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America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

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Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#661

Post by smabie »

zepto wrote: post #242
Thorentis wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But not everybody can be in the top 1% by definition. So either a category of people exists that do not need/cannot afford $1500 phones, or $1500 phones are a basic necessity that every human needs alongside food and shelter. I would argue that yes, in the first world a smartphone is almost required, but there are plenty of great <$200 Android phones that do everything one would deem essential. $1500 smartphones are…

> But not everybody can be in the top 1% by definition. Sure - but what should the wealth ratio between the top 1% and everyone else be? Perhaps if the ratio were lower, everyone would be able to afford great phones. Also, who ‘deems’ what is essential?

Or maybe no one could afford great phones

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#662

Post by natenthe »

BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #520
pembrook wrote: post #480

> It amazes me why most people do not grasp this. I think it is lack of education. Huh? Literally everybody grasps this. This is the most widely parroted mainstream narrative about the economy right now on the internet. Hell, you can't throw a rock at the Wall Street Journal (conservative) or the New York Times (liberal) without hitting a sentence that mentions wealth inequality brought on by fed policy. For further…

Exactly. Mainstream actually educated economists are right, not people hyperventilating about money printing. On top of what you said about the effect of printing making valuations high, only temporarily and only on paper, the opposite lack of printing, is actual redistribution towards the rich in a much more real and persistent way. Insufficiently inflationary money can be used as a way for the rich to withdraw from…

"Mainstream actually educated economists are right, not people hyperventilating about money printing."

The thesis of your post is literally a fallacious argument - the argument from authority. The textbook definition.

Yes, the "experts" are always right, like the experts that ran LTCM, the hedge fund run by rocket scientists that crashed the economy (until being bailed out by the Fed) /s

I would go on with more examples of fallacious "argument from authority" logic gone wrong, but I don't have the time.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#663

Post by Aerroon »

danans wrote: post #220
mindslight wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even with income remaining stagnant, the prices for goods and services should have been continually going down due to technology and outsourcing. Price optimization is the fundamental mechanic of any market! For example, when most manufacturing was moving to China the promise was that it would benefit consumers via lower prices. However the Fed's overt policy is to erase these gains by printing money via low interest…

> Even with income remaining stagnant, the prices for goods and services should have been continually going down due to technology and outsourcing. The price for goods did go down. Everything from food to toys to tools got much cheaper than it was before. However, the price for cornerstone needs that govern access to opportunity - i.e. healthcare, housing, education, physical security - and the percentage of income a…

Maybe the reason the price of those cornerstone services is that people had more money left over, thus were willing to pay more? This effect seems to be happening with housing and education.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#664

Post by username90 »

pembrook wrote: post #584
adam_arthur wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the situation we're in is unprecedented. Never before has the government stepped in with this much force in response to an economic crisis. The March crash was the event that was going to normalize asset prices, but really just became a blip due to the pump. Should the government have done nothing? Absolutely not, but aid should have been better targeted. Overleveraged and poorly run businesses should fail. Pe…

> The March crash was the event that was going to normalize asset prices, but really just became a blip due to the pump. The main reason it was a blip, is because earnings have returned almost to pre-COVID levels for large public companies. Just as everyone expected. Did fiscal and monetary policy help smooth things out? Sure. But again, earnings are normalizing, like we knew they would. Markets discount the entire f…

> So you're saying "this time is different." Let's see how that plays out.

Main difference from the past recessions is that today the main way to store money is index funds. In recessions people pump money into savings, ie into index funds, ie into the stock market making stocks value increase rather than fall. As long as people believe that index funds are a more stable currency than the dollar this will continue to be true in future recessions.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#665

Post by 01100011 »

f38zf5vdt wrote: post #581
notahacker wrote: post #496

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This narrative also has the effect of deflecting attention from other policies which contribute towards inequality an awful lot more. It's not like the majority of recorded history on the Gold Standard was noted for the bottom 90% enjoying relatively large shares of national wealth and income security.

Yet, paradoxically, the economic golden era of post-WW2 United States from 1946-1969 was entirely on a gold standard.

