Oligarchy in the United States?

Karla Gurrola

POLS202

Dr. John Lucas

Oligarchy summary

"Oligarchy in the United States?" Summary/Reaction

Jeffrey Winters and Benjamin Page present ideas along with data concerning Oligarchy within the United States that allows for questions and further research for the reader. Winters and Page cite Aristotle in defining Oligarchy as the (few) richest citizens exercising power, and that these few who have the highest concentration of wealth also happen to control in politics. For that reason their next point illustrates the difficulties in a Democracy and Oligarchy co-existing in a government such as in the United States. They explore how extreme wealth (top 10%- to 1%) can provide a great deal of resources and give motivation to use and exercise political power, therefore making their contributions more valuable than the bottom 90% of the population. Oligarchs do not even have to be aware that they are Oligarchs or be organized in any way in order to use their political power.

In the article, Winters and Page break down how the political power is measured with two tables and income facts. With their findings, the bottom 90% will always have an individual power index score of 1 where the top 1% will have 882.8 times as much. The problem with this massive inequality is that as stated by Winters and Page "US policy making reflects the pure workings of populistic democracy, in which every citizen has an equal voice. Wealth and income matter." Winters and Page state that the Oligarchs may not control policies, only those that concern with income and property defense. In the article the policies that oligarchs have a great influence on are international economic policy, monetary policy, tax policy, and the "over-all distributional consequences of government action." And although not all policies in the US are affected by Oligarchy there are a few that they point out to be of great interest to the Oligarchs. According to the authors Oligarchs gain control over these policies by lobbying, elections by making campaign contributions and influencing who gets elected, opinion shaping, and constitutional rules like getting judges appointed.

"Oligarchy in the Unites States?" raised several questions to the reader. "Does