Misplaced Pages policy say about editors who knowingly insert statements which they know are not supported by the most reliable sources to advance a political point of view?
8. Which specific statements do you believe I have not been entirely honest about?
9. Do you believe that a contradiction indicates that one of the contradicted statements is false?
10. How do you intend to correct the mistakes inherent in using less reliable sources which disagree with more reliable sources?

EllenCT (talk) 07:30, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

First answer the question about what your article related goal here is, and whether you now oppose the ITEP chart you formerly supported. VictorD7 (talk) 16:05, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

I asked for third parties' opinions on which of us has been including the more reliable sources on the crux of our disagreement. I still support including the ITEP chart and have no idea why anyone would think otherwise. Your turn. EllenCT (talk) 13:26, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Since ITEP agrees with sources like the CBO and TPC about attributing corporate taxes to shareholders, it's unclear why you're attacking my sources on this point, why you consider this corporate incidence tangent "the crux of our disagreement", or how this is relevant to the article. VictorD7 (talk) 19:28, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

You probably see my attempt to help you reconcile a logical contradiction as an attack on "your" sources. I am trying to help, not attack. The ITEP, CBO, TPC, TF, HF, OMB, Treasury, CEA, World Bank, IMF, and university economics departments all publish series, some papers of which are peer reviewed and some of which are not. Would you please answer the questions? EllenCT (talk) 02:31, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

You still haven't answered mine. Why do you feel corporate incidence is "the crux of our disagreement"? And why do you support the ITEP chart when it attributes corporate taxation to shareholders too? VictorD7 (talk) 03:32, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

It's my best guess of the crux. The ITEP attributes a proportion within the peer-reviewed range given above. 11. What do you think is the crux of our disagreement? Please answer the other ten first. EllenCT (talk) 04:31, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Guess? Just to clarify, is it your position that the discrepancy between ITEP and the other sources is due to differences in attributing corporate incidence, and that the former allegedly doesn't attribute to owners (shareholders/investors/capital), attributing to consumers and/or labor instead, or at least attributes such a smaller proportion to owners than the other sources that it causes the huge gap, resulting in a less progressive looking structure with relatively higher low income rates and lower high income rates than other sources? VictorD7 (talk) 04:53, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, a smaller portion, but I'm not sure about what you mean by income rates. Attributing 0% of corporate tax incidence to consumers makes it look like the top 1% pay more taxes than the top 20%. Attributing a peer reviewed amount makes it look like the top 1% pay less taxes as a percentage of their income. EllenCT (talk) 05:25, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you have proof of that? Leaving aside the fact that the gap between TPC's and ITEP's top 1% rate is larger than TPC's entire corporate component of that rate, ITEP itself contradicts you on attribution.

• ITEP (pages 44-45): "Of course, while a corporation may be treated as a single legal person, it exists in reality as a collection of individuals—the shareholders that own it; the executives and staff that work for it; and the consumers that buy its products. As a result, any tax levied on a corporation ultimately falls on one of these groups. Economic research generally indicates that for the most part, it tends to be borne by corporate shareholders. The owners of corporate stocks and business assets — which are concentrated among the rich — ultimately pay corporate income taxes...the corporate income tax is one of the most progressive taxes a state can levy. Since stock ownership is concentrated among the very wealthiest taxpayers, the corporate income tax falls primarily on the most affluent residents of a state. As the chart on this page shows, the wealthiest one percent of Americans held just over half of all corporate stock in 2007, while the poorest ninety percent of Americans owned just 10 percent of the total".
• While I haven't seen ITEP's actual federal component breakdown (you certainly haven't provided it), their state by state breakdown reiterates that, and their total state average attributes no corporate taxes to the lowest 95% of income earners, a rate of 0.3% to the top 1%, and 0.1% to the next lowest 4% (page 118).
• This is from a WSJ story hosted on ITEP's site: "Yet wealthy people bear a bigger share of corporate income taxes, which are ultimately borne by individuals. "All taxes have to be paid by somebody at some point," says Steve Wamhoff, legislative director at Citizens for Tax Justice, the liberal lobbying arm of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a research group. "The corporate tax is paid by the owners of corporate stock and business assets.""
• When one searches on the ITEP site for "corporate taxes", near the top this piece pops up by CTJ (your chart source), ITEP's "sister" group and "lobbying arm": "... the corporate income tax is ultimately borne by shareholders and therefore is a very progressive tax, which means any attempt to replace it with another tax would likely result in a less progressive tax system....The Corporate Income Tax Is Borne by Shareholders and Thus Very Progressive....Taken as a whole, America’s tax system is just barely progressive. It would be considerably less progressive if the corporate income tax was repealed. Most, if not all, of the corporate income tax is borne by shareholders in the form of reduced stock dividends, and high-income Americans receive the lion’s share of these dividends. Corporate leaders sometimes assert that corporate income taxes are really borne by workers or consumers. But virtually all tax experts, including those at the Congressional Budget Office, the Congressional Research Service and the Treasury Department, have concluded that the owners of stock and other capital ultimately pay most corporate taxes. Further, corporate leaders would not lobby Congress to lower these taxes if they did not believe their shareholders (the owners of corporations) ultimately paid them. (In contrast, corporations do not lobby for lower payroll taxes, which are borne by workers)."
• CTJ reiterates that view in this testimony before the Congressional Progressive Caucus (page 7): "The owners of corporate stocks and business assets — which are concentrated among the rich — ultimately pay corporate income taxes. Corporate leaders and their lobbyists argue that corporate taxes are ultimately paid by workers who suffer when corporations leave the U.S. to find lower taxes. This cannot be true. Corporations would not spend so much time lobbying you to lower their taxes if they did not think their shareholders were the ones ultimately paying them. Several non-partisan analysts have also concluded that the corporate income tax is mostly borne by the owners of corporate stocks and business assets."
• Clearly a rational person must accept that your hypothesis is refuted. There is no contrary evidence, much less proof of your claims. There's overwhelming proof of the opposite. Do you accept this? If so, we can move forward and I'll address your "peer review" comments. VictorD7 (talk) 06:14, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

I absolutely do not accept your continued cherry picking of non-peer reviewed sources. The peer reviewed evidence is clear and contrary to your verbose attempt at obfuscation. Please answer the eleven questions above. EllenCT (talk) 09:18, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Since you refuse to address or even acknowledge the overwhelming proof I just posted that ITEP (your cherry-picked source, not mine), attributes corp. taxation to owners (and even explicitly argues against attributing it to consumers or labor!), the total opposite of your entire premise for this section, then it should be clear to anyone reading this that you aren't interested in having an honest, rational conversation, and that your other wild, ignorant claims merit no response. VictorD7 (talk) 18:10, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Non-peer reviewed, cherry-picked sources aren't proof of anything. See below. EllenCT (talk) 07:25, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

That's your description for ITEP now? You're the one who cherry-picked it; you're trying to add its chart to the article. It may be a garbage source, but it can be used to prove its own views. Indeed, see below. VictorD7 (talk) 04:54, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

This really isn't the place to argue over corporate tax incidence. If people want detailed information, they can go to the relevant article. Rwenonah (talk) 15:53, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Are you proposing Corporate tax incidence? I have had that on my to-do list for a while, but if we can't work this out, it will be born controversial, and I would very much like to prevent that. EllenCT (talk) 04:31, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Since the incidence of corporate tax is debatable, we cannot use it to prove the U.S. tax system is inherently progressive. If it were progressive then one would expect that U.S. stock markets would consistently underperform foreign stock markets because the higher corporate tax would lead to lower equity accumulation. TFD (talk) 09:32, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

True, all things being equal, but rule of law, independent judiciary, intellectual property rights, fiscal stability and physical security, for example, also factor in equity accumulation. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 15:55, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

It would not affect profit as a percentage of share value, because share value takes those factors into account. TFD (talk) 16:12, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

All the presented sources say it is progressive, but the entire premise of this section was Ellen's belief that ITEP's tax incidence numbers differed so dramatically from other tax incidence sources because it allegedly attributed corporate taxes to consumers or labor rather than owners, an assumption I just showed is absolutely false. Despite her claim, corporate taxation is not "the crux of our disagreement". This entire tangent was pointless. VictorD7 (talk) 18:16, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

Did you read her report from the Brookings Institute? TFD (talk) 18:53, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

You mean the Tax Policy Center? Yes. It didn't say what she claimed it did either. But this isn't about whether you think corporate taxes are progressive. This is about whether Ellen's ITEP source thinks they are. VictorD7 (talk) 19:10, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

It most certainly does say that the peer reviewed literature agrees with your original statement that corporations pass most of their taxes on to consumers. Perhaps you can find dozens of non-peer reviewed sources that say they do not, to support your disinformation campaign that US taxation is supposedly progressive for the top 1%. But you have not found a single peer reviewed source supporting your revised view which you adopted for the purpose of supporting that disinformation, and your refusal to answer any of my questions while I have answered all of yours proves it. You have provided the clearest evidence of willful POV-pushing editing behavior I have ever seen, here on one of Misplaced Pages's most popular articles. Do you really think you are convincing anyone of your position? You have sealed your fate. EllenCT (talk) 00:59, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Prove that with quotes. While you're busy not doing that, and lying about my statement, explain why you still believe ITEP (the point of this whole discussion; the graph you wanted to add) attributes corporate taxation to consumers or labor rather than owners, given all the proof I posted above from ITEP itself contradicting you (including from their actual numbers), while you haven't supported your claim with a shred of evidence. VictorD7 (talk) 01:32, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

A single paper by independent authors in ITEP's or anyone else's series is not the collective judgement of that organization. As requested: "a $1.00 increase in corporate tax revenue decreases wages by approximately $0.60" in the United States (that is a WP:SECONDARY source because it is based on many other curated data set publications, and it is peer reviewed) and "an exogenous rise of $1 in tax would reduce the wage bill by 49 cents" in Europe (also a peer reviewed WP:SECONDARY source.) Answer the 11 questions above. EllenCT (talk) 04:36, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

You still haven't answered why you believe ITEP attributes corp. taxes to consumers when all the evidence I posted from them states the opposite, that they attribute to owners like the TPC and CBO do. Answer that and I'll debunk your "peer review" claims, though, if you can't answer the ITEP question, the other tangent is irrelevant to the article. Cooperate and I'll even answer your 11 questions as a courtesy, but I want to wait until after we clear up the most important part of this discussion (the ITEP thing). However, I will point out that neither of your quotes come from the TPC meta-analysis you linked to and have been making claims about (meta-analyses are superior to single studies for our purposes), and, like that piece, they both focus on labor, not "consumers" as you've been claiming. Neither of your quotes even mentioned "consumers". VictorD7 (talk) 04:52, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Because the evidence you posted isn't the official ITEP position reflected in their summary graph, it's just unreviewed individuals writing papers in their series. Please do me the courtesy of answering the 11 questions above, whether or not I am able to meet your moving goalpost criteria for whatever the "ITEP thing" is. The quotes didn't come from the TPC meta-analysis, they came from a citation search on the intersection of the most highly favorably cited of its sources. "Labor" includes consumers and employees, as opposed to capital ownership, which also includes consumers through e.g. pension funds, which have become vanishingly small these days. EllenCT (talk) 06:08, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

So you have absolutely no evidence to support your claim that ITEP attributes corporate taxes to consumers? And no, I did post their official (and only) position, including testimony to Congressmen. I even linked to the official report with their actual state by state tax incidence numbers, in which they call income and corporate taxes the "main progressive element of state and local tax systems" (page 5), and assign all measurable corporate taxes to the top 5% in the combined average (page 118), with the top 1% paying by far the highest corporate tax rate. How do you reconcile your position with this fact? I'm not the one here with the moving goalpost. This is the crux of this entire section, and we need to settle it. It's ok to admit you were mistaken, Ellen. You won't melt and the world won't end. If you do, I'll answer your 11 questions and post in depth on the tangential "peer review" element. And no, "labor" refers to employees. Of course people are typically both, but employees and consumers are often investors too, so that's beside the point. Your sources invariably speak of the labor/capital split and the impact on "wages", not "consumers". VictorD7 (talk) 07:59, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Your attempt to dodge the source quality issue is a complete waste of everyone's time. I have answered every one of your questions, but I will not answer any more until you answer all eleven of mine. You also ought to check an economics glossary to avoid making yourself look any more foolish than you already have. EllenCT (talk) 10:27, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Funny, I was thinking the same thing about you regarding dodging and making yourself look foolish with your basic ignorance. Since your 11 questions are largely ad hominem drivel that aren't relevant to the article, while my question that you continue to dodge is vital to the premise of this entire section and much of your posting in recent weeks (including some of your article editing), it's far more incumbent on you to answer. I just posted direct proof showing that ITEP's tax incidence attributes corporate taxation to owners in a very progressive fashion, just like the TPC and CBO, the opposite of what you've been claiming about ITEP. Clearly you have absolutely no counter evidence, but your failure to even address the posted proof demonstrates bad faith on your part. If your dodging continues, you'll be exposed as a troll. VictorD7 (talk) 18:06, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Questions about your behavior aren't ad hominem unless you have been misbehaving. Are you going back on your promise to answer them? EllenCT (talk) 21:48, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I said I'd answer your ridiculous ad hominem questions as a courtesy if you cooperated by addressing the actual substance of how ITEP attributes corporate taxes, the whole reason you've been subjecting this Talk Page and article to "corporate incidence" talk in recent months. What do you think about the section below, where I quote ITEP's own FAQ stating that they attribute taxes progressively to corporate owners? Feel free to comment on it down there. VictorD7 (talk) 22:08, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

The only reason you see the questions as ad hominem is because you know honest answers will expose the extent of your abuse of wikipedia rules and low quality sources to push your political viewpoint. They are nothing more than query reiterations of the statements you called all lies. You said you would answer them, so answer them. EllenCT (talk) 01:44, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you think ITEP is lying when it claims to attribute corporate taxes to capital owners, yielding progressive results? VictorD7 (talk) 03:09, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I will not answer any more of your questions until you answer mine. I will point out that the question at the top of page three of the document you link to only discusses corporate income tax, not property, sales, or excise taxes or tariffs, and doesn't say whether "primarily" means more or less than 54.5%, which is the figure I understand that they use, and a far cry from the 100% implied by your cherry basket of non-peer reviewed sources. EllenCT (talk) 04:53, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Your entire discussion has been about corporate taxes, not other types. And here's what ITEP says on corporate taxes (note the sentence after the "primarily" one): "It is generally agreed that corporate income taxes, at both the state and federal level, fall primarily on owners of capital. In accordance with this theory, ITEP’s incidence analyses of state corporate income taxes typically distribute the incidence of the tax according to nationwide ownership of capital assets such as stocks and bonds....The incidence of the tax in ITEP’s analyses is generally quite progressive, because the vast majority of capital income nationwide is held by the very best-off Americans." I'm not sure what you mean by the "54.5%" number (capital, labor, or consumers? Did you find that in an ITEP source somewhere or just make it up?), but it says it attributes corporate taxes according to ownership of capital assets. Is ITEP a "cherry basket of non-peer reviewed sources", Ellen? VictorD7 (talk) 05:12, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I was referring to the same use of the word "primarily" that you quoted. Answer my questions. EllenCT (talk) 05:17, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I know. That's why I pointed out that the following sentence is the one that explains how ITEP actually attributes corporate taxes. Only "ownership of capital assets such as stocks and bonds" is mentioned. Do you have a verifiable source for your "54.5%"/"consumers" claim? And you didn't answer, do you feel that ITEP is a cherry-picked, "non-peer reviewed source"? Or do you just mean the CBO and TPC when you apply that label? VictorD7 (talk) 05:26, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I will not answer any more of your questions until you answer mine. You said you would do so, but you have not. People can see how true you are to your own word, let alone to the reliable sources. EllenCT (talk) 05:41, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Anyone can see that I said I'd answer your off topic questions after we settled the ITEP attribution matter, since the latter is vastly more important to the article. Is ITEP a reliable source for its own views, Ellen? You have an obligation to answer that, since you are trying to push ITEP's tax chart into the article. That is the basis for this entire discussion you've started. VictorD7 (talk) 05:48, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

This whole section is about the quality of sources used by ITEP, and I answered all your specific questions about them. The 54.5% figure comes from a source I cited months ago because I picked up the phone and called someone who used to work for the ITEP and asked them what they used, just like I suggested that you call them weeks ago. This isn't article space so I don't need you to be able to verify what you ought to be able to do for yourself. You clearly have no intention of keeping your word and answering my questions. EllenCT (talk) 07:25, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I'll answer below, since this split conversation is silly. VictorD7 (talk) 19:12, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

ITEP attributes corporate taxes to owners, just like the TPC and CBO.

