The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/inequality/page/2/)
Eleven Cornell students represent the University at the eighth annual Ivy Policy Conference — a forum in which delegates from eight Ivy League universities grapple with issues on their respective campuses and seek to develop collective solutions. This year’s theme was “Inequalities within college campuses.”
When Michael Moore responded to the deaths of 12 innocent high school students with Bowling for Columbine, no one could have argued against the film’s political significance. A fiery critique of congressional negligence to curb gun violence, Moore’s impassioned documentary was so charged with a palpable, collective anger that many still refer to it as one of the most compelling political statements made by any documentarian. Even watching Bowling for Columbine nearly a decade after its initial release as an Australian high school student did little to weaken my appreciation of its persuasive fury. And the fact that U.S. legislators have failed to account for the thousands of victims of gun violence and have written off their deaths as an acceptable cost for the preservation of a 200-year-old constitutional amendment has only strengthened the contemporary legacy of Moore’s most important work. Moore’s latest film, Where to Invade Next — despite being deceptively titled to suggest a censure of American foreign policy — focuses on social welfare offered by other countries that Moore believes America ought to imitate.
Nearly 100 people attended a lecture on the variables affecting income inequality delivered by Prof. Miles Corak, economics, University of Ottawa, in Goldwin Smith Hall Monday. Corak began the talk titled ‘Too many children left behind? Inequality, Life Chances, and Public Policy’ by introducing “three facts” related to intergenerational economic mobility and levels of income inequality. He said “generational earnings mobility” – the measure of the extent to which one’s parents’ income determines one’s own income – varies from country to country. The United States and United Kingdom are among the highest ranked of the countries in this metric, that is, in those countries, the most inequality from generation to generation is preserved, according to Corak.
“We have been listening to your stories,” said Renee Alexander ’74, associate dean and director of intercultural programs, student and academic services. “[This dinner] is a way to work together, establishing commonalities as we work across differences.”
Speaking to nearly 90 students, administrators and faculty members on Thursday, Alexander encouraged them to speak openly about race and campus climate with each other over a meal. The “Breaking Bread” dinner, held in the Biotechnology Building, was filled with 10 tables with about eight participants each. The dinner and the small group setting aimed to allow participants to feel comfortable expressing their feelings and sharing their personal stories in a safe space. To stimulate and direct conversation at the tables, facilitators posed three questions to participants, asking individuals to elaborate on their experiences with issues including race in higher education and how the University and members of the community can act in the future to better the campus climate.
Cries of “the students united will not be defeated!” filled Ho Plaza Thursday afternoon when nearly a hundred students banded together for the Million Student March and demanded tuition-free public college, cancellation of all student debt, a $15 minimum wage for campus workers and immediate divestment from fossil fuel corporations. Despite a student’s post on social media calling for its cancellation, students gathered on the steps of Willard Straight Hall at 3 p.m. for the march, which was organized by the Cornell Independent Students’ Union for a national event with more than 100 participating colleges. An hour before the march, a student posted on the Facebook event page a screenshot of a CISU statement of the union’s demands, underlining a portion of the sentence, “Alongside students, faculty must demand that low-income and colored people traditionally excluded by the status quo, are invited into the university system.”
Pointing to the phrase “colored people,” the student said in her post that she found it insensitive. “This is NOT okay. CISU needs to be held accountable.
The democratic debate is probably old news by now, but I’ve been itching to talk about Bernie Sanders’ performance. If you watched the debate (and can remember what happened a week ago), you know he wouldn’t shut up about one issue — high rent prices. Just kidding, that’s Jimmy McMillan. Bernie’s issue is income inequality. I’ve been planning on writing about income inequality for a while.