THE PUBLIC HAS LATELY HEARD a lot about income inequality in this country (and it’s about time!). Over the last 40-plus years, starting around the time of the Reagan administration (January 1981), the financial statistics tell us all the vastly increased wealth of the country has gone to the very rich, the top two per cent. Income for the middle-class and poor has stagnated, or gone down. This seems undeniably true, but nevertheless the middle-class has grown immeasurably richer over those same years, and even most of the poor are better off..

Let’s start with the fact I’m composing this essay on a keyboard attached to a computer. (I could just dictate it, but my fingers don’t jump into as many sidelights as my brain and tongue.) When finished it will be posted on the Internet, on my personal blog, available to pretty much the whole modern world. In 1980 the Internet was In its infancy, and few predicted it would grow into the largest organization ever known. Today the ‘Net, and the millions of jobs/income and associated industries it supports, enriches the lives of billions of people. I think it safe to say few developments in human history have so quickly changed the world, and how we live in it. This was made possible by mass production advances that brought prices down to where all but the poorest can afford computers and ‘Net access.

Second, let’s look at mass entertainment. Today I pay eight dollars a month for Netflix, which provides me with more good movies (though separating good from schlocky can take time) than I have leisure to watch. That’s on top of the 400 channels (many of which also offer movies) provided for a much larger fee by my cable company. These include everything from tedious reality shows to excellent TV series to informative and educational science and nature programs. All this on a 60-inch high definition screen that probably equals the movie theater experience of my misspent youth. And I can watch the daily news of the world while eating dinner and having my evening cocktail in the comfort of an easy chair.

With the ongoing implementation of Obama Care, the great majority of U.S. citizens will soon have medical insurance, and the high-quality care it provides. Modern medicine has progressed by leaps and bounds since 1980 (not that some sharp demarcation occurred then; this is a continuing process). The new or greatly improved machines available now are too numerous and complicated to spell out. If you see a doctor very often, you know of them. As a a result of both increased knowledge and better care, most people now live longer, healthier lives. And that gives us more time to relax (or retire) and enjoy the ‘Net and movies.

On-line formal education is now a reality. You can earn a college diploma from your room at home. Robots are replacing humans in many dull, repetitive tasks — think auto assembly lines — while humans perform the far more interesting and lucrative jobs of preparing the distant study class materials and designing and building the assembly robots. And cellphones. Ah, our second brains! Who wants to live without them? Some of these improvements are in their infancy and have a way to go, but they got an impressive start over the last thirty years.

Add up how much the lives of almost all of us have changed. Look back on the ancient days of pre-1980, and compare our lives then and now. We in the middle-class have better health, longer lives, more decent entertainment, and increased leisure and retirement time in which to enjoy them. I think these developments make us all much richer, even if our dollar income hasn’t gone up enough to notice.

And now let’s adjust that pay inequality anyway, and pay down the national debt that burdens rich, middle-class and poor alike.

Image credit: NASA