This is important because Ellen's entire premise has been that ITEP attributes corporate taxes "regressively" to consumers rather than owners, explaining (trying to excuse) the difference between its tax incidence numbers and the other sources. She's posted no evidence of this, but that premise is why she's created all these discussions about corporate incidence, and it's even led to her adding a segment that's still in the article. But the premise was wrong. From ITEP's own FAQ:

"It is generally agreed that corporate income taxes, at both the state and federal level, fall primarily on owners of capital. In accordance with this theory, ITEP’s incidence analyses of state corporate income taxes typically distribute the incidence of the tax according to nationwide ownership of capital assets such as stocks and bonds....The incidence of the tax in ITEP’s analyses is generally quite progressive, because the vast majority of capital income nationwide is held by the very best-off Americans."

This supports the overwhelming evidence I've already posted from ITEP above. The discrepancy between ITEP and other sources must be caused by other factors. A reasonable person would consider this issue settled. Does anyone have any rational counter argument or counter evidence? Or can we agree that Ellen is wrong and move on from there? VictorD7 (talk) 18:59, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

As has been pointed out to you, other sources disagree. Furthermore, since you have already dismissed ITEP as a rs, claiming it is "left wing", then you cannot use it as a reliable source. Reliability does not mean the source says what you happen to believe. TFD (talk) 21:14, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

No, you completely missed the point. This isn't about whether corporate taxes are progressive. This is about whether Ellen was correct in claiming ITEP treats them as regressive. She's the one pushing the ITEP chart as a source. She claims they attribute corp. taxes to consumers. I found all this evidence showing they attribute it to owners. Which of us do you think is right on this point? I'd like your feedback. VictorD7 (talk) 21:24, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Where'd you run off to, TFD? Does ITEP attribute corporate taxes to consumers (regressive) or capital owners (progressive)? This isn't a trick question. I'm essentially asking you what 2+2 equals and making it an open book test. Feel free to read the above quote containing the answer, any of the other evidence posted here saying the same thing, or anything else about ITEP you want to if you can find it. VictorD7 (talk) 00:48, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Are you now claiming that ITEP is rs? Otherwise what they say is mute. TFD (talk) 01:50, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

You've got to be kidding. Let me try this again. I'm not asking you to comment on corporate taxes. This discussion isn't about whether corporate taxes really are progressive or not. I think ITEP is garbage, but it is a reliable source for its own views, and Ellen's still pushing its chart for article inclusion. Let's make this test multiple choice: Please read the ITEP quote I posted above, and answer whether it means....

A. ITEP attributes corporate taxes to capital owners, producing progressive results (my position)

or

B. ITEP attributes corporate taxes to consumers, producing regressive results (Ellen's position)

And I'm guessing you meant "moot", not "mute", and no, it's not because Ellen is still basing her entire position on the answer being "B". Again, the only reason we're discussing corporate incidence is because Ellen wants to include the ITEP chart, and she's still insisting that its discrepancy with other sources can be dismissed as differences in corporate attribution. VictorD7 (talk) 03:02, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

The correct answer to VictorD7's false multiple choice question is none of the above. ITEP attributes 54.5% of corporate taxes to capital owners and the remainder to consumers, in accordance with the ranges given in the most reliable of the peer reviewed WP:SECONDARY sources, which I know from a personal communication unsuitable for inclusion as a source in articles. That is why they show the top 1% paying less total tax as a percentage of their income than the top 20%, and why VictorD7 despises them even though he is willing to quote vague passages from them to try to support his POV-pushing. EllenCT (talk) 05:06, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you have a verifiable source to support your anecdotal claim allegedly delivered via secret communication? One that mentions this "54.5%" figure, or even the word "consumers"? Because publicly ITEP just speaks of attributing to capital ownership, and even explicitly argues against "corporate leaders" who support attributing to consumers or labor. VictorD7 (talk) 05:20, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but it's unpublished, as I said above. Call them and ask them. But first answer my questions. EllenCT (talk) 07:25, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

You said you called someone who "used to work for" ITEP. That means they don't work for them now? Did you personally know this person or what? Is his or her name a secret? I'm not interested in contacting ITEP when they clearly spell out their methodology all over their website and publications, only stating that they attribute corporate taxes to owners and arguing against the notion of attributing to consumers or labor, even attacking the motives of those who do argue in favor of consumer attribution. The burden of producing source proof otherwise is on you. Even if your mystery source was telling the truth, that would just mean that ITEP is saying one thing publicly and quietly doing something very contradictory, totally destroying the group's credibility. It would mean that they support and publicly lobby for corporate taxes as a "very progressive" tax on "owners of capital" (their words), while silently scoring them in a far more regressive fashion just to make overall taxation look less progressive than it really is, hoping to fuel popular support for tax hikes on "the rich" regardless of type. It's telling that you'd have no problem with that. VictorD7 (talk) 19:12, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

And if ITEP attributes half to consumers, how do you explain them attributing zero state corporate taxes to the bottom 95% in their combined state average (page 118), and by far the highest corporate tax rate to the top 1%? Is it possible your alleged secret source who "used" to work for ITEP was mistaken? VictorD7 (talk) 20:47, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Answer my questions and I'll answer yours. EllenCT (talk) 03:26, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

You're the one trying to get something added to the article. VictorD7 (talk) 04:05, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

English, national language?

I don't think you can call English the national language of the US. Does English represent the ethnically diverse national identity of the US? Also, surely English is the de facto official language of the US, as it is used officially by the government of the US? How else is "official language" defined? And why is it stated that English is only the official language of at least 28 states? Do the federal bodies in other states exclusively use Spanish instead? This article appears to use a odd definition of "official language". Rob (talk/edits) 17:54, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

An "official language" on a national level would require a piece of law, such as a passed congressional bill or part of the US Constitution, that established English as the official language. Otherwise, it is not "official," which is a legal definition. There has not been any law and there is not any part of the Constitution designating any language as the official language of the United States, so we do not have an official language. Other countries often do have laws specifying official languages, such as Canada's Official Language Act, which legally specified English and Friend as the official languages of Canada. English is the "de facto" language in the United States due to the portion of the population speaking it as their first language and language of every day use. English is only the official language in 28 states as only those 28 states have passed laws designating it as their official language. Other states likely have not passed any law at all regarding an official language, and thus do not have one. Federal bodies act according to federal laws, not state laws (generally), and the lack of designating English as the official language in 22 states does not in any way make Spanish their official language. --OuroborosCobra (talk) 18:01, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Apologies, I meant "state bodies", not "federal bodies". Your definition of "official language", that it requires legislation, is different to that in Europe. Proclamation is enough to designate something as official here. I guess "official" has a different meaning here. Also, that English is the de facto language of the US, doesn't make it the national language. Unless again we have an alternative definition, "national language" is the language that represents the national identity, and not necessarily the majority, such as in Luxembourg, Wales, and the Irish Republic. English would be a national language of Britain; where it was formed; not the US. Regards, Rob (talk/edits) 18:43, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Official language is always de jure, not de facto. That's what "official" means. --Golbez (talk) 18:03, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

So, English is official in 28 states and five territories in the U.S. along with Spanish in Puerto Rico, Samoan in American Samoa, and Chamorro in Guam and Northern Marianas? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:00, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

English is considered the de facto national language because it is spoken as a first language by over 80% of the population and as a 2nd (or higher) by the rest of the population, and is the form of communication used almost the entire time by the government and media. Also "national" language does not have to mean the country where the language originated, it can refer to the language either spoken by the vast majority of the population and/or the common language used to unify the country. English is not considered de jure or "official" on the federal level because the federal government has never made a legal proclamation, on paper, that English is the official language. It would be ridiculous to proclaim that the US has no national language, de facto or otherwise, when English is spoken by almost everyone here. I hope that cleared things up for you. Cadiomals (talk) 10:08, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

In Europe, "national language" refers almost exclusively to the language of the national identity, and thus, English wouldn't be described as the national language of the US. Even though 80% of the US population speak English, 80% of the US population are not ethnically British. Similarly in the Irish Republic, English, the most spoken language, would not be described as a national language here, as it was adopted by the country's people fairly recently (last 500 years), whereas the original language, Irish Gaelic, that represents the Irish identity, is often described as the national language of the state. There's quite a few states in Europe with minority national languages, which probably explains the alternative definition. I should probably check the US definitions before commenting on terminology in a US English article. Thank you, Rob (talk/edits) 10:37, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

So it turns out my query was answered in good order, and we all understand why WP uses "national language" as English for the U.S. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 12:06, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

It would be fairly difficult to determine the national language of the US using the so-called "European definition" considering the United States is a relatively young colonial nation whose main language originated some place else, and without the lengthy history needed to develop a new language of its own, while the natives who once lived here (along with whatever languages they spoke) have almost all been wiped out. The article for National language provides for varied definitions. Cadiomals (talk) 20:13, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

If the articles, written in European English, then the European definitions would be used. That's why at Britain's article, English is stated as an official language, even though there is no legislation determining the official language. Rob (talk/edits) 21:22, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I might have misread your comment. Apologies if I was patronising you, Rob (talk/edits) 21:27, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

No problem. 'No harm, no foul. play on.' TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 16:45, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

Usefulness of US languages treemap

I do not agree with the addition of this U.S. languages treemap but wanted to make sure others agreed before removing it myself. 1) The "English" portion of the treemap takes up 80% of the graph and the rest of the languages are just little colored rectangles with unreadable text unless they are clicked on and most importantly 2) it is essentially a graphical repetition of data already found in the table to its left and as such it is redundant. This image reminds me of the product exports tree map except there is already a table showing the same information. So I don't think the graphic actually adds anything useful and just saturates the article with even more diagrams. Does anyone disagree? Cadiomals (talk) 04:50, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

It communicates the tabular information graphically. That's why graphs exist. And it fills a big white space next to the table that would otherwise be empty. Could certainly make the fonts larger if that would help. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 05:30, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

This would work better as a bar chart. As it is, or as a more traditional pie chart for this kind of data, it can not convey the extent of multilingualism. EllenCT (talk) 07:06, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Agree with Ellen on pie chart, and related languages should have related colors on the spectrum and be placed adjacent, such as the Romance Languages, or at least related dialects such as French-French-creole, etc. The present chart does not provide space for labeling French, which is a larger block that Vietnamese. Bar chart might allow for uniform fonts labeling all languages on the chart (English inside its bar) in a way which would be difficult in a pie chart at article scale. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:05, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I'll add a label to French.

Pie charts are misleading, for many reasons explained in pie chart and other sources. And The tiny slivers you'd get would not solve any labeling problems; they'd make it worse. You'd use up white space around the graph in order to make room for labels, which would make the graph even harder to see. I understand how attractive pie charts are, because they look pretty and they're familiar. But when you have more than two data items, pie charts create a false impression, which undermines the whole point of the graph. You want your audience to get a grasp of the proportions between the items, and pies do that poorly.

A bar chart isn't misleading like a pie; people generally will interpret the proportions correctly, as with the tree map. But it wastes large amounts of space, so that in order to make room for all the dead space above the bars, the smaller values are reduced to even harder to see slivers. The point of the the tree map here is to enlarge the marks to fill all the available space, so that you can see as much of them as possible, while retaining correct size ratios between the marks.

I wouldn't want make the colors related because this chart is about the number of speakers of each language in the US, not linguistics. It's true that some languages share common roots, but to use color imply a special relationship between US speakers languages would be original research. Here are the alternate versions, using a pie and bars, if those are preferred. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 17:46, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Wow. thank you. Tree map really does convey the information more clearly graphically at scale. Impressive. Thanks for your patient and courteous reply. I still wonder if an additional layer of geographical origins might be conveyed by use of the spectrum, maybe by major world regions as denominated in the U.S. Census. Perhaps the percentages could be listed alongside each language in the Tree map key. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 18:57, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I still don't see how it conveys information any more effectively when a data table that gives exact numbers already exists, because English alongside Spanish basically dominates the diagram with a few little squares in the corner. I therefore continue to see it as redundant and superfluous. There isn't an inherent necessity to represent all the data graphically when tables do it just fine. At least it's taking up white space and not squeezing aside any text. Cadiomals (talk) 23:20, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree the table is superior to even a log-scale bar chart. EllenCT (talk) 05:10, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

A bar chart with a semilog y-axis scale would be more informative than any of these, and again, would not misrepresent multilingual speakers. EllenCT (talk) 21:52, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Article size (load time is long)

So I am sure most will agree this article is bloated with details that can be better served in the main articles. Having people Skipp the article because its to big and tedious does not help anyone. Will make a section below soon with a break down of the article and things that can be moved. Would love others to get in this conversation as I can see from above lots of editors have raised this concern yet more still being added to section many find not all that relevant. A section like "Income, poverty, and wealth" should be trimmed...way to much details for the average reader who is coming here to learn about the USA as an overall topic. -- Moxy (talk) 23:36, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

You should have been here two months ago when the Income, poverty and wealth section and a few other sections were about twice their current sizes. It was an arduous month-long process just to get those sections shortened. The sections I think could use significant trimming are History, Crime and law enforcement and maybe a little in Culture; otherwise the rest of the sections look of adequate length. Even though I still think I, P, and W can be further trimmed, it was exhausting enough just to get it cut down to its current size and there are definitely users here who will object to further shortening it. It would be another arduous process that should be taken one section at a time. Cadiomals (talk) 23:55, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Agree there will be a few that think the article is not to long or think what they added is so important that sizes does not matter. But what we have to look at its readability...simply not good if people leave the page because its simply full of details (stats) that have no meaning or context to a NON American. -- Moxy (talk) 00:26, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I would be happy to see the History and Culture sections trimmed down very substantially, but not the current events-related parts where low-information voters are likely to look when making political decisions, especially in the face of such a strenuous disinformation campaign based on cherry-picked low quality sources. EllenCT (talk) 01:37, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I agree with trimming Income, poverty, and wealth, but if you're serious then hang around and participate, Moxy. Don't fire off a driveby shot and take off. VictorD7 (talk) 03:14, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Would love to help - but have not recently because i am not interested in the edit wars that have been happening here. I will even bring this to GA level if we can agree on trimming at least 1/3 of the article. As most know I specialize in references ...over the next week or two will make bibliography that we can work from. Canada - Bibliography of Canada this way we can all agree what sources are the best.There is way to many web-links here should look like Military history of Canada as in real books should be used. -- Moxy (talk) 16:03, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Wunderbar -- the article, IMHO, is too long by far more than you can imagine, contains material which, at best, belongs in su-articles, and I suggest substantial trimming of some of the er "lesser references" should be possible. For my approach see (my edited version) vis-a-vis the starting point for my edits at <g>. I also would like readability to improve -- right now it is at 50, which makes it "Wiki-average" which, IMHO, not that much to boast about - let's aim for 55 at least. Collect (talk) 17:10, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

The longest sections in history are the first few. I've taken a shot at just trimming below, but reading into Gordon S. Wood's The idea of America -- another approach might be to treat the history topically, concerning constitutionalism, democracy, party politics, judicial review --- directly relating to the current U.S. -- much as JimWae proposed something is missing in an article on the United States without treatment of the growth of democracy. The first few sections have been hijacked from a year or so ago and seem to be metastasizing into a chronological narrative. This whole issue of length can be sidestepped in large part with a link to History of the United States, and choosing a topical treatment. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:45, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

I will say that length can't be the only concern. If we're going to fix the History section then let's fix it. Quality and accuracy matter too. We certainly can't just deal with the first two sections. The worst section is the last one, and the others need work as well. VictorD7 (talk) 18:24, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Native American and European contact

The following proposed section edit is for conciseness and encyclopedic style. The final paragraph concerning a few Indian wars was so unrepresentative as to be distracting, the subject matter belongs in Settlement.

People from Asia migrated to the North American continent approximately 15,000 or more years ago. Some, such as the pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, developed advanced agriculture, grand architecture, and state-level societies. After European explorers and traders made the first contacts, it is estimated that their population declined due to various reasons, including diseases such as smallpox and measles to which indigenous Americans had no natural immunities, intermarriage, and violence.