Yes, the period following massive government debt spending during WWII. There are unique economic and demographic factors specific to that era.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#666

Post by WalterBright »

TrinaryWorksToo wrote: post #594
WalterBright wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how do you explain everything that happened on the wealth inequality front from the 1970s up to the financial crisis of 2009? In one word: computers. In tsunami after tsunami from 1975 to the present, computers have revolutionized everything we do. I remember one tsunami in 1975, when slide rules in September were $125 and by December they were $5 and in January they disappeared. The calculator had arrived. In 1980…

> and those smart enough to have invested in them. Correction: Wealthy enough to be able to invest in them.

Robinhood has conclusively shown in the last month that ordinary Americans, even poor ones, have access to investing in stocks. This includes access to margin and sophisticated options trading.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#667

Post by babesh »

john_moscow wrote: post #367
natenthe wrote: post #57

Correction: The Fed's policies have taken $50T of wealth from the Bottom 90%. When you bail out irresponsibly over-leveraged and nearly bankrupted banks and corporations, and pay for those bailouts with tax-payer money, you steal from the poor and give to the rich. Most importantly, when the Fed decides to print money ad nauseam, they create massive asset inflation, which steals from the poor and gives to the rich. T…

>It amazes me why most people do not grasp this. Because the people who figured that out also figured out the divide-and-conquer strategy. So first you quietly take X% out of everyone's pocket, and then you do massive PR campaign splitting them into identity groups and forcing them to fight over who should be more entitled to a 0.1X% bonus in the name of equity and justice. And you turn a blind eye, and even somewhat…

https://waitbutwhy.com/2019/09/stories.html

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#668

Post by BenoitEssiambre »

natenthe wrote: post #662
BenoitEssiambre wrote: post #520

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Mainstream actually educated economists are right, not people hyperventilating about money printing. On top of what you said about the effect of printing making valuations high, only temporarily and only on paper, the opposite lack of printing, is actual redistribution towards the rich in a much more real and persistent way. Insufficiently inflationary money can be used as a way for the rich to withdraw from…

"Mainstream actually educated economists are right, not people hyperventilating about money printing." The thesis of your post is literally a fallacious argument - the argument from authority. The textbook definition. Yes, the "experts" are always right, like the experts that ran LTCM, the hedge fund run by rocket scientists that crashed the economy (until being bailed out by the Fed) /s I would go on with more examp…

ouch burned... except that it isn't the thesis of my post, I just started it by hooking into your argument about education.

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#669

Post by TrinaryWorksToo »

undefined1 wrote: post #616
TrinaryWorksToo wrote: post #594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and those smart enough to have invested in them. Correction: Wealthy enough to be able to invest in them.

or early enough $1,000 invested in AMZN is now worth over $1M. or $10 in Bitcoin would have done the trick.

Do you understand how poor some people are?

Re: America's 1% Has Taken $50T From the Bottom 90%

#670

Post by biztos »

Thorentis wrote: post #226
zepto wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that the thread is about how $50T has been appropriated from the poor it seems odd to say that the poor should use $250 phones, and they have no business owning anything which costs more.

But not everybody can be in the top 1% by definition. So either a category of people exists that do not need/cannot afford $1500 phones, or $1500 phones are a basic necessity that every human needs alongside food and shelter. I would argue that yes, in the first world a smartphone is almost required, but there are plenty of great <$200 Android phones that do everything one would deem essential. $1500 smartphones are…

I have an iPhone because it is (for my needs) a better machine. I wear Nike running shoes because they fit me well and that gets me a safer workout.

Some things have functional advantages even if they also signal status. The working class has at least as much need for functionality as anyone else. A $400 phone vs a $200 one could easily be more useful to a poorer person than a richer one. Same with $100 vs $25 shoes.

My Seiko tells time as well as a Rolex (though not as well as an even cheaper quartz watch would). But even here, where status is definitely a factor, it’s not like the Rolex has no additional value: it has resale value, and aesthetic value.

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