Why the growing income/wage gap? It's you, you uneducated fool!

Concerned about the growing divide between the rich and poor, between the well-paid and poorly-paid? Well, Fed chief Ben Bernanke has the solution: go get yourself a better education, you fool!

Speaking to the Omaha, Nebraska Chamber of Commerce, Bernanke said, according to Market Watch(emphasis added):

Education, not protectionism, is the best weapon in the fight against rising income-inequality...If we do not place some limits on the downside risks to individuals affected by economic change, the public at large might become less willing to accept the dynamism that is so essential to economic progress...The gap rose particularly rapidly through most of the 1980s, although it has continued to trend higher...I read the available evidence as favoring the view that the influence of globalization on inequality has been moderate and almost surely less important than the effects of skill-based technological change...As a result, erecting trade barriers to trade and investment would not be helpful, he said.

Bernanke made no conclusion on the issue of soaring CEO compensation, beyond noting that some economists tie it to the increased complexity of corporations, while others see it as a result of CEOs being in charge of their own pay.

Now isn't that really cute? The gap rose "particulalry rapidly" through the 1980s. So I guess we can spell the origin of "the gap" R E A G A N. Like so many other despicable traits of 21st century America.

But don't worry, that's the message Big Ben is trying to send here. It isn't that big bad globalization you've been hearing about from those nasty, pessimistic sources (like this one); it's just a little asymmetry between education and skills that are in demand. We'll solve it. Go back to sleep. A deep sleep. Count backward with me, from 100: 100...99...98...97...Reagan is a hero...96...95...gloablaization is good...94...93...your eyes are getting....blind.