In the early days of colonization many settlers were subject to shortages of food, disease and attacks from Native Americans. Native Americans were also often at war with neighboring tribes and allied with Europeans in their colonial wars. At the same time many natives and settlers came to depend on each other. Settlers traded for food and animal pelts, natives for guns, ammunition and other European wares. In the process "Native American influenced colonist, and colonist influenced Native American". Natives taught many settlers where, when and how to hunt and fish and cultivate corn, beans and squash in the frontier. European missionaries and others felt it was important to "civilize" the Indians and urged them to concentrate on farming and ranching and not depend primarily on hunting and gathering.

end proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:04, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Weren't you the one who once pointed out that the source actually said violence was not a significant factor in Amerindian depopulation? This might be a good opportunity to fix that. VictorD7 (talk) 19:20, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

insert. Disease was overwhelmingly the cause of Amerindian depopulation. Another myth-buster, most fatalities along the Oregon Trail were first snake bites, second self-inflicted gunshot wounds -- not attacks by Amerindian raiders. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:46, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Not sure, but it really does read like an eighth grade textbook. I'm not happy with how the section has been hijacked from about a year ago. Rather than refighting American historiography here, I wonder if we could turn to a topical organization on constitutionalism, democracy, judicial reiview and political parties as U.S. historical contribution to world political life, and leave the rest to History of the United States. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:02, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

I never really saw a need for a separate Native American section to begin with, since this is a national and not continental history, but some others disagreed. The bigger problem was that the process went off the rails for a while due to unilateral, piecemeal editing with little or no thought given to the big picture, until at least some order and stability was restored. I'd have to see what you're proposing before endorsing a topical approach, but I do generally support the notion of editing coherently with the big picture in mind. VictorD7 (talk) 18:19, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

edit. Settlement

proposed section edited for conciseness and encyclopedic style.

After Columbus' discovery of the New World in 1492 other explorers followed. The first Spanish explorers set up settlements in parts of Florida and the American southwest that were eventually merged into the United States. There were also some French attempts to colonize the east coast, and later more successful settlements along the Mississippi River. Successful English settlement on the eastern coast of North America began with the Virginia Colony in 1607 at Jamestown and the Pilgrims' Plymouth Colony in 1620. Early experiments in communal living failed until the introduction of privately held farms. The continent's first elected legislative assembly, Virginia's House of Burgesses of 1619, and the Mayflower Compact at the Pilgrims disembarking, established precedents for the pattern of representative self-government and constitutionalism that would develop throughout the American colonies.

Most settlers in every colony were small farmers, but other industries developed. Cash crops included tobacco, rice and wheat. Extraction industries grew up in furs, fishing and lumber. Manufacturers produced rum, ships and by the late colonial period Americans were producing one-seventh of the world's iron supply. Cities eventually dotted the coast to support local economies and serve as trade hubs. English colonists were supplemented by waves of Scotch-Irish and other groups. As coastal land grew more expensive freed indentured servants pushed west. Slave cultivation of cash crops began with the Spanish in the 1500s, and was adopted by the English, but life expectancy was much higher in North America because of less disease and better food and treatment, so the numbers of slaves grew rapidly. Colonial society was largely divided over the religious and moral implications of slavery and colonies passed acts for and against the practice. But by the turn of the 18th century, African slaves were replacing indentured servants for cash crop labor in southern regions.

With the 1732 colonization of Georgia, the 13 colonies that would become the United States of America were established. All had local governments with elections open to most free men, with a growing devotion to the ancient rights of Englishmen and a sense of self-government stimulating support for republicanism. With extremely high birth rates, low death rates, and steady settlement, the colonial population grew rapidly. Relatively small Native American populations were eclipsed. The Christian revivalist movement of the 1730s and 1740s known as the Great Awakening fueled interest in religious liberty and congregational self government.

In the French and Indian War, British forces seized Canada from the French, but the francophone population remained politically isolated from the southern colonies. Excluding the Native Americans, who were being conquered and displaced, those 13 colonies had a population of over 2.1 million in 1770, about one-third that of Britain. Despite continuing new arrivals, the rate of natural increase was such that by the 1770s only a small minority of Americans had been born overseas. The colonies' distance from Britain had allowed the development of self-government, but their success motivated monarchs to periodically seek to reassert Royal authority.

end proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:53, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

It'd be more encyclopedic to add the word "successful" to the cited English colonies somewhere, since they weren't the first English attempts. I'm also not sure about the "bonded labor" sentence. Doesn't "bonded labor" refer to people who lose their freedom over debts? VictorD7 (talk) 19:50, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. And the focus can be enlarged to other "successful" colonies to incorporate those Dutch, Spanish, French and Russian colonies which are eventually incorporated into the U.S. This is way to much English colonies, exclusively original-thirteen. Moxy has proposed using a Canadian bibliography of sources in the discussion above, I wonder if they treat all Europeans more evenhandedly.

But, also, another approach might be to treat the history topically, concerning constitutionalism, democracy, party politics, judicial review --- directly relating to the current U.S. -- much as JimWae proposed something is missing in an article on the United States without treatment of the growth of democracy. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:57, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Not sure if your first paragraph was sarcastic, but adding a single word qualifier (or slight rewording) for the sake of accuracy is hardly tantamount to enlarging the section's scope to issues of tangential importance. An inadequately qualified "began" is the problem. Maybe just saying "Permanent English settlement on the eastern coast of North America began ...." would suffice, though that might be murkier than "successful" since Roanoke was an attempt at permanent settlement. VictorD7 (talk) 18:21, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Your recommendation is incorporated above in the narrative without italicization.

I'm not sarcastic. To stay with the original thirteen is fine for now, as most U.S. current day constitutional procedure is English-derived. However, today Spanish colonial law influences the Ninth, Tenth and Fifth Circuit Courts in California, Arizona and Texas and Code Napoleon the Fifth Circuit in Louisiana. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:06, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

I tweaked the sentence closer to what I actually had in mind. As for scope, the Spanish and French are appropriately mentioned, but a rational history of the US would primarily focus on the English colonies. I'm not sure there's much room for more on other colonial influences when you're reducing centuries of settlement to just four short paragraphs that don't even describe English growth with specifics apart from naming the first two colonies and Georgia. More important to American development than foreign influence or even slavery was the early shift from a communal arrangement to a capitalistic one in both Jamestown and Plymouth, as it both enabled those colonies' survival/success and set the tone for an American ideology that persists to this day and is even distinctive compared to the UK, and yet you're proposing dropping that brief sentence, along with any mention of early hardships faced (though the latter are at least mentioned vaguely in the prior section). VictorD7 (talk) 18:54, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

Lest I come off more argumentative than I intend, for the most part I think your proposals are fine. I'm just making a couple of observations. VictorD7 (talk) 18:59, 20 December 2013 (UTC)

The economic system is not properly called capitalism after the experiment in communalism, but I used the term 'private farm holdings' above as our next redraft. The communalism was derivative from primitive Christian church under persecution as described in New Testament book of Acts. It was ended famously at Jamestown when John Smith imposed martial law and declared to the rich who had paid for their passage as adventurers (versus indentures to the company), "He who shall not work, shall not eat." That was again, in context of the starving community at the time, a scriptural reference, not economic capitalism. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:59, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm fine with that wording, and it's close to the sentence currently in the article ("personal property"). I'll just sidestep the issue of whether it'd be appropriate to equate early church sharing with the authoritarian communal operations in the early English colonies (though I agree that was an inspiration), and whether "capitalistic" is appropriate to describe the direction they proceeded on, since I just used the word for convenience. It's arguably not optimal to use the word "capitalism" at all since it was largely coined (at least made famous) by socialists to have a negative connotation, but sometimes it's handy.

We should still do something about the incoherent "bonded labor" sentence. Might be easiest just to delete it. VictorD7 (talk) 21:56, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

If there are no further objections from anyone else these changes should probably be applied as soon as possible. Cadiomals (talk) 06:31, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

I have no problems with calling bonded labor what it was, but what does "eclipsed" mean and is it too euphemistic for the realities involved with the exchange of exogenous diseases? EllenCT (talk) 01:15, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

That sentence can either be deleted because it is reiterated quite a few times already throughout the History section or clarified with "surpassing Native American populations, which were greatly reduced by violence, displacement and exposure to exogenous diseases" attached to the preceding sentence. I would prefer deleting it to prevent redundancy. Cadiomals (talk) 22:06, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Actually the "eclipsed" line is important because it deftly captures what happened: regional tribes numbering in the thousands even before the depopulation were dwarfed in size by a massive colonist population surging into the millions, a phenomenon I don't think is captured elsewhere in the article but is detailed in the sourcing. As for the Amerindian depopulation (which had only marginal impact on the eclipsing), Cadiomals is correct about it being discussed elsewhere in the article. It has its own problems, as noted earlier, since the sourcing actually says violence was not a significant factor in the depopulation (which was overwhelmingly caused by disease); another old misleading segment no one has gotten around to fixing yet. VictorD7 (talk) 22:45, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm fine with making the changes, since the "bonded labor" sentence is already present anyway, but that sentence should still be deleted since it's incoherent, unless someone can explain what it means. Our focus should be on quality and accuracy too, not just length reduction, and if we're ever going to fix the History section this is the time to do it. VictorD7 (talk) 21:10, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

What if that sentence was changed to "Nevertheless, slavery became a crucial component of the Southern economy" or something along those lines? It is straightforward and clearly accurate. Cadiomals (talk) 22:06, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Something along those lines would be better, though I probably wouldn't go with "crucial" in the colonial period. Whether it's a clause or a sentence, it should probably say something like "especially in the south", since northern colonies had thousands of slaves too (fewer, but a lot), and we shouldn't imply it was a strictly southern phenomenon. Remember that later sections go more into depth about slavery, the north/south divide, and the Civil War. VictorD7 (talk) 22:50, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Okay, so we can use "Nevertheless, slavery continued to be an important part of the American economy." Since there seems to be nothing else, implementing these much needed changes should be delayed no longer (including "Native American and European contact" above). It wouldn't hurt to make any other small tweaks afterward. I don't want to do it myself because I don't know precisely where all the sources need to be placed, so Virginia should do it. Cadiomals (talk) 08:33, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

"Bonded labor" is used in the literature to differentiate among a) free labor for those who paid their own passage, b) bonded labor of indentures, whether 3-5 years for artisans or 7 years for unskilled field laborers and c) enslaved labor which does not equal bonded labor in numbers until the end of the late colonial period in the Chesapeake Bay region (VA-MD).

Any reference to the importance of slavery in field labor in the South is a reference to the last 50 years of a one hundred and fifty year span. Early Colonial is roundly 1600 to 1700, Late Colonial 1675-1776 depending on the treatment. For the first fifty-years in Virginia 1607-1657, enslaved laborers who were Christian such as the Angolan-African and African-Spanish slaves were freed at seven years (Muslims were not, just as Christians slaves were not freed in Islam in the 1600s). For Virginia, the largest colony by far -- four times that of Massachusetts in Early Colonial period--, importation of slaves does not measurably increase as a percent of the total labor force until after Bacon's Rebellion in 1675.

For a first draft, I'll try to incorporate stated concerns as best I can. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 14:08, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Why can't we make the US cities template more like this?

This is the conventional template used for almost all countries. We simply use the populations of the city propers instead of their metro areas, which shouldn't make a huge difference. The current table, in my opinion, lists information unnecessary and uninteresting to most readers, like what regions the cities lie in and the MSAs used by the Census Bureau. This template is not only simpler and more straightforward, but it's smaller and allows 20 cities to be fit into less space. That's why it's the conventional template used in most articles. We should seriously consider using this instead. Cadiomals (talk) 01:15, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

I like your proposal’s economy of graphic presentation. But I’d like the regions reported to be the SMSAs. Their description could be in subsidiary articles, linked in the chart. Instead of "Gold Coast-Tweed Heads QLD/NSW", use the convention, Greater New York SMSA. versus "New York–New Jersey–Connecticut–Pennsylvania, NY–NJ–CT–PA MSA", or Greater Philadelphia SMSA versus "Philadelphia–Camden–Wilmington, PA–NJ–DE–MD MSA."

SMSAs reflect how Americans live, work and commute to entertainment, in banking, marketing and trade. So the Rand-McNallly Commercial Atlas uses SMSAs. Using core cities alone is simply 19th century anachronism which does not reflect current reality or usage. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:28, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Wouldn't a solution be to simply name this table "Largest metropolitan areas in the U.S." and then use the populations of the Census' MSAs instead of the city cores? Cadiomals (talk) 06:42, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes. Though the links take some research. New York's SMSA is treated at New York metropolitan area, Philadelphia is at Delaware Valley, so the chart will have to be coded ], ] to read New York MSA, and Philadelphia MSA, respectively, so we can sidestep any "turf" wars at Misplaced Pages to be waged over regional naming conventions. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:56, 21 December 2013 (UTC)

Relative wealth

The paragraph on wealth tries to puff up symptoms of income inequality. What could be included from the CreditSuisse Global Wealth Databook to help balance it? I'm thinking rank by median wealth. EllenCT (talk) 07:33, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Not sure if you meant to word your first sentence like that, and your link is busted, but, as I posted before when you raised this issue, Credit Suisse, a private, Swiss based finance outfit, is a dubious source for an article at this level and the report is more of a brand exposure ad campaign than anything else. Among other methodological flaws, the results aren't PPP adjusted (the norm for international comparisons). For example, their report says France's wealth per adult tripled(!) in value between 2000 and 2007, but acknowledges that "much of the pre-2007 rise was due to the appreciation of the Euro against the dollar." In other words, it's a distortion with very little impact on actual living standards (mostly a mirage). There are similar descriptions for many other countries. Unless you really believe that French people saw their wealth triple in a few years, this report is worthless. If we were to add new stuff to an already bloated article, there are countless more deserving items. VictorD7 (talk) 09:09, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I fixed the link. What do you propose as a more authoritative source on wealth? The number of billionaires per hollowed-out shell of formerly vibrant cities? Just because you found a typo or glitch doesn't mean you should throw the baby out with the bathwater. EllenCT (talk) 11:41, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your goal is here, but I know that this summary article has more than enough economic statistics and even some other country articles don't have. If you desire more balance in certain sections, you should consider what things should be excluded rather than included. Based on discussions above most people would not support the addition of further statistics as we agreed this article could use fewer details, not more. It has already surpassed the 90KB limit, suggesting that a lot of info can be condensed or spun off into separate articles. You went as far as to add retirement savings statistics which is completely irrelevant to most readers and which no other country article includes. We've all heard your arguments before about "crucial" info for "low-information voters" which is important to current "election cycles", but it has no place in this summary article as has been repeated many times before by so many different people. In short, no more new economic statistics ought to be added; if anything we should be considering which ones can be cut out. Many people still think the I, P and W section can be cut down one or two paragraphs further, but in not wanting to dwell on the same issues we've decided to move on to other sections for now. Cadiomals (talk) 19:50, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

I am just saying that it would be better to describe wealth by ranking countries by median wealth, since it is a relative measure, than ranking _illionares per capita, or _illionares per anything else for that matter. That's a replacement, not an addition. EllenCT (talk) 02:10, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

No, the section hasn't mentioned that for quite some time. I guess you haven't read it lately either. VictorD7 (talk) 22:10, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Not a "typo or glitch" but fundamental flaws. VictorD7 (talk) 21:27, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Assumes facts not in evidence. Why do you think the France issue wasn't a one-time thing? EllenCT (talk) 02:10, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Because I actually read the report. Apparently you didn't. I just cited a salient example to illustrate the absurdity of the report's methodology. VictorD7 (talk) 22:10, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

Why do you believe that they don't adjust for PPP? EllenCT (talk) 05:48, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Did you miss where I just said they've got the French population tripling its wealth in a few years due to their currency's appreciation against the dollar? That's the type of distortion PPP adjustment is designed to prevent. Plus the report's intro says they don't use PPP but rather nominal US dollars, despite admitting that in international comparisons it's common to use PPP conversions. Their given reason for bucking standard practice is that the top few percentiles account for a large chunk of every nation's wealth, and that elite group travels internationally a lot, arguably making exchange rates more important than normal cost of living calculations. Of course that analysis sacrifices meaningful measurement for the vast majority of the population (certainly at the mean and median) to cover a small minority at the top. VictorD7 (talk) 07:07, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

If they used PPP, would that make the U.S. ranking go up or down? EllenCT (talk) 01:02, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

DAB pages

this edit does not follow the guideline in WP:DAB, regarding the connection of a primary use for a term with a corresponding disambiguation page. Further, the previous edit-summary was inaccurate, misleading at best (see https://toolserver.org/~dispenser/cgi-bin/rdcheck.py?page=United_States for a clue). TEDickey (talk) 23:43, 24 December 2013 (UTC)

Well-developed infrastructure???

This article claims that the United States infrastructure is "well-developed", while the accompanying link:

1. is dead; 2. points to a site where the USA is currently given a GPA of D+ for its decaying infrastructure.

http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/

Should the article be edited so as to reflect the reality as an encyclopedia should?

