DJanyreason (sweet name!) asks, "It seems to be almost accepted as a matter of course that promoting savings is a good idea, but I don't quite get why. If consumption is promoted, rather than savings, that should do a better job driving the economy, no? If demand goes up, than productivity will go up to meet demand, resulting in more (and better paying) jobs."I'm not an economist, so you may want to ask one of them about this, too. But the basic point here is that saving/investing has higher returns than consuming. If you buy a Nintendo, you just spent $200. If you sock the $200 away in stocks for a couple of (good) years, you end up with more than $200. From the point of view of a progressive who's concerned about inequality, one of the primary drivers is that the poor and working class only make money from their jobs. The upper middle class and the rich make money from their jobs and also from their money. And in recent years, due to housing and stock bubbles, people have been able to make a lot of money from their money. So much, in fact, that it turned out to be unsustainable. But a lot of people got rich. ASSIGNMENT DESK: SAVINGS VS. CONSUMPTION.
DJanyreason (sweet name!) asks, "It seems to be almost accepted as a matter of course that promoting savings is a good idea, but I don't quite get why. If consumption is promoted, rather than savings, that should do a better job driving the economy, no? If demand goes up, than productivity will go up to meet demand, resulting in more (and better paying) jobs."I'm not an economist, so you may want to ask one of them about this, too. But the basic point here is that saving/investing has higher returns than consuming. If you buy a Nintendo, you just spent $200. If you sock the $200 away in stocks for a couple of (good) years, you end up with more than $200. From the point of view of a progressive who's concerned about inequality, one of the primary drivers is that the poor and working class only make money from their jobs. The upper middle class and the rich make money from their jobs and also from their money. And in recent years, due to housing and stock bubbles, people have been able to make a lot of money from their money. So much, in fact, that it turned out to be unsustainable. But a lot of people got rich. 
