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Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

theguardian.com

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Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#171

Post by cal5k »

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #154
sykh wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't read Pinker's book and he is certainly more knowledgeable than I am on the topic. What does he say about attitudes like "keeping up with the Joneses", jealousy, and similar emotions? It seems to me that most people tend toward jealousy and compare themselves to those who are better off rather than those who are worse off. I've been under the impression that disparity, inequality in and of itself is a proble…

I think it's disingenuous to label someone who is struggling to fund housing and healthcare as just jealous.

I think it's disingenuous to argue against words the above commenter did not actually write.

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#173

Post by tonyedgecombe »

cal5k wrote: post #171
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's disingenuous to label someone who is struggling to fund housing and healthcare as just jealous.

I think it's disingenuous to argue against words the above commenter did not actually write.

It seems to me that most people tend toward jealousy

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#174

Post by noobermin »

cal5k wrote: post #158
ericd wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Largest understatement I've seen in a while.

Between Mao and Stalin alone you're probably talking 50-100MM deaths. That's one hell of a downside.

I assure you, capitalism has killed more people than that. We just don't call them victims of capitalism.

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#175

Post by YorkshireSeason »

dgudkov wrote: post #137
Animats wrote: post #15

Communism went away. It's not that communism was better. It's that it was competition. There was, for half a century, a competitive threat - do better than the USSR, or face a revolution. That threat was taken quite seriously in the US for decades. Industrialists (the US economy was mostly manufacturing back then) were careful not to get too greedy or power-hungry. They feared expropriation. Britain nationalized many…

>Communism went away. Not really. Plenty of people now pushing for the equality of outcome. Which is a cornerstone of communism.

Marx and Engels most certainly did not think equality of outcome was a cornerstone of communism, on the contrary. Just think about "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" from Marx Critique of the Gotha Program. Clearly administering goods according to need is antithetical to equality of outcome.

Marx/Engels thought that equality in general, was a concept used by the "bourgeoisie" to manage scarcity. They thought that equality of outcome was impossible, and that communism would be so much more efficient than capitalism at providing goods (because communism would be based on pure cooperation rather than 'energy intensive' class antagonisms of capitalism) that nobody cared any more about equality, because everybody had more than enough. In other words, with communism, the desire for equality would whither away.

See e.g.

- F. Engels, Brief an Bebel (1875), MEW 34, 129

- F. Engels, Anti-Dühring, MEW 20, 9599

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#176

Post by cal5k »

cal5k wrote: post #158
ericd wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Largest understatement I've seen in a while.

Between Mao and Stalin alone you're probably talking 50-100MM deaths. That's one hell of a downside.

You can assure me all you'd like, but it's data that I find compelling. Many of the deaths in Maoist China were of starvation, a direct consequence of Mao's crackpot policies. Venezuela is a striking modern example of the same phenomenon.

If you can find an example of a government's commitment to free markets directly resulting in the starvation of tens of millions of people your argument would be much more credible.

EDIT: This is re: the comment below. We've reached HN's maximum allowable comment depth.

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#177

Post by noobermin »

cal5k wrote: post #163
ericd wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The richest pay the vast majority of the tax in the US, regardless of whether they work. And the very richest in the US almost all got there by working, many of them by starting huge companies.

Marxist reverence for the proletariat has been an enduring concept. The problem is that nobody has actually defined who the prols are - are they the factory workers? Entrepreneurs? Teachers? Accountants? Lawyers? Engineers? Civil servants? The US economy is crazy diverse. There really is no such thing as a unified working class struggling against "the man".

If you're just talking about Marxian definitions, it's simple:

Owns means of production: bourgeousie

Works without owning means of production: proletariat

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#178

Post by Semaphor »

thinkloop wrote: post #90
Semaphor wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom is also a problematic word. I guess you could say that Europe has "more units of communism" than the US. But if you ask where a poor person is more free, you'd get quite different answers from different people.

The poor person has more choices because money was forced from a rich person to them (please keep in mind that I am not against this, it is likely the better system). But these are extremely different kinds of freedom. If you have an example of how the poor person was forced to be poor it would be important here.

That's what I mean by different definitions of freedom

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#179

Post by mythrwy »

cal5k wrote: post #60

Steven Pinker's new book, Enlightenment Now, has a pretty compelling section on wealth/income inequality. The basic position - and I think the data supports this - is that it really doesn't matter what the top 1% are doing so long as the bottom half are seeing improved living conditions. Furthermore, wealth isn't a static I win/you lose proposition - much of that wealth has been created in recent history. People spen…

Improved living conditions are great, but not at the cost of ceding almost full control of what goes on in the world to a small handful of people.

Even if many of them are benevolent for now, it may not always be that way. It's simply not a safe system. We need a level of opportunity for all to advance. And that means some level of economic equality for all.

This is a matter of intrinsic justice but also more importantly a matter of practicality to avoid the hazards of slavery, corruption, dynasty and stagnation.

Inequality has always been, and likely always will be. And this natural and its fine (like most things) within certain parameters. Inequality doesn't doesn't need to exist at these extremes. Its dangerous.

Re: Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

#180

Post by sykh »

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #173
cal5k wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's disingenuous to argue against words the above commenter did not actually write.

It seems to me that most people tend toward jealousy

You added a phrase that I did not write.

as just jealous

I did not write this or imply this. People who struggle with food or housing are not merely jealous. They have real concerns and need. The discussion I referred was not about such people or conditions.

I was responding to the notion that inequality does not matter as much now because conditions for the those at the bottom have improved. Clearly the implication is that we are not talking about people struggling with food and housing. The idea is that if everyone has their basics needs met does inequality still matter?

I suggested it would still matter due to the tendency toward jealousy and comparing oneself to those who are better off.

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