Yes. Please see http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/28/roads-bridges-decaying/2594499/ Please see also Cohen, Isabelle; Freiling, Thomas; Robinson, Eric (January 2012). The Economic Impact and Financing of Infrastructure Spending (PDF) (report). Williamsburg, Virginia: Thomas Jefferson Program in Public Policy, College of William & Mary. p. 5. Retrieved October 1, 2012. And Pereira, Alfredo (1999). Is All Public Capital Created Equal (peer reviewed paper). Review of Economics and Statistics, 82(3): 513-518. EllenCT (talk) 00:02, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

I guess I can modify the statement in both the lead and economy sections to exclude that, and it won't change the overall message that the US has a highly advanced economy. Cadiomals (talk) 03:08, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Do you feel that removing information about the infrastructure is superior to correcting it? EllenCT (talk) 05:46, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

So now we have to source the fact that the US has a "well developed infrastructure" by world standards? The US has an unparalleled superhighway system, 16 of the world's 30 most trafficked airports, state of the art telecommunications infrastructure, advanced water treatment plants and sewer systems, a first class power grid, many of the world's great skyscrapers, high quality building codes, and countless other features from high tech canals to the Hoover freaking Dam. I understand that it's a Democratic party talking point that we need more infrastructure spending, but holding that position isn't mutually exclusive with acknowledging that the US has among the world's most developed infrastructures. Heck, otherwise maybe we should delete the "developed nation" part too, since they also argue we need more government spending to fix the dismal economy. I'll note that none of the sources presented make international comparisons (so the "grade" is meaningless in this context), and that both the American Society of Civil Engineers (first source) and Associated Equipment Distributors (Ellen's second source) have a vested financial interest in increased spending on infrastructure, and both openly admit to advocating for that. Ellen's USA Today article covers some recent problems but doesn't dispute the developed nature of US infrastructure in the larger scheme of things. Her last source isn't available for free online reading but from the abstract appears to just be a policy paper arguing in favor of high infrastructure spending as a general principle that doesn't directly comment on this larger issue either.

I partially reverted so this could at least be discussed some. VictorD7 (talk) 06:03, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Please note that the adjective "well-developed" implies not only quantity, but quality too. The plain fact that an airport is "trafficked" does not say anything about its quality. No US airport has a 5-star or 4-star ranking by Skytrax. The aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, in which some areas were left without electricity for weeks due to the lack of underground power cables in the New York metropolitan area, did not indicate that the US has a "first class" power grid. Please refrain from bringing an internal US political debate into the discussion.201.17.48.236 (talk) 08:49, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Hey, you're the one whose source was an internal American advocacy group with a direct financial interest at stake. And actually being highly trafficked does say a lot about quality in terms of functionality, or else the airports wouldn't be able to handle that traffic. I'd never heard of Skytrax, but apparently it's a little British outfit that produces reviews and, according to your article link, was recently slapped down by the UK Advertising Standards Authority on several counts of systemic "misleading advertising" regarding its reviews and star ratings. Even then it looks like their focus is on frivolous cosmetics, like how pretty a lounge is. Most of America does have underground cables, but every country has power outages, especially in the wake of unusually extreme weather. Britain's suffering widespread blackouts right now after some rainy weather that doesn't come close to a hurricane. In the 2000s 10,000 French people died (half of them in Paris) after a heatwave that was mild by US standards, due to problems blamed on various aspects of their infrastructure. They had to convert a refrigerated warehouse next to a fruit and vegetable market into a makeshift morgue to contain the overflow of dead bodies. The US is the world's largest commercial supplier of nuclear power, but has never had a catastrophe like Fukushima or Chernobyl. And please refrain from chopping other people's posts in half. I had to fix that. VictorD7 (talk) 19:15, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

The source you are referring to in your first sentence is the source the original article was pointing at. Please follow the guidelines on top of this page. They disallow personal attacks. If high traffic implies a well-developed infrastructure, then we should also classify the infrastructure of India, for example, as well-developed. Would you say so? Hong Kong sees hurricanes on a regular basis, yet does not suffer weeklong power blackouts. 201.17.48.236 (talk) 00:07, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

It was also the source you went out of your way to link to, the one you based your position on, and was the only source used in your op. I have no idea who added it to the article, but the segment, like much of the lede, shouldn't need sourcing for such an obvious statement. I didn't make any personal attacks, but you've edited my posts twice now, the last pure vandalism, and that does violate Wiki rules. No Indian airports rank among the highest in traffic. Hong Kong is a city, and lacks most of the US infrastructure items I listed below. Plenty of US cities and towns handle hurricanes/earthquakes/tornados/etc. as good as or better than the rest of the world. New York is an aberration in many ways for reasons that should be obvious, and doesn't define the entire country. You don't seem to have a point here. VictorD7 (talk) 20:58, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

I probably removed it a little too quickly and could have just put "dead link" or "citation needed"; but now that I think of it, that part of the sentence is probably not very necessary. Though I agree with most of what you say (that US infrastructure, while somewhat under-maintained and uneven, is still far superior to that of most of the world's nations) "developed country" already implies that the country's infrastructure is well-developed; as such, it may be removed on the basis that it is simply redundant. It is impossible for a country to have a developed economy without the advanced infrastructure needed to support it; so the US isn't far removed from other developed countries and definitely not superior (the US is the largest developed country, but more infrastructure does not necessarily mean superior infrastructure). Meanwhile, having abundant natural resources and the world's highest productivity are fairly distinct elements of the country that have a reason to stay. If a similar or same source can be found to replace the dead link it could be kept; if not it wouldn't hurt to remove it for redundancy, but neither should any political talking points or advocacy replace it. Either way it would not change the overall message in that sentence which is that the US economy is highly advanced, and we should not dwell on something so small when there are bigger fish to fry. Cadiomals (talk) 06:28, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

The redundancy/space argument is a lot better than the other one, and is why I only soft opposed (I'd strongly oppose replacing it with the aforementioned talking point), though I do think the US has a unique overall infrastructure in terms of scope, variety, and technology level. Since it's such long standing material, I'd prefer to wait at least a couple of days in case other people want to weigh in. VictorD7 (talk) 07:13, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

The available evidence does not suggest that the US has a unique infrastructure, even in quantitative terms. The Mercer 2012 City Infrastructure Ranking Top-20 features 12 cities in Europe, 4 in Asia-Pacific and 3 in Canada, but only 2 cities in the US: http://www.mercer.com/qualityoflivingpr 201.17.48.236 (talk) 14:23, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

I would never consider US infrastructure superior to other developed countries either, but still vastly superior to the majority of the world's countries which are still developing, even if many say we spend too little on it. If that part of the statement were to be removed it would be primarily due to redundancy (not inaccuracy), as having a "well-developed" infrastructure is already a prerequisite for being a "developed" country, and this is not a distinguishing aspect of the US against other developed countries. Cadiomals (talk) 17:36, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

That list is very limited to a small selection of large cities (ignoring thousands of towns and medium sized cities), and even it puts 6 US cities in the top 31 and 9 in the top 50 (a sizable chunk). It's also not clear precisely what their methodology was. Having experienced European roads and other infrastructure, I would rate US infrastructure as superior (on balance) to those of other developed nations (not that driving on cobblestones isn't fun; notoriously inefficient service personnel working limited hours less so), but such an evaluation isn't necessary to use the label "well developed", as Cadiomals observes. As for unique, no other nation has the same diverse mix of high quality dams, canals, power plants, wide-laned superhighways (and in the US broad, rationally laid out roads aren't restricted to major cities), irrigation systems, air traffic development, large buildings, telecommunications wiring, desalinization/water treatment plants, cell/radio towering, cutting edge oil field development, energy usage (American consumers have more appliance access than Europeans, as the grim French tragedy related above illustrates), food production and distribution systems (compare grocery stores some time, US versus Eur., especially in average towns), sports stadiums (not even close), numerous major ports, many of the world's largest and most advanced hospitals, the world's highest rated universities, expansive railroad networks, etc., etc.. Americans don't rely on public transport to the same degree Europeans do because they prefer the freedom of owning and driving their own vehicles, but some US cities like New York were among the first in the world to build major subway systems. The US invented the skyscraper along with countless other modern infrastructure components. The US is currently building spaceports for private ships to use (e.g. ,). How many other nations can say that? In the grand scheme of things it's absurd to deny that the US has a well developed infrastructure. VictorD7 (talk) 19:15, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

On European old town cobblestone streets: are there tourists from the US who think these streets were designed for driving on? On historical references: these points show how old and outdated the New York infrastructure is (cf. hurricane Sandy). On spaceports: first, the fact that NASA expects the private sector to build spaceports so that it does not rely on Russia any more for access to space does not exactly illustrate technological achievement in the US public sector, which primarily defines a country's infrastructure; second, if spaceports render a country developed, then Russia should be classified as more developed than the US as we speak; last time I checked, it was not listed as a developed country (though it is classified as a high-income economy by the World Bank); third, a spaceport does not improve the daily life of people on earth and will not make any difference to residents of New York or New Orleans when the next hurricane comes. On dams, canals, etc: China currently has more, bigger, etc. of those than the US, including the longest highway system in the world, yet is not even classified as a developed country. 201.17.48.236 (talk) 02:08, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

It doesn't matter what the little winding (sometimes cobblestone) roads were designed for, it's the reality of the situation. NY is an aberration in many ways, and not representative of the vast nation. I mentioned spaceports for use by private spaceships (the first one invented by Americans several years ago), and you failed to meet my challenge. The US has been the lead space faring nation for decades (public and private), its reliance on Russian transport for astronauts is temporary, and even now it's miles ahead of anyone else in unmanned space flight, so that's a bizarre and counterproductive area for you to focus on. We could debate whether space travel and its associated technologies benefit people on earth, but that was just one item of many I listed, so dump your straw man. Hurricanes routinely hit the US Gulf Coast, causing vastly fewer fatalities than they do elsewhere due to superior US preparation, warning systems, and infrastructure. Katrina was an extreme aberration due to a one time flood levy break, and even then far fewer people died than in France during the mild heat weave mentioned above. On bridges, dams, and canals, bigger isn't necessarily better. China has five times as many people as the US, but Americans use four times as much energy per capita as Chinese, and significantly more than most Europeans. That's a testament to the US power grid. The only nations that rank ahead of the US in per capita energy usage are a few tiny ones, mostly in very cold or very hot locales (e.g. Iceland, some rich Arab sheikdoms). By contrast, the US is a mostly temperate nation of well over 300 million people, and those people aren't just running air conditioners or heaters 24/7. VictorD7 (talk) 20:58, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Let's try not to get too far adrift with this issue as has happened too many times before. By tomorrow as long as no one else objects I will remove that part of the statement on the basis of redundancy (developed country = well-developed infrastructure; the US is not terribly unique within the 1st world in terms of this; does not change overall point of statement). You said yourself you wouldn't be much opposed to its removal on this basis as long as there isn't any political advocacy replacing it. Then we can move on from this minor non-crucial issue. Speaking of which, I don't know if you caught my reply in edit: Settlement. Those History changes should be applied ASAP as long as no one else has concerns with it. Cadiomals (talk) 21:44, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Yes, by all means remove it or better replace it with a more accurate description such as "relatively extensive albeit decaying", so it does not mislead people into expecting, for example, European or East Asian high-speed railways in the US. That is the kind of infrastructure most people will have in mind, as opposed to trips to space that the user above appears to have in mind. Please note that the current state of the article is a deterioration over the state it was in at the beginning of this discussion. Then, there was a wrong claim along with a dead link, yet if one followed the link they would end up in a site offering a diametrically opposed view on the matter. Now, the claim remains, but the link to the different view is deleted. Please make it right. 201.17.48.236 (talk) 00:07, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Only extremely ignorant and/or narrow minded people would mistakenly equate "infrastructure" primarily with public transport, and we shouldn't be guided such an incorrect mind set. Americans typically mock the idea of public transport. Major European cities may be better for tourists, but American infrastructure is better for residents. The spaceports just underscore the unique nature of the USA's well developed infrastructure, even among developed nations. Given my long list, your cherry-picking retorts are pitiful. As explained to you earlier, the source (which never should have been added) doesn't contradict the (correct) claim or make international comparisons. VictorD7 (talk) 20:58, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Nero had freaking aquaducts. What the civil engineers care about is the first derivative ("the direction the country is going") and you should too, because it can take months to go from D+ to D, weeks to go from D to D-, and if you don't maintain a B+ or better, that means the bill just keeps going up. EllenCT (talk) 01:10, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Rome is famous for having an extremely well developed infrastructure for the time. As for "direction", by your logic every time a recession hits the US should no longer be called a "developed" or "high-income" country. VictorD7 (talk) 20:58, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

• The U.S. has a well developed infrastructure. That the U.S. has places where the infrastructure is past the "best by" date doesn't mean the infrastructure isn't "well developed". I can drive on paved surfaces and reach something like 99% of the U.S. population that way. I can take airplanes and land it to somewhere within like 20 miles of the same proportion of the population. Nearly all households have access to reliable electricity. Is it the best country in the world on any measure? Hell no. That's not what well developed means. But by any reasonable comparison to a) how the U.S. was 100 years ago and b) how most of the world lives, the U.S. infrastructure is well developed. The large amount of press the infrastructure problems in the U.S. gets is due to several factors. First, it isn't as good as it could/should be given the U.S. economic state and it probably isn't as good as it was at its best. But none of that means that the U.S. belongs out of the "well developed" category. Yes, it has problems. Yes, other countries do it better. No, none of that means that the U.S. infrastructure isn't "Well developed." Some perspective is necessary here. --Jayron32 15:26, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your input Jayron, and I agree with most of what you say. As I explained above and which no one seems to be strongly against is that I would remove that part of the statement not because it is inaccurate but on the basis of redundancy, as in when saying a country is "developed" it is already implied that it has a "well-developed" infrastructure relative to most other countries. In this way the US is not highly distinguished from the rest of the first world, whereas having abundant natural resource wealth and the highest worker productivity are distinguishing economic factors. We should be able to move on from this and not rehash the same arguments. Cadiomals (talk) 18:52, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I just wanted to ensure some discussion and expose how lousy the original argument was. That's been accomplished. VictorD7 (talk) 21:01, 27 December 2013 (UTC)

Well-developed but decaying

I propose that the US infrastructure be described as "well-developed but decaying" per the original poster's discovery that the original cited source no longer supports the article's statement (which should speak volumes to anyone hoping to return this article to good status by itself) and the three sources I added. EllenCT (talk) 03:18, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

I propose that instead of describing the infrastructure, we find sources that give reasonable, well understandable metrics, such as the % of households with reliable electricity and disease-free water; the number of people with access to paved roads, distance from airports, etc, as well as data as to, say, the state of repair of various infrastructure and how that compares to the worldwide average, and use absolutely NO adjectives or descriptors of any kind. We're in the business of reporting information, not telling people how to feel about that information. They can decide for themselves whether the data reported in the article represents "well developed" or "decaying" or whatever the readers mind tells them to feel about it. We should just report the information and leave it at that. --Jayron32 06:11, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

The solution which no one objected to was to simply remove that part of the statement, which resolves the issue fully, rather than modifying or finding alternate sources to it. Also, adding "decaying" completely misses the purpose of the overall statement, which lists the factors that are responsible for America's large and productive economy. To add that would be to simply insert more advocacy that has no place in the lead or this summary article. I archived this discussion because it has been resolved and I won't be contributing any more to it because it would involve rehashing the arguments above and going around in circles once again. Cadiomals (talk) 08:24, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Based on my quick reading of the discussion, I support Cadiomals suggestion. Though I did want to add that the scope of infrastructure seemed limited in the discussion. If we look at what the U.S. government defines as the nation's critical Infrastructure, the private sector owns and operates approximately 85% of it. Here is a list of what the DHS lists as the Critical Infrastructure Sectors - "Chemical", "Commercial Facilities", "Communications", "Critical Manufacturing", "Dams", "Defense Industrial Base", "Emergency Services", "Energy", "Financial Services", "Food and Agriculture", "Government Facilities", "Healthcare and Public Health", "Information Technology", "Nuclear Reactors, Materials, and Waste", "Transportation Systems", and "Water and Wastewater Systems". So if any future discussion arises regarding adjectives to describe the "infrastructure", make sure you take the weight in totality and specify the type of infrastructure you're talking about along with the necessary attribution. Morphh 14:27, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

While the DHS might classify nuclear waste as part of our critical infrastructure, I doubt most of our readers or any representative sample of people using the term would. Why not weight the infrastructure by how many people depend on it for their and their family's physiological well-being? EllenCT (talk) 03:52, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The nuclear sector produces 20% of the country's power. My point, which I stated in the last sentence, was to be specific as to what you're talking about and attribute it. Making a general statement about decaying infrastructure without specifying you're talking about "roads and bridges" or whatever, is misleading. Morphh 03:59, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I was supporting quoting from the civil engineering association: "D+". Are there any published figures with which they disagree? EllenCT (talk) 08:10, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I strongly object to the continued addition of instructions to refrain from discussing my proposal to update the text with the accurate version of the statement that the cited source originally supported. Cadiomals, if you persist in adding the closure/archive template before the discussion has concluded, I will open an RFC. EllenCT (talk) 01:01, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

If you actually read my and everyone else's arguments above you would have no desire to extend this petty discussion further. With four other users in agreement (including the IP who brought this up in the first place), a modified version of the statement will not be added because it has no relevance here, misses the overall purpose of the sentence it was in, and has already been removed. You had already mentioned your proposal earlier and it was rejected by others. This relatively minor issue has been resolved via consensus and extensive enough discussion which should thus be concluded, unless anyone wants to go around in circles with you which I doubt. Cadiomals (talk) 09:06, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The IP's proposal was, "relatively extensive albeit decaying." EllenCT (talk) 12:06, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

The IP said "Yes, by all means remove it or better replace it..." which means they would have taken either or. Meanwhile, three other editors and myself agreed that it would not be relevant to add a modified version of that statement and we each contributed our own rationales, so the former course was taken through consensus and the issue was resolved. Cadiomals (talk) 18:10, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

You honestly think that an article on the U.S. should not include information on the rapid rate of infrastructure decay cited in the exact same source that the article used to cite? That does not reflect good editorial judgment, whether supported by three or thirty. Please stop trying to railroad your preferred view from nowhere on topics of obviously vital importance. EllenCT (talk) 05:18, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Going through this discussion, I get the impression that some editors would prefer to suppress any information on the state of infrastructure in the US. Still, it has been argued in good faith that any "distinguishing aspect of the US against other developed countries" would be worth mentioning. It has also been argued that US Americans "typically mock the idea of public transport", which, if true, may be a factor in neglecting public transport infrastructure and hence constitute a distinguishing aspect of the US against other developed countries. It has also been argued in good faith that the US "has places where the infrastructure is past the 'best by' date". These observations have value that makes them worth appearing in this article. Some relevant information can also be found at http://www.infrastructureusa.org/. 96.240.21.221 (talk) 00:21, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

POV Crime section sentence needs revision for neutrality.

