When it comes to reducing inequality, Americans may be open to bolder solutions for reining in those at the top than for ones boosting people at the bottom.

But sometimes that depends on how close to the bottom they are.

Over 70 percent of Americans in a recent New York Times-CBS News poll favored raising the federal minimum wage from its current level of $7.25 to $10.10. And they not only favored by a wide margin raising taxes on people earning over $1 million a year, they also narrowly favored (50 percent to 45 percent) capping the amount of money top corporate executives could earn. They did overwhelmingly oppose raising wages to $15 per hour for fast-food and other hourly workers.

Consider for a second just how radical pay limits would be for the United States if they were actually put into place: To pick some numbers purely for illustrative purposes, such limits might mean that, even if your boss or board of directors thought you were worth $10 million a year, you would have to leave half of that on the table because the law said you couldn’t earn more than $5 million.

One possible explanation for these results is that average Americans simply feel more distance, in economic terms, between themselves and the rich than between themselves and low-wage workers. They feel no hesitation about rolling back the income of wealthy people because being rich is so far from their experience that they simply can’t imagine it or identify with people who are.