Actually much of the section is rife with skewed POV and sorely needs revising, but this should be low hanging fruit. The last two sentences read:

In 2008, Louisiana had the highest incarceration rate, and Maine the lowest. Despite Louisana having the highest number of its citizens imprisoned, the FBI's crime report for 2012 listed the state as having the highest rate of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in the United States.

Saying "despite" implies that one should expect a state with higher incarceration to have a lower crime rate than states with lower incarceration. But since people are imprisoned after being convicted of crimes, it's logical that a state with a higher serious crime rate would also have a higher incarceration rate. This misguided POV language should be tweaked. The whole sentence should probably be deleted since the section currently lacks crime rate breakdowns by city or race, but in the meantime at the very least it should be tweaked to read:

In 2008, Louisiana had the highest incarceration rate, and Maine the lowest. In 2012 Louisiana had the highest rate of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in the United States.

While it doesn't address due/weight/source that's biased as hell, it does present the fact with neutral language. Since this should be a non-controversial tweak, I'll implement it in a couple of days if there's no objection. VictorD7 (talk) 19:12, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Such detailed state breakdowns should not exist in this article in the first place whether or not they are perceived as biased. This is an overview of a single country and those extra details are simply not necessary. Cadiomals (talk) 09:20, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Should we just delete those sentences then? VictorD7 (talk) 09:52, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I am opposed to removing this information. We tout so much puffery that downsides are necessary for balance. EllenCT (talk) 12:09, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

This is not about "balancing puffery" this is about removing details irrelevant to a summary article. Details on states' crime rates don't belong on an article giving an overview of a whole nation. As for "balancing puffery" that section already states that the US has a higher crime rate than most other developed nations. If you are the only one opposing this, it will still be removed anyway as your views have consistently been at odds with consensus on many issues. Cadiomals (talk) 18:16, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I am also opposed to removing this sourced factual sentence. If we are going to delete things by simply labeling them "extra details" than we should just go ahead and delete virtually all of the United States article. I also notice that Victor is not challenging the accuracy of anything in the section. It seems like he simply wants to forbid mentioning any notable or relevant fact that does not conform to his own very biased POV. Murder is the most serious crime that a person can commit and it is logical and relevant for a section title "crime and law enforcement" to have at least one internal comparison that notes which state has the highest murder rate. An article on a country as large as the United States should not be stripped of all internal comparisons. I also don't think that the sentence needs to be tweaked at this time. "Despite Louisana having the highest number of its citizens imprisoned, the FBI's crime report for 2012 listed the state as having the highest rate of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in the United States." is simply a factual statement that is highly notable and relevant to the topic of the section. On an unrelated matter, if nobody objects I am going to go ahead and delete this sentence since it lacks a source: "Federal law prohibits a variety of drugs, although states sometimes pass laws in conflict with federal regulations." and correct the spelling of Louisiana.Lance Friedman (talk) 19:03, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

A number of non-regular users have voiced their concerns that this summary article is too extensive, and we are trying to heed their call and take stock of what can be condensed. One pointed out a barometer for article length which is an upper limit of 90 KB of prose, which this article currently still exceeds even after major shortening in November. After that point WP guidelines state that some information should be condensed or spun off into separate articles devoted to their topics. As of now everyone is in agreement that the History and Culture sections need some trimming, while non-regulars have even pointed out that other sections such as Income, poverty, and wealth should still be reduced further. Also, you can go ahead and delete that drug sentence. It is unsourced and seems disconnected from the information around it.

If we are not going to remove the two sentences that VictorD7 then we should at least look at the following paragraph to determine what can be cut out. Please don't tell me that you really believe an entire paragraph devoted to details on death penalty and execution laws is relevant to this article. There has to be some stuff we can remove from this:

Capital punishment is sanctioned in the United States for certain federal and military crimes, and used in 32 states. While there are 32 states which include capital punishment within their sentencing statutes, some states (such as New Hampshire and Kansas) have yet to execute anyone since 1976, as demonstrated by the lack of any executions by these states out of the 1,317 total executions which had taken place by December 5, 2012. No executions took place from 1967 to 1977, owing in part to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling striking down arbitrary imposition of the death penalty. In 1976, that Court ruled that, under appropriate circumstances, capital punishment may constitutionally be imposed; since the decision there have been more than 1,300 executions, a majority of these taking place in three states: Texas, Virginia, and Oklahoma. Five state legislatures in the modern era have abolished the death penalty, though two of those laws (in New Mexico and Connecticut) were not retroactive. Additionally, state courts in Massachusetts and New York struck down death penalty statutes and their legislatures took no action in response. In 2010, the country had the fifth highest number of executions in the world, following China, Iran, North Korea, and Yemen.

Cadiomals (talk) 19:52, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

No, Friedman, I just prefer the article conform with Wiki guidelines on neutrality. I'd be all for balancing the cherry-picked info with facts about the murder capitals of the country in terms of city, racial crime rate breakdowns, and lots of other important stuff you didn't see fit to add, but, as Cadiomals indicated, the consensus sentiment here is that the article is too long, so streamlining is generally preferred to adding material.

As for the actual proposal, you didn't even provide a defense for using the loaded, illogical, POV language "despite". That wording isn't factual at all. My edit will retain the facts (for now), but the "despite" phrasing has to go. Plus it'll save a little space. VictorD7 (talk) 20:06, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Victor, I don't see how adding what you vaguely term "racial crime rate breakdowns" and 'murder capitals" would be "balancing" anything that is currently in the crime and law enforcement section. Cadiomals, I have no problem with making the entire United States article moderately shorter and more concise. However I would like to see more of an emphasis on deleting unsourced material as opposed to sourced material. For example, the food section and the section above it have multiple paragraphs that are totally unsourced and relatively trivial in nature. If nobody has any objections i'm just going to start deleting a lot of unsourced material that is peppered throughout the United States article. That should help greatly in tightening the article. I also have no problem with shortening the capital punishment paragraph. It is a little long compared to the others in the section. If nobody objects I'll go ahead and delete this part of the part of the paragraph: "While there are 32 states which include capital punishment within their sentencing statutes, some states (such as New Hampshire and Kansas) have yet to execute anyone since 1976, as demonstrated by the lack of any executions by these states out of the 1,317 total executions which had taken place by December 5, 2012"Lance Friedman (talk) 16:29, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

You can add a ton of sourced, factual material, that doesn't necessarily mean it belongs in this particular article; that is what we have to take stock of. Also instead of just saying you're going to start removing random unsourced material it's advisable to present it all here first of course so it can be discussed. The Food section is fairly short in comparison to other sections so it may be best to just find sourcing for some of those statements, though I agree some paragraphs in Culture can be trimmed. To cut down an already short section while leaving another one unnecessarily long makes little sense to me. I also propose condensing this sentence in the capital punishment paragraph: Five state legislatures in the modern era have abolished the death penalty, though two of those laws (in New Mexico and Connecticut) were not retroactive. Additionally, state courts in Massachusetts and New York struck down death penalty statutes and their legislatures took no action in response down to "Meanwhile, several states have either abolished or struck down death penalty laws". Such specific detail is so irrelevant in this article, and if readers really wanted to learn more they would visit the actual main articles, that's what they're for. Cadiomals (talk) 18:51, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Ah, so by your own logic you're seeking to "forbid mentioning any notable or relevant fact that does not conform to (your) own very biased POV". Or maybe you now realize that accuracy isn't the only quality issue at stake. I don't personally feel strongly one way or the other about the drug sentence, but you should hold off on other unilateral deletions of long standing material (including the food section) until they're discussed here first. Remember that Misplaced Pages standards don't require something to be sourced, only verifiable. Most article items are undeniably true, and adding sources to some of the material not likely to be challenged would be a frivolous waste of space. You didn't provide a defense of the "despite" language, so I'll proceed with that tweak soon. VictorD7 (talk) 18:12, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Victor, so far there is no consensus for you to make any of your proposed changes. Two people are against deleting the sentence and two people support keeping it in. I am the only one who has commented on your proposed rewording and I am opposed to it because i don't think there is any problem with the current wording. If a clear consensus emerges on any of your proposed changes, I will defer to that consensus. Until then you should not make any changes to the section. I myself will not make any unilateral deletions. I will post proposed deletions on the talk page before deleting. If nobody objects I'll make the deletion to the capital punishment paragraph later tonight or tomorrow. I assume you support that deletion.Lance Friedman (talk) 19:30, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Hold off on changes to the Crime section too until we nail down here what should be deleted. I'm not deleting the sentences for now, but am removing frivolous POV wording in a slight tweak. So far you're the only one objecting to revising the "despite" language for neutrality and common sense (my actual proposal), and you have yet to provide a reason. Do you have a rational, compelling objection to my proposed wording above? VictorD7 (talk) 19:36, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

A lot of these sections have far too much detail. The article should give a general overview of the main points and extensive detail should be in other articles. It would be worthwhile pointing out that justice policy and rates of crime differ considerably between relatively enlightened and relatively backward parts of the U.S., of which Maine and Louisiana are two examples. There is also no need for mentioning the FBI's report inline. Presumably it is accurate, not just their opinion. Also, since part of the purpose ot draconian sentencing is to deter crime and prevent criminals from re-offending by locking them up, one might expect that higher incarceration rates would lead to lower crime. If sources draw a connection between incarceration rates and crime rates, there is no reason why we should not mention it. TFD (talk) 20:10, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

"relatively enlightened and relatively backward parts of the U.S." - Gee, no POV prejudice there. As for your line about "draconian" sentencing, that might apply to an apples to apples comparison of a single state over time, but not an apples to oranges comparison of two different states at the same time. If one state has a higher crime rate, for whatever reason, it's going to have more people incarcerated than a state with a lower crime rate even if sentencing guidelines are the exactly the same, won't it? VictorD7 (talk) 22:47, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Then suggest a politically correct alternative for the word "backward." Anyway, your view of sentencing is the wrong way around. The whole point of "draconian" incarceration rates is to reduce crime. If crime is not reduced, then the policy is a failure, which is the point of saying "despite." While higher crime rates would normally lead to more people in prison, the point is that sentences in LA are longer and therefore one would expect that to deter criminals and to keep them off the streets. TFD (talk) 08:29, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

This is drifting off topic into general political discussion again, a bad habit that needs to stop. The real issue is whether you can make the argument that details like that really belong in this summary article and that they ought not just be kept in relevant articles like Crime in the United States or Incarceration in the United States. I believe the sentence "In 2008, Louisiana had the highest incarceration rate, and Maine the lowest" can be kept as it notes that regional/state disparities exist, while the sentence succeeding it should be removed for irrelevancy. Cadiomals (talk) 08:45, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't recall ever hearing someone argue that one state should be expected to have a lower crime rate than another state due to sentencing. The current Wiki text is a straw man argument. Misplaced Pages text shouldn't be making arguments at all, and certainly shouldn't be seeking to portray some places as "backward" either in direct or thinly disguised language. Crime rates can decrease dramatically in LA (arguably in part due to tough sentencing) and still be higher than another, radically different state. Crime rates are driven by many variables. One, for example, is racial makeup. Blacks nationally commit murder at 7 times the rate of non-blacks, and most blacks live in the south. LA has over 4 times as many blacks proportionally as MA. Other factors (socioeconomic, broad cultural, geography) might also be at play in explaining the difference between the states. The fact that LA has more murders than MA proves nothing regarding sentencing. The gap might be even wider if LA had more lax sentencing. Regardless, at a snapshot, people are incarcerated because they've been convicted of crime, so one would expect a state with a higher crime rate to have more people currently incarcerated. You just admitted that "higher crime rates would normally lead to more people in prison", so there's really nothing left to argue. The current sentence is a poorly thought out political talking point. The text has to change to drop the POV (at best) assumption. VictorD7 (talk) 18:03, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

While more crime would lead to more people in prison, we are talking about the length of prison terms. Longer terms mean that someone who otherwise might commit a murder cannot because he is still in prison for a previous offense. And longer sentences should deter people from committing crimes in the first place. Why do you think sentences are longer in Lousiana if not to reduce crime? TFD (talk) 20:38, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

The issue here isn't whether tougher sentencing has reduced crime over time (it probably has), but whether one should assume a state with more people incarcerated should have a lower crime rate than a totally different state given all the other variables involved. So far no one has presented evidence of anyone arguing that LA would have a lower crime rate than another state because of its tough sentencing, making the text a straw man argument. Best for Misplaced Pages's voice to sidestep such disputes and just neutrally present facts; let readers do the interpreting. VictorD7 (talk) 21:14, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

No, it is whether tougher sentencing would lead to lower crime. Tougher sentencing is btw the main reason Lousiana is the world's leading jailer, beating out China and Iran. You agree with Lousiana that tougher sentencing reduces crime. Don't know what "over time" means. It's been that way for over a century. TFD (talk) 21:22, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Louisiana's murder rate has fallen from a sky high rate of 20.3 per 100k in 1993 to 10.8 in 2012. How much if any of that decline is due to sentencing (which has gotten tougher in recent decades) is a separate debate, but it has fallen dramatically. That it's still higher than a state that had a relatively low crime rate to begin with doesn't necessarily have anything to do with sentencing, and even if it did you shouldn't be making that POV argument in Misplaced Pages's voice. Even if you were to ignore policy and make such an argument, the current text inadequately fleshes it out. At a snapshot, a state with a higher crime rate will have more people in prison than one with a lower crime rate. You can't escape the logical causality of crime-conviction-incarceration, in that order. VictorD7 (talk) 21:42, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how "balancing puffery" means singling out two states in an article about the whole country. The sentence should go. There are better ways of doing this than describing the crime statistics of 1/25th of the states, comprising 1/50th of the population. --Golbez (talk) 21:06, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Victor, according to the FBI, Alaska and New Mexico have the third and fourth highest rates of violent crime in the USA http://247wallst.com/special-report/2013/10/04/the-most-dangerous-states-in-america/3/ Do you think the Eskimos and Mexicans are the explanation for the high crime in those states? Also, lots of countries have large African minorities. France has a larger African minority population than the U.S, yet its murder rate is exponentially lower than our own: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/10/16446720-americans-far-more-likely-to-suffer-violent-deaths-than-peers?lite Regardless all of that is off topic.------ The sentence being disputed is part of a paragraph about our highest in the world incarceration rate. Louisiana is mentioned in this paragraph because it has the highest incarceration rate in the nation, roughly double the national average. Because you think it it is "illogical" and "poorly thought out" among other things, you want to delete or alter this last sentence in the paragraph: "Despite Louisiana having the highest number of its citizens imprisoned, the FBI's crime report for 2012 listed the state as having the highest rate of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in the United States." However, far from being such a crazy thing to say the largest newspaper in Louisiana says virtually the same thing: "Despite locking up more people for longer periods than any other state, Louisiana has one of the highest rates of both violent and property crimes." http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2012/05/louisiana_is_the_worlds_prison.html The conservative Reason Foundation also says virtually the same thing: "Despite having the highest incarceration rate in the nation, and higher corrections expenditures per capita as compared to its neighboring states, Louisiana’s violent crime rate has remained consistently above those of its neighboring states, as well as the national average." (Sentence is on page 3 of link): http://reason.org/files/louisiana_sentencing_reform.pdf I am thinking maybe we we should make the last sentence of incarceration paragraph into a direct quote from the NOLA article. It is a very interesting article. Happy New YearLance Friedman (talk) 12:48, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually blacks are only 3.5% of the French population and 13% of the US population, but you completely missed my point, which is that lots of variables (not just race/ethnicity) impact crime rate (and I was speaking of a current US based subcultural phenomenon that isn't necessarily the same for all blacks everywhere). I just cited one salient example commented on by researchers from the FBI to academics. : "Expanded Homicide...Data Of the offenders for whom race was known, 52.4 percent were black, 45.2 percent were white, and 2.4 percent were of other races." This American Thinker piece concludes that non-black, legal US residents have a murder rate around 1 per 100k, about the same level as northern Europe, citing among others UCLA professor Peter Baldwin who's written for the Huffington Post before. I haven't had time to dig into the illegal alien murder stats they give but the FBI black/white stuff is solid. That's important information in and of itself that more merits inclusion than a lot of the stuff currently in, especially given the misleading incarceration racial breakdown already present.

Back to my point. Just because a source has an opinion doesn't mean it's appropriate to include that opinion in the article, especially unchallenged and in Misplaced Pages's voice. Lots of sources have all sorts of opinions. Reason is a libertarian magazine with a soft sentencing agenda. Your other source, The Time Picayune editorial, was written by a girl named Cindy Chang and it's not clear that she's an expert on anything apart from writing fact poor liberal political polemics on various issues in that paper. Nothing she said changes the fact that, all things being equal (including law enforcement effectiveness, meaning perps are caught), a state with a higher crime rate will have more people incarcerated than one with a lower crime rate. If the state with a higher crime rate has tougher sentencing on top of that, then it will have even more people incarcerated, not fewer. You're still pounding at a straw man argument, Friedman. You failed to link to anything where someone claims tougher sentencing in one state will mean that state will have a lower crime rate than another state. There's absolutely nothing surprising about the state with the highest violent crime rate having the highest incarceration rate. The low quality, totally frivolous POV wording should be adjusted so that we have merely a neutral presentation of the facts. VictorD7 (talk) 20:10, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Changes

I am being bold and making what I feel are the necessary trimmings, which I think are compromising and non-extreme. It is not good for such lengthy pointless back-and-forth to continue without anything being done.

• Keeping "In 2008, Louisiana had the highest incarceration rate, and Maine the lowest" because it is worthwhile to mention that disparities exist among states/regions and that crime and incarceration is not uniform across the country, while tweaking succeeding sentence to read "In 2012 Louisiana had the highest rate of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters in the United States."
• Removing "While there are 32 states which include capital punishment within their sentencing statutes, some states (such as New Hampshire and Kansas) have yet to execute anyone since 1976, as demonstrated by the lack of any executions by these states out of the 1,317 total executions which had taken place by December 5, 2012" as agreed upon by Lance Friedman
• Condensing the excessively detailed sentence "Five state legislatures in the modern era have abolished the death penalty, though two of those laws (in New Mexico and Connecticut) were not retroactive. Additionally, state courts in Massachusetts and New York struck down death penalty statutes and their legislatures took no action in response" down to "Meanwhile, several states have either abolished or struck down death penalty laws" while adding a wikilink pointing to those states.
• Removing mention of Poland

I think all these changes are badly needed, none are very major or extreme and I hope they will be respected so we can bring this issue to a close and keep moving forward in the process of making this article worthy of Good status once again. Cadiomals (talk) 21:47, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

The Crime section still needs more work, but those edits resolve this Talk Section issue.VictorD7 (talk) 17:51, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Better textual descriptions of economic inequality

Currently, all the article says about income inequality is "The rise in the share of total annual income received by the top 1 percent, which has more than doubled from 9 percent in 1976 to 20 percent in 2011, has had a significant impact on income inequality, leaving the United States with one of the widest income distributions among OECD nations.", citing sources from 2013, 2005, and 2007, respectively. I propose updating and expanding that with summaries of:

1. "Changes in capital gains and dividends were the largest contributor to the increase in the overall income inequality. Taxes were less progressive in 2006 than in 1996, and consequently, tax policy also contributed to the increase in income inequality between 1996 and 2006. But overall income inequality would likely have increased even in the absence of tax policy changes." --Hungerford, Thomas L. (December 29, 2011). Changes in the Distribution of Income Among Tax Filers Between 1996 and 2006: The Role of Labor Income, Capital Income, and Tax Policy (Report 7-5700/R42131). Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service. Retrieved 1 January 2014.
2. "The average increase in real income reported by the bottom 90 percent of earners in 2011, compared with 1966, if measured at one inch, would extend almost five miles for the top 1 percent of the top 1 percent." --Johnston, David Cay (February 25, 2013). "Income Inequality: 1 Inch to 5 Miles". TaxAnalysts.com. Retrieved 1 January 2014.
3. "Single black and Hispanic women have a median wealth of $100 and $120 respectively; the median for single white women is $41,500." --Lifting as We Climb: Women of Color, Wealth, and America’s Future (PDF). Oakland, California: Insight Center for Community Economic Development. Spring 2010. Retrieved 1 January 2014.

I understand that space is tight in such a large article, but some or all of these would inform readers more accurately about the true economic condition of the US than what we have now, and therefore would be well worth hundreds of extra bytes. This is the most important issue facing the U.S. according to a recent economics Nobel winner. EllenCT (talk) 14:21, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

I did make a suggestion. It's called not adding the first two because they are inappropriate for this article, and probably adding something along the lines of the third one; except instead of focusing on women it should be a brief mention of race in general, and if added it should displace your pointless and out-of-place stats on retirement savings. Also, I don't make such accusations lightly, but given your history (not just in this article) it would be quite difficult at this point not to label your edits and suggestions as tendentious. It's the same every time you bring this topic up, and it's really been enough. Sorry if you don't like this clear reality pointed out for other editors to be wary of. Cadiomals (talk) 06:37, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Why omit women? Why do you disagree, with Forbes of all sources, about the impacts of the retirement savings crisis? You were saying that you don't think editors should be warned about other editors' abuses, but somehow my persistence against someone trying to use non-peer reviewed sources which contradict the peer reviewed secondary sources to push his political point of view is wearing you out? If you don't want me to complain about such editing abuses, then why are you complaining about my attempt to present an accurate representation of the economy? In what universe would pointing out inaccurate POV pushing be better than making improvements? I simply do not understand your reasoning. EllenCT (talk) 12:32, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

This article is very large in scope, so if you want to include points about differences in wealth by race, wouldn't it be better to broaden it slightly? I think it's appropriate to point out that racial disparities, but focusing on women is missing part of the bigger point. There's a lot of literature out there on income and wealth gaps by race.Mattnad (talk) 17:31, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree, we need slightly more text on this. But there are some concern trolls pretending to want more accuracy but continuously resorting to attacks who are backing up the people willing to try to cherry pick from less reliable sources. EllenCT (talk) 03:52, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

When did I ever say I "don't think editors should be warned about other editors' abuses"? Please quote me directly on that, otherwise it's a fallacy. Your complaints about VictorD7 were inappropriate for this Talk page and I advised you to contact an admin or take it somewhere more appropriate instead, and you did, didn't you? And you ended up shooting yourself in the foot by exposing your own history of abuses. I also never said to omit women, I said to include the general population by race, men and women, which is more broad and neutral. I don't understand your reasoning either, because after being shot down repeatedly by consensus you keep coming back with the same kinds of suggestions, which have not been considered by the majority of editors to be improvements to this article. Most others would have taken the hint by now. If all you're going to do is build straw men and repeat your usual "arguments" I won't be replying to you anymore on this thread. Cadiomals (talk) 18:18, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

You personally and repeatedly removed my warnings about VictorD7's continual attempt to cherry pick non-peer reviewed sources against my peer reviewed WP:SECONDARY sources. If your complaints about how you don't have enough patience to deal with that are appropriate, then why weren't my original warnings? You are welcome to enumerate whatever "history of abuses" you think I have on my talk page, but otherwise you should remove or at least strike such personal attacks. Should you wish to actually discuss the topic at hand to try to improve the article, then please let me know why you think describing the plight of minorities in general would be better or worse than describing the plight of minority women. EllenCT (talk) 03:52, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

For the record, Ellen's claims about me and that topic are completely false, and were systematically debunked by me and other editors on the Talk Page she linked to earlier. Far from cherry-picking, I used every source available, including the ones she linked, to refute her position. Even those who share her politics don't agree with her. I would appreciate it if she stopped invoking my name in this ad hominem diversion from substance. VictorD7 (talk) 06:14, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

VictorD7 has still been unable to find a single peer-reviewed source agreeing with his newfound belief that corporations pass 0% of their taxes to their customers, and now he doesn't want his name associated with the fact that the several sources he did find saying so were all not peer reviewed. I will not shut up about this until an apology makes it to my talk page along with the answers to the 11 questions that VictorD7 still refuses to answer. EllenCT (talk) 06:33, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Please stop peddling falsehoods, Ellen, particularly off topic ones. () I won't hold my breath waiting for your apology, or for you to find a single source supporting your claims about "consumers". VictorD7 (talk) 08:39, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Replacing your savings segment with a sentence breaking down median income by race (not necessarily in the same place) might be acceptable (though it'd mean this article is really selective about the racial breakdowns it includes and omits), though it should be sourced by a relatively neutral reference like the Census. I oppose adding the gender breakdown. That's a partisan talking point and if we added a nominal breakdown we'd need to add contextual info like this study showing that the "wage gap" almost entirely disappears when variables like qualifications, hours worked, and children are controlled for. Bloating the article further with new point/counterpoint stuff would probably be going in the wrong direction. I certainly oppose convoluted, cherry-picked presentations of niche demographics. I'll also note that wealth is a shakier measurement than income (because it's harder to measure), and we'd need to verify your last source's claims anyway. It's from a liberal advocacy group that lobbies for racially discriminatory finance legislation in favor of "people of color" and is so unnotable that it apparently has no Misplaced Pages article. That my perusal of its website found most its links busted wasn't encouraging. VictorD7 (talk) 06:14, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I am interested in the opinions of those who do not use non-peer reviewed sources to try to push their political opinions into articles, and therefore I disregard VictorD7's opinions. EllenCT (talk) 06:33, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

So based on your logic I should disregard all your future proposals and opinions in the future streamlining of this article? It is ironic that you would accuse someone else of "trying to push their political opinions" when, unlike you, Victor has not proposed or wrongfully attempted any insertions of content for the past two months, while you have tried at every turn, forcing a number of RfC's that have all turned out against you. I would prefer non-tendentious editors who actually know what kind of content is appropriate for this summary article, so I ought to ignore and disregard Ellen's opinions, except that would be unfair and against Misplaced Pages's behavioral guidelines.

Also in response to your above reply, describing inequalities with minorities rather than just minority women would be infinitely better because it is inclusive, covers the topic more broadly and may actually be appropriate for this article, not to mention a mountain of well-known reliable sources already exist for such a subject, rather than the more obscure ones you've chosen to cherry-pick. Cadiomals (talk) 08:28, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

edit. Independence and expansion - part 1.

edit. Independence and expansion - part 1 - the first two paragraphs. Proposal:

The American Revolution was the first successful colonial war of independence against a European power. Americans had developed an ideology of "republicanism" that held government rested on the will of the people as expressed in their local legislatures. They demanded their rights as Englishmen, “no taxation without representation”. The British insisted on administering the empire through Parliament, and the conflict escalated into the American Revolutionary War. The Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, on July 4, 1776, proclaiming that humanity is created equal in their inalienable rights. That date is now celebrated annually as America's Independence Day. In 1777, the Articles of Confederation established a weak government that operated until 1789.

Britain recognized the independence of the United States following their defeat at Yorktown. In the peace treaty of 1783, American sovereignty was recognized from the Atlantic coast west to the Mississippi River. Nationalists led the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 in writing the United States Constitution, and it was ratified in state conventions in 1788. The federal government was reorganized into three branches for their checks and balances in 1789. The Bill of Rights, forbidding federal restriction of personal freedoms and guaranteeing a range of legal protections, was adopted in 1791.

end proposal for the first two paragraphs. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:28, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

That looks good to me so far. Should there be something about checks and balance of power, possibly tacked onto the "three branches" sentence? It may not be vital since it's mentioned lower in the Gov. section, but then so is the Bill of Rights, and the Montesquieuesque concern was a major force at the Constitutional Convention, so it wouldn't be inappropriate to mention here. VictorD7 (talk) 18:42, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

insert. done, with "... government was reorganized into three branches for their checks and balances in 1789." TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:58, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

"...proclaiming that people are created equal," without quotes, please! EllenCT (talk) 01:29, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Insert. okay, "...proclaiming humanity is created equal in (their)(its) inalienable rights", without quotes or quoting either phrase. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:33, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually I prefer using the actual quoted words if we're saying what they were "proclaiming", but maybe it's not a huge deal either way. Should we spend a few words mentioning what those inalienable rights are though? Most notably life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? Or would that be frivolous space consumption? VictorD7 (talk) 19:14, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm very conscious here at 'United States' for this history section to be very abbreviated, not drifting into territory better treated in History of the United States, so I wrote out all references to presidents by name, for instance, not because they are not important, but only because the main points can be covered without naming them per se. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:20, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

You should explain how your proposal differs from what is already there and why the changes should be made. Incidentally, if you do not use quotes, then you should use modern spelling, viz., "inalienable." I doubt that the term "nationalist" would be applicable, and the current reading that talks of the "ideology of republicanism" is questionable. TFD (talk) 05:20, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

The proposal is shorter because the article is too long. "Nationalist" is sourced by the original contributor, that's how they are characterized in the literature in Wood, Maier and elsewhere, and you offer no sources for an alternative. Misplaced Pages explains "ideology of republicanism" more fully for you at the subsidiary article linked there in blue at "ideology of republicanism" in the proposal, i.e. Republicanism in the United States. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:33, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

The source uses the word "nationalist" in a non-standard way to mean people who wanted a national government. Wood saw republicanism as only one of two ideologies - the other one was liberalism. We need to be careful in phrasing. TFD (talk) 08:27, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Wood says the national government was "created" in the 1790s (2011, p.255) and the Anti-Federalists claimed with some justification that they were the real federalists. Instead of parsing which group were the 'real' federalists here, as we are constrained by an encyclopedic style, we should use the standard way of referring to --- those who innovate and impose a national government ---, as the "nationalists", just as we find both a) in common usage by a general readership and b) in the literature. You have not offered a source to justify altering the standard meaning of 'nationalist' in the existing text. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 14:04, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Is it okay if you added a quick mention of George Washington being unanimously elected the first president in 1788 at the end of the second paragraph? I don't think it would hurt as he of course left a major influence on how govt was conducted and set many precedents as first president, one of many being the two term tradition, which should maybe be mentioned. Cadiomals (talk) 22:00, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

My instinct is to agree with Cadiomals about mentioning Washington, since he explains the name of the capital and a state and was crucial to nation's formation and development in many ways (it'd be bizarre for this article not to mention him at all), but I'm curious to see how TVH's entire History draft unfolds without presidential mention first. I suppose we could revisit the Washington issue later. VictorD7 (talk) 19:31, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

I'd agree if one were to be mentioned, Washington would be the one, indispensable man, as Flexner put it. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:09, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

edit. Independence and expansion - part 2.

edit 'Independence and expansion, paragraphs 3 and 4 into one. proposal:

Although the federal government criminalized the international slave trade in 1808, after 1820 cultivation of the highly profitable cotton crop exploded in the Deep South, and along with it the slave population. The Second Great Awakening, beginning about 1800, converted millions to evangelical Protestantism. In the North it energized multiple social reform movements, including abolitionism, in the South, Methodists and Baptists proselytized among slave populations. Americans' eagerness to expand westward prompted a long series of Indian Wars. The Louisiana Purchase of French-claimed territory in 1803 almost doubled the nation's size. The War of 1812, declared against Britain over various grievances and fought to a draw, strengthened U.S. nationalism. A series of U.S. military incursions into Florida led Spain to cede it and other Gulf Coast territory in 1819.

end proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:47, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Looks good so far. Do you remember the text of the War of 1812 segment we had a several editor consensus for that vanished mysteriously at some point? Might be a good opportunity to tweak the current sentence by removing a definitive statement that the result was a "draw", since there's disagreement. Many sources vaguely call it a draw, but some call it a British victory and some call it an American victory. I believe the old consensus sentence described the war's impact while avoiding one of those pat designations. Just a suggestion. VictorD7 (talk) 19:16, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

There is a scholarly consensus the war was a draw. Rwenonah (talk) 19:45, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

The scholarship is as I described it: many (probably most) "draw", and some saying either the British or Americans won. We aren't required to use such language; scholars say many things about the war currently not included in this article. I'm not sure how scholarly the word "draw" even is. VictorD7 (talk) 19:53, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

True. You're probably right its better to just stay away from the term. Rwenonah (talk) 19:55, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Regardless, the war did more than simply "strengthen nationalism". It stabilized borders, saw US territorial acquisition at Mobile, spurred the development of a standing, high quality professional military (at least the officer level), compelled Britain and other global nations to take the US seriously as a sovereign nation, and broke the power of Britain's Amerindian allies, clearing the way for westward expansion. Some (not all) of that was mentioned in the aforementioned old consensus version. VictorD7 (talk) 20:06, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

The war brought about every USG demand, principally the respect of US citizens on land and sea and recognition of its sovereign territory. The kidnapping of US citizens at sea with and without British accents ceased, including free whites and blacks. National citizenship is changeable. Peace came after defeating British invasions in the north and in the south and Wellington refused the American theater command. Britain relinquished their demands requiring Maine (plus) be ceded to Canada, free navigation of the Mississippi, and an independent Native buffer-state between the Ohio River and the Great Lakes to limit any US expansion along the Canadian border west of Ohio. UK finally withdrew from its forts on US soil since the 1783 Treaty of Paris, and ended its military aid to Native Nation allies.

On the other hand, Article Ten forges an alliance between UK and US to end the international slave trade, and bilateral peace commissions are set up to guarantee Canadian borders so as to end the threat of US invasion. The British sneak attack on New Orleans launched during peace negotiations failed to secure its free navigation of the Mississippi through the port of New Orleans (see Gibraltar for an example of how this would have worked out for the Americans had there been a British victory).

--- However let's stay with "a draw" for now, and walk through the entire section once to shorten it, then return to open debate on the great issues of American history later. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 20:42, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

One historian said "The war was a draw, but the United States won the negotiations".Rwenonah (talk) 20:44, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Save the minor issue of the War of 1812 and the question I raised about G. Washington above, both parts look pretty good. All major points covered. I assume there will be a part 3 with the rest of the paragraphs. Cadiomals (talk) 21:51, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

As a first draft revision, I wrote out the named presidential references, all of them, although I know high school history teachers prepping students for the Advanced Placement tests emphasize Presidents as a way to organize chronology in the essays. I just did not think them essential in this summary encyclopedic overview of U.S. history here, versus the History of the United States, which is a different article. Part 3 appears below. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 10:54, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Edit. Independence and expansion - part 3.

edit independence and expansion. part 3. proposal:

From 1820 to 1850, Jacksonian democracy began a set of reforms which included wider male suffrage, and it led to the rise of the Second Party System of Democrats and Whigs as the dominant parties from 1828 to 1854. The Trail of Tears in the 1830s exemplified the Indian removal policy that moved Indians into the west to their own reservations. The U.S. annexed the Republic of Texas in 1845 during a period of expansionist Manifest Destiny. The 1846 Oregon Treaty with Britain led to U.S. control of the present-day American Northwest. Victory in the Mexican-American War resulted in the 1848 Mexican Cession of California and much of the present-day American Southwest.

The California Gold Rush of 1848–49 spurred western migration and the creation of additional western states. After the American Civil War, new intercontinental railways made relocation easier for settlers, expanded internal trade and increased conflicts with Native Americans. Over a half-century, the loss of the buffalo was an existential blow to many Plains Indians cultures. In 1869, a new Peace Policy sought to protect Native-Americans from abuses, avoid further warfare, and secure their eventual U.S. citizenship.

end proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 10:30, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

"Wars of extermination" can easily be misinterpreted by a modern reader out of context. If we're replacing direct quotes from the Declaration of Independence, we should probably replace that colorful quote too with language more accurately describing the policy shift. VictorD7 (talk) 19:38, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

That is why Ulysses S. Grant's phrasing is in quotes. Would you prefer a more modern term like genocide? TFD (talk)

You mean the word that was overwhelmingly rejected by consensus here a few months ago? Nah, I'd prefer non loaded, non emotive, coherent language. And yeah, I mentioned the quotes. The deleted Declaration of Independence quotes were quotes too. VictorD7 (talk) 22:30, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

How about 'reversed the previous costly policy of wars to extermination, intending to civilize' without quotes? see revised proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 00:18, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

The problem is "policy" and "extermination", since it wasn't US policy to exterminate the Amerindians, and the Grant quote was obviously hyperbole describing something he didn't want to happen in the future (a few years earlier he had laid out the Peace Policy: ) "To" is still problematic because Amerindian non-combatant deaths at the hands of the US military were actually quite small. Legislation to at least nominally protect Indians from white abuses long predated Grant, as did pro-assimilation sentiment, but the new "peace policy" was primarily an attempt to strengthen the largely dysfunctional and sometimes corrupt Indian relations infrastructure (e.g. more robust reservation system; replacing appointed administrative political cronies with more sincere Christian outfits), and a key shift in actual policy was to treat them as wards of the government rather than independent nations (complete with discarding the chaotic treaty process), with an eye toward "civilizing" them in the American fashion. All this was intended to minimize or eliminate future wars. How about something like this? In 1869, a new Peace Policy sought to protect Native-Americans from abuses and avoid further warfare, intending to civilize and eventually give them U.S. citizenship. Or maybe the sentence should focus on the key shift from independent nations to government wards. Here's an alternative proposal: In 1869 a new Peace Policy sought to reduce warfare by treating Amerindians as federal government wards rather than independent nations, civilizing them, and eventually giving them U.S. citizenship. Regardless, the current wording is misleading and should change.VictorD7 (talk) 03:44, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I took a variation of your first alternative. 'In 1869 a new Peace Policy sought to protect Native-Americans from abuses, avoid further warfare, and secure their eventual U.S. citizenship.' TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:04, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. VictorD7 (talk) 09:10, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Align images 'right'

I have aligned the only 'left' image to the 'right' in accordance with WP:ACCESS.

It allows access to those readers with sight disabilities, including those who are legally blind in classroom settings. Computer screen enhancers magnify text in WP articles in such a way that it can be readily followed only with all images aligned to the right margin.

For articles using the WP:ACCESS convention, the student can actively participate in group projects and in-class research available through few other formats. It is good thing at Misplaced Pages. Without it they are unnecessarily handicapped a) in topic searches to locate material and b) in reading speed for text comprehension, both of which are essential for real-time classroom participation with fully sighted peers. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:06, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

This alignment right for images necessarily places a limit for illustrations in sections of very short text. But the general rule is to align images with text, that the encyclopedia be primarily text unless the article is explicitly a gallery of images.

Alignment right makes impossible the "ears" layout of an image on each side of a center gutter of text, makes impossible left-right slalom of images with text snaking down the page --- regardless of however crafty that might appear on the browser of the composing editor. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:13, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Added facts deleted

At B. Fairbaim’s “added facts” edit to the article, I deleted the lengthy and undiscussed paraphrase of British convict labor found elsewhere in History of the United States at British Colonization.

It is not useful for the history section in this United States country article to mirror subsidiary history articles piecemeal in their detail. Convicts working a term until freed were a form of indentured labor encompassed in the reference found in the existing text. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 15:08, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I also reverted his Columbus "discovery" deletion for the reason given in my edit summary. It's not that I oppose his alternative wording per se, but I don't want a fallacious argument (Columbus supposedly not discovering America) to set in and possibly influence future decisions. VictorD7 (talk) 19:02, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree that the added info on British convicts is irrelevant to the overall "big picture" focus of the section. However, in terms of Columbus' "discovery" of the New World, that can and will be interpreted in different ways by our readers. For example, most of them know that Asiatic Paleo-indians were the first humans to set foot in the Americas, while many of them may even know that the Norse were the first Europeans to encounter North America; Columbus "discovered" it for Western Europe but many readers may not think of it that way at first. I can see them raising such objections on this Talk page in the future, so I think "first voyage" is the most neutral and clear-cut wording to prevent any potential confusion. Cadiomals (talk) 01:23, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

We might say 'indentures and convicts' -- were the editor to collegially join the Talk page for a discussion, especially considering Georgia's unique beginnings, but convicts are a small percentage overall, and otherwise not worth inclusion at this summary level. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:18, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

As I indicated, I can live with the wording. But hopefully those people understand why we bother mentioning Columbus at all, because I guarantee that in this age of dumbed down curricula and deemphasis on history many don't. Addressing the opening words' own purpose in the section was one advantage of using the completely accurate "discovery". VictorD7 (talk) 03:23, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Tag at demographics.religion

At 'demographics.religion', the tag reads, This section's factual accuracy may be compromised due to out-of-date information. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (March 2013).

This seems to be no more than a drive-by disruptive speculation, with no discussion here of the promised new data. Without the advertised discussion of the current sources available, I'll remove the tag. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 15:34, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually the religious demographics info has been of concern to me because the data has not been updated since 2007, 7 years ago; there is even one statistic from as far back as 2002, and as many know America's religious demographics are not static. If someone could find a more updated source (preferably from the same one, Pew) it would be better. If not we will have to wait till newer info is released. Cadiomals (talk) 17:42, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Therefore the tag can be removed until there is more up-to-date information.

We are reporting the best information to our knowledge at this time, there is no annual report to my knowledge, I have seen Time use seven-year old data for a religious article, and when the less frequent religious demographic studies are taken, we will post them as editors with this area of interest make their contributions.

Or the tag is an invitation for an editor with the interest to make a more current contribution? Tag or no tag? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:47, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Talking About Languages

I was looking at the language chart that said that about 80 percent of Americans spoke English. I have to wonder whether I'm reading that wrong, because in the way im reading it theres no way it's 80 percent, it's more like 99 percent honestly. Even as a 1st language that seems off... Themane2 (talk) 02:00, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

It's referring to Language Spoken at Home, which is the standard proxy the Census uses to describe language preference. It doesn't preclude also speaking other languages. There's probably no data on how many Americans don't know a word of English; more likely you'd find surveys measuring English proficiency, which is probably another way of saying level of educational attainment. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 02:34, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

In terms of number of legal residents who can speak English, it probably is 99%, but 80% is the percent of people who speak English as a first language and only speak it at home. The remaining 20% are people who have other first languages, not people who speak other languages but don't know English. Cadiomals (talk) 02:49, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Yes, except first language is not the same as Language Spoken at Home. The cited sources don't say anything about first language; that's a different set of statistics. My mother in law's first language is not English but everyone in her house speaks mostly English at home. --Dennis Bratland (talk) 03:56, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Geography

The U.S. is in a geographic sense, the 50 States, the District of Columbia and outlying areas, iaw the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations, Title 48, Chapter 2. Also, outlying areas includes U.S. commonwealths (2), territories (3) and minor outlying islands (9). Puerto Rico is a commonwealth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 144.183.224.2 (talk) 16:54, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

True. The Supreme Court said in Insular Cases, courts could not incorporate territories politically into the U.S., and now a First District Court and Appeals Court said Congress had by the twenty-first century for Puerto Rico. The District of Columbia (DC), Puerto Rico, Northern Marianas, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam and American Samoa have mutually agreed with Congress to citizenship broader than than held by the territory of Hawaii or the Territory of Alaska, self government in three branches, and territorial representation in Congress. All but American Samoa have organic statutes making them organically part of the U.S. by law.

However, three editors here say that once the Supreme Court labels islanders "savage", their great-grand children cannot be recognized as a part of the U.S. until that same court which gave us Plessy v. Ferguson reverses itself and proclaims them no longer savages. This, even though the Court said only Congress makes citizens, and the holding of the Insular Cases was only that a discriminatory tax regime could be established to ensure domestic sugar oligopoly, nothing about islander citizenship, only that the Court could not make them citizens.

There is an uninhabited Pacific island of coconuts which are no longer harvested as a plantation free of the protective sugar tariffs, and so deemed "incorporated" relative to the discriminatory tax regime. But I once argued that the four millions U.S. citizens represented in Congress should be included in the WP article for the United States, and got walls of text without sources opposing, although I showed primary and secondary USG sources in law as well as scholarship from legal, political science and historical scholarship to include islanders in the modern U.S. of the twenty-first century.

The three editors lost in a dispute resolution to exclude islanders last year, but an administrator asserted that since he had allowed the inclusion of islanders in the U.S., he could overturn the dispute resolution and wiki-cecede them from the U.S. on his own authority. Since the first sentence addresses the federal republic, it should read, "The United States is a federal republic consisting of 50 states, a federal district and five territories represented in Congress." But the subject is moot for now until the attention of an alternate administrator. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 19:52, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

"However, three editors here say that once the Supreme Court labels islanders "savage", their great-grand children cannot be recognized as a part of the U.S. until that same court which gave us Plessy v. Ferguson reverses itself and proclaims them no longer savages." OK, so you have no interest in coming to a consensus, merely insulting your fellow editors (if not their persons then their intelligence) because you disagree with them. (also, that same court also gave us Brown v. Board of Education, but no, go straight for the racism angle, because that's how we do things here apparently) --Golbez (talk) 20:08, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

insert. "Race angle" is a red herring. The three editors insist on their unsourced interpretation of Insular Cases, regardless of subsequent Congressional legislation, Presidential executive orders and federal judicial acknowledgement of Congressional political incorporation of islanders who are citizens, self governing, and represented in Congress.

There is no insult on my part. The editors chose the grounds of their original research based on the Insular Cases --- which characterize islanders as "savages" to justify withholding citizenship until Congress acted, that was their only grounds --- But that is a history irrelevant to this article lead. My point is now Congress has acted, and so the Insular Cases are superseded, despite the WP resistance by unreconstructed editors here. There are no sources to deny including islanders in the U.S. federal republic for this article as it related to the modern U.S. Excluding them is the insult. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:24, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Many countries in the world have outlying territories, and that is to be elaborated on in Political divisions, not detailed outright in the lead. Cadiomals (talk) 20:44, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Agreed, although State Department reports American Samoa is the only "outlying territory" of the 'big five'. Countries which have outlying territories without representation in their national legislature exclude those territories as in U.K. and its U.K. Virgin Islands. Those with outlying territories WITH representation in their national legislature include those territories, as in France and the United States.

But the U.S. article in WP does not. There are no sources to exclude U.S. citizen islanders from the lead, --- only reference by original research to Insular Cases by the Supreme Court a century ago, which since have been superseded by Congressional law and islander referendum -- since the 1990s. In that way the article lead is more out of date than the religion section. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:24, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

IP, I do not know what you mean by "in a geographic sense." Under U.S. constitutional law and international law, the territories are outside the U.S., but subject to it. The U.S. Supreme Court has decided that the 5th or 14th amendments are the only parts of the U.S. constitution that apply to territories held by the U.S., including Guantanamo Bay, and the U.S. Congress may and does apply federal statutes to them. TFD (talk) 07:44, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

"Geographic sense" means the places of the United States. Guantanamo is not included. It has been U.S. practice for two hundred years to extend essential protections to territories, but some privileges inherent in states are denied to territories until statehood. Federal statutes apply to both states and territories by law, that is an unexceptional observation as all are in the federal republic, part of the U.S. --- "outside the U.S., but subject to it" refers to the states in free association with the U.S., i.e., the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau.

As usual, an IP editor who would contribute has a source, U.S. Code, Title 48, Ch. 2, and TFD has none to deny the international legitimacy of the USG, and administrators will decide. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:16, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Was there a point to the IP's original post here? Looking at the current text for the lead of this article, I see the United States is a federal republic consisting of 50 states, 16 territories, and a federal district. How is that in any way discordant with U.S. Code of Federal Regulations, Title 48, Chapter 2? older ≠ wiser 13:43, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

The edit that added that has been reverted. --Golbez (talk) 20:05, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

That edit is consistent with the IP source. CMD reverted it claiming there was no discussion here, and without a source himself. An administrator chose to oversee no source blanking without discussion here to overrule a sourced contribution discussed at Talk.

So we have Seqqis, IP and TVH support the sourced change, older-wiser makes no objection, and no one else opposes, unless you count TFD disruption implying Puerto Rico status is equivalent to Guantanamo, which is clearly fringe. Administrator Golbez observes islanders are excluded from the lead without discussion.

The lead which now excludes four millions who are territorial islanders and --- a) mutually U.S. citizens with three-branch self-government and territorial representation in Congress, and b) enjoying all fundamental protections and more privileges than 20th century territories of Alaska and Hawaii ---, is an unsourced insult from the fringe. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:02, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree with the decision to delete mention of the U.S Virgin Islands from the lead. However, Puerto RIco should probably be put back due to its huge population particularly in relation to some of the states, it for example has a population that is exponentially larger than Alaska. If we want to delete something from the lead it probably should be the mention of the nine unpopulated territories. Also, this sentence in the third paragraph could also go: " The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a global military power." On a related topic, the political divisions sub-section is a mess. It currently weirdly equates the District of Columbia with a tiny unpopulated territory in the Pacific. I'm surprised no one has noticed. I'm going to delete that right now. It also gives a tiny amount of info about the political status of the populated territories. But oddly makes no mention of the political status of D.C. The positioning of the map also looks kind of weird with its huge blank spots on both sides.Lance Friedman (talk) 22:37, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Alaska and Hawaii are only mentioned by name because they are the parts of the U.S., except Palmyra, that are not contiguous to the rest of the country. California, and many other states, are exponentially larger in population than Alaska, but are not mentioned in the lead. I do not see why we should mention Puerto Rico just because it is the most populous overseas territory any more than we should mention California because it is the most populous state. I think Palmyra should be mentioned in the article because it is part of the U.S., according to the U.S. government. TFD (talk) 00:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Palmyra should be noted in the article, as should all the territories; it should not, however, be noted in the intro. Even if it is part of the country, it's an exceptionally trivial part. --Golbez (talk) 07:48, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

DC is constitutionally alike the 'big five' territories in its territorial representation in Congress. But DC is considered part of the U.S. federal republic everywhere except in outdated Encyclopedia Britannicas. There DC is lumped into the same section as overseas territories because constitutionally it is not a state in the United States. Britain does not acknowledge its own overseas territories in Parliament, so Britannica does not recognize U.S. territories as a part of the U.S. though they were represented in Congress.

But British practice should not govern the U.S. article, U.S. practice should. See. U.K. Virgin Islands without representation in Parliament, a governor appointed by the Queen, and without citizenship until recently, versus U.S. Virgin Islands with territorial delegate in Congress, a popularly elected governor, and with U.S. citizenship. DC and the "five territories represented in Congress" deserve mention in the lede. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 09:52, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

A sidenote on Britannica, it has been an American-controlled encyclopaedia for over a century, and is designed for American audiences. CMD (talk) 15:14, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Unlike an outdated edition of Britannica, the source says the U.S. is more than the 50 states. Since 21st century DC and the 'big five' territories are the same in that they are not states, but alike --- in U.S. citizenship, fundamental constitutional protections, three-branch self-government, and territorial representation in Congress, --- so they should have like treatment in the lede as included in the U.S. "federal republic". TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 17:53, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

,

Does anyone have any specific proposals? I'll put one out there. There is no need to specifically mention trivial unpopulated U.S, territories in the lead. I propose the 4th sentence in the first paragraph be tweaked to read the following: "The country also has five populated U.S. Te territories in the Pacific and the Caribbean of which Puerto Rico is the most populous.Lance Friedman (talk) 18:26, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

When mention Puerto Rico, but not California, or any of the states that have larger populations? It seems like too much detail for the lead. I agree that Puerto Rico is the only territory that receives significant attention, but even then it's not as high profile as say India was in the British Empire. TFD (talk) 18:44, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

insert. India was never represented in Parliament as Puerto Rico is in Congress. Direct representation of citizens in the U.S. territorial tradition of two-hundred years is not the same as imperial rule of subjects by Britain. Seven times over fifty years only 3% Puerto Ricans vote for independence from the U.S., whereas India sought and gained independence from British empire shortly after WWII.

All U.S. citizens represented in Congress in the modern era should be represented in the lede as belonging to the U.S. There is no legitimate grounds for excluding them in the 21st century, so TFD has no source to counter the IP reference to modern U.S Code at the beginning of this thread. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:53, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually I don't think it would be a bad idea to add a single sentence to the lead that mentions the gigantic population differentials between the states such as: "Among the states California has the largest population at 38,332,521, more than 10% of the U.S. population and Wyoming has the smallest population at 582,655, a population smaller than both Puerto RIco and the District of Columbia." The huge population differential between the states is far more notable than a lot of the stuff that is currently in the lead such as info about unpopulated territories.Lance Friedman (talk) 20:38, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

There is not "a lot of the stuff that is currently in the lead such as info about unpopulated territories." The lead merely says, "The country also has five populated and nine unpopulated territories in the Pacific and the Caribbean." I would rather cut that back to say, "The country also has overseas territories in the Pacific and the Caribbean." TFD (talk) 06:35, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

American Samoa is the last “overseas territory” of the U.S. according to the U.S. sate department. TFD edit for conciseness would be inaccurate. Making no distinction by populated islanders is confounding U.S. citizens with coconuts in as fringe a way as the previous assertion that Puerto Rican commonwealth status is equivalent to Guantanamos orange jump suits.

TFD confounds states and territories. Mention Puerto Rico as a territory because it is constitutionally different from states, but larger than 20 states, and represented in Congress. Then add a note to note the four others represented in Congress and the nine uninhabited -- footnoting maintains conciseness in the narrative and accuracy in WP. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:22, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

The U.S. state department does not say American Samoa is the "last "overseas territory" of the U.S." Instead, under "Certificates of Non Citizen Nationality", it refers to the INA 1952. The INA, Section 101 Definitions, says, "As used in this Act- (29) The term "outlying possessions of the United States" means American Samoa and Swains Island." TFD (talk) 20:14, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Very well, your proposed edit would be technically in error as well as fringe conflating a) uninhabited territories of coconuts and b) inhabited territories of U.S. citizens.

Citizens just like those in DC that is mentioned. Islanders in the 'big five' are a) mutually in the U.S. by local constitutional convention and referendum, b) with fundamental constitutional protections under federal courts, c) under three-branch local self-government, and d) territorial representation in Congress consistently following national practice of two hundred years.

And now some would exclude islander citizens from the U.S. federal republic in the lede because, ... unstated, unsourced POV in the face of IP reference in U.S. Code.

Three millions Puerto Rican U.S. citizens who voted in referendum again in 2012 with an 80% turnout to belong to the U.S. --- 3% voted for independence---, they amount to more than 20 states, the Puerto Rican legislature has applied for statehood. --- And they are not worthy of mention in the lede because, ... unstated, unsourced POV. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:48, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

History draft

I know y'all are passionate about this topic, but I hope it doesn't distract from or derail the unfolding of the History draft. VictorD7 (talk) 17:51, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Which section did you want to address first? Should one or more existing sections be combined going forward? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 11:51, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Unlike the settlements subsections section and the other history sub-sections that have been shortened. The rest of the sections in the history section are not overly long. I would be opposed to deleting material in the rest of the history sub-sections if the reasoning for the deletion is simply to make them smaller. The only remaining size issue in the history section is that there are too many graphics in the section resulting in the 911 now awkwardly being in the geography section. I am going to delete the mayflower compact pic in an attempt to at least partially rectify this issue. Anyone looking at the overall United States article can see that the section that is currently most screwed up is the demographics section. Attention needs to be focused on that section. Some of the graphics in the section need to be deleted and there is no reason to give such a confusing and overdetailed racial break-ground of the country in the population sub-section. The current name of the subsection is not accurate. As currently written it is more a race and ethnicity subsection not a population sub- section.Lance Friedman (talk) 16:49, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually the Mayflower Compact picture has no influence on the positioning of the 9/11 picture, at least not on my computer where it has always been in the Contemporary history section. I don't know what the resolution is on your computer but no matter how much I zoom in it stays in that section. I think the only way to solve your problem is to get rid of one of the pictures in the section above it, either the cold war or civil rights image as they are the only ones that could push down the 9/11 image. It would be unusual for there to be at least one image in every section except the Settlements one. Cadiomals (talk) 17:28, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Also, I agree that the Demographics section needs clean-up, but I also think at least one more History section needs trimming of some excess detail that doesn't fit into the big picture we are trying to paint in History. The last paragraphs in the Cold War and Civil Rights section devolve into a listing of major events under each of the last several presidents, and I'm pretty sure that falls under WP:RECENTISM. The father of this country, George Washington, is not mentioned once in the article but the last several presidents are as a result of recentism bias. We need to remove mention of specific non-pivotal events under each president and reorganize it to paint the Big Picture of the overall impact of the Cold War instead. Cadiomals (talk) 17:44, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

On my computer deleting the Mayflower pic moved the 911 pic up causing a portion of it to now be in the contemp. era subsection. Though as you point out, the main problem is that as currently positioned the two pics in the subsection above contemp. era do not fit into that subsection. Deleting one of the two pics from the article would probably be too controversial. Probably the Kerry pic in the foreign relations section should be deleted and replaced with the Reagan/Gorby pic or the two pics in the civil rights/cold war subsection simply turned into a double image. I'm open to more changes in the history section, but a lot of the remaining sections in the history section are pretty tight. Some actually might actually require modest expansion. I think the civil rights/cold war section actually needs an additional sentence mentioning the end of America's second longest war in 1975. As currently written it misleadingly makes it look like the Vietnam war ended in the 1960'sLance Friedman (talk) 18:15, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

insert. Mechanically, I think {{clear}} at the end of a sentence keeps the image above it from pushing down the page into following text. I'll give it a try. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:27, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

TVH, I thought you were doing the entire section, especially given your comments about dementioning the presidents. What would be the point of removing mention of the most important presidents but retaining the awful current format where all the recent ones are listed? Every remaining History section needs serious work. There are also still some outstanding quality/accuracy issues that need addressing as we proceed. Length isn't the only concern here.VictorD7 (talk) 18:33, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

The following paragraph shows the recentism I am talking about. It includes an arbitrary listing of major events under the past several presidents. Changes in taxation and spending, recessions, and scandals have happened countless times through American history and I don't view them as big picture details. The paragraph needs restructuring to mention the broader impact of the Cold War and its aftermath, as well as the rise of tensions in the Middle East that continue to affect us today.

In the 1970s, the American economy was hurt by two major energy shocks. The Nixon Administration restored normal relations with China and oversaw the beginning of a period of generally eased relations with the Soviet Union. As a result of the Watergate scandal, in 1974 Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign, to avoid being impeached on charges including obstruction of justice and abuse of power. The Carter Administration of the late 1970s was marked by the Iran hostage crisis, stagflation, and an increase of tensions with the Soviet Union following the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. The election of Ronald Reagan as president in 1980 heralded a rightward shift in American politics, reflected in major changes in taxation and spending priorities. His second term in office brought both the Iran–Contra scandal and significant diplomatic progress with the Soviet Union. The subsequent Soviet collapse ended the Cold War.

Agreed. A link to List of Presidents of the United States ought to be enough to assist readers with a presidential bent. And impeachments and scandals belong in History of the United States article rather than in this country article.

What is the practice for the 'See also' section? Does it reiterate the "Main article" and "See also" sign posts found throughout the article? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 06:36, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Religion pie chart needs updating

I updated the text in the body to the the most recent Pew Forum survey from 2012 (which is necessary because it showed notable trends), but so far the pie chart does not match because it still shows data from 2007. Someone who knows how to do these graphics should tweak it. However, since this recent survey did not expand on "other religions" (such as Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, etc) and only treated them as a broad category the "Other religions" portion of the chart may need to be expanded just to cover those. Cadiomals (talk) 20:40, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Edit ‘civil war and reconstruction era’.

'Civil War and Reconstruction era', proposed edit:

From the beginning, inherent divisions over slavery between the North and the South in American society ultimately led to the American Civil War. Initially states entering the Union alternated slave and free keeping a sectional balance in the Senate, while free states outstripped slave states in population and in the House of Representatives. But with additional western territory and more free-soil states, tensions between slave and free states mounted with arguments over federalism and disposition of the territories, whether and how to expand or restrict slavery. Beginning in December 1860, conventions in thirteen states declared secession—which the federal government maintained was illegal—and formed the Confederate States of America.

The ensuing war was at first for Union, then after 1863 as casualties mounted, a second war aim became abolition of slavery. Following the Union victory in 1865, three amendments to the U.S. Constitution ensured freedom for the nearly four million African Americans who had been slaves, made them citizens, and gave them voting rights. These Amendments lead to a substantial increase in federal power. aimed at reintegrating and rebuilding the Southern states while ensuring the rights of the newly freed slaves., but following Reconstruction, Jim Crow laws soon disenfranchised many African Americans.‪

end proposal. This is now short enough to merge logically an abbreviated 'industrialization' section. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 07:07, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

edit. Industrialization

Edit 'Industrialization' section. proposal:

In the North, urbanization and an unprecedented influx of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe supplied a surplus of labor for the country's industrialization and transformed its culture. Immigration policies were Eurocentric by restricting Asians from immigration and naturalization beginning in 1882. National infrastructure including telegraph and transcontinental railroads spurred economic growth, greater settlement and development of the American Old West. The end of the Indian Wars further expanded acreage under mechanical cultivation increasing surpluses for international markets. Mainland expansion was completed by the Alaska Purchase from Russia in 1867. In 1898 the U.S. entered the world stage with important sugar production and strategic facilities acquired in Hawaii, then Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines were ceded by Spain in the same year following the Spanish American War.

The emergence of many prominent industrialists at the end of the 19th century gave rise to the Gilded Age. It was a period of extravagant affluence, worker injury and concentrations of monopolistic power that led to the rise of Populism, Socialism, and Anarchism in the U.S. This period eventually ended with the beginning of the Progressive Era, a period of significant reforms in many societal areas, including women's suffrage, regulatory protection for the public, greater antitrust measures to ensure competition and attention to living conditions for the working classes.

end proposal. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 08:06, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

I think it is worthwhile to leave in the sentence on immigration being Eurocentric and barring Chinese. This is fairly notable as the US has always struggled with how and to what extent it should accommodate its many immigrants. Cadiomals (talk) 09:40, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Worthwhile it is. Eurocentric policy against Asian immigration and naturalization is replaced with its source. I hope no one believes the 1882 statute is still in force; the WP U.S. lede should not make it seem so. TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 13:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

--- Aside. Still, no source obtains for WP U.S. lede policy, blanking those who have chosen to be naturalized as U.S. citizens in Pacific island territories of Northern Marianas, Guam and American Samoa. I will await another editor's initiative before resuming the discussion. But the question remains, What could be the unsourced POV behind it, why do islander referendum, legislatures and constitutional conventions not count at WP --- so that they are excluded in the lede in this 21st century article though sourced by U.S. Code in force ---, not even in a footnote? TheVirginiaHistorian (talk) 13:17, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

1. Kenworthy, L. (August 20, 2010) "The best inequality graph, updated" Consider the Evidence
2. "Who Pays Taxes in America?" (PDF). Citizens for Tax Justice. April 12, 2012.
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4. Crook, Clive (February 10, 2012). "U.S. Taxes Really Are Unusually Progressive". The Atlantic. Washington DC. Retrieved April 3, 2013.
5. ^ Matthews, Dylan (September 19, 2012). "Other countries don't have a "47%"". The Washington Post. Retrieved October 29, 2013.
6. "How Much Do People Pay in Federal Taxes?". Peter G. Peterson Foundation. Retrieved April 3, 2013.
7. ^ Cite error: The named reference CBO, Distribution was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
8. "Table T12-0178 Baseline Distribution of Cash Income and Federal Taxes Under Current Law" (PDF). The Tax Policy Center. Retrieved October 29, 2013.
9. Harris, Benjamin H. (November 2009). "Corporate Tax Incidence and Its Implications for Progressivity" (PDF). Tax Policy Center. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
10. Gentry, William M. (December 2007). "A Review of the Evidence on the Incidence of the Corporate Income Tax" (PDF). OTA Paper 101. Office of Tax Analysis, US Department of the Treasury. Retrieved October 9, 2013.
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12. Musgrave, R.A. (March 1951). "Distribution of Tax Payments by Income Groups: A Case Study for 1948" (PDF). National Tax Journal. 4 (1): 1–53. Retrieved October 9, 2013. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
13. Prasad, M. (April 2, 2009). "Taxation and the worlds of welfare". Socio-Economic Review. 7 (3): 431–457. doi:10.1093/ser/mwp005. Retrieved May 5, 2013. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
14. Crook, Clive (February 10, 2012). "U.S. Taxes Really Are Unusually Progressive". The Atlantic. Washington DC. Retrieved April 3, 2013.
15. "How Much Do People Pay in Federal Taxes?". Peter G. Peterson Foundation. Retrieved April 3, 2013.
16. "Table T12-0178 Baseline Distribution of Cash Income and Federal Taxes Under Current Law" (PDF). The Tax Policy Center. Retrieved October 29, 2013.
17. ^ Cite error: The named reference MLA Data was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
18. "Regional Population, 2021". Australian Bureau of Statistics. 11 February 2022.

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