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American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

economist.com

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Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#131

Post by andyferris »

WalterBright wrote: post #95
shric wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Walter, I believe the idea against wealth inequality is not purely that there are wealthier people but that their wealth should be redistributed such that the wealthier people are less wealthy (but still wealthier) and the poorer people are less poor (but still poorer).

There have been many attempts at taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and the result was always everybody was worse off except the people who ran the government.

That’s incorrect.

In most western nations, the “people who run the government” get paid a salary similar to a good software engineer (or maybe a doctor), and progressive taxation lets the government fund social services including free healthcare and tertiary education.

Rather than use Stalin as a straw man, maybe try take your nation in direction that helps people, rather than away?

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#132

Post by hparadiz »

Nursie wrote: post #105
hparadiz wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could only relate to this stuff in my 20s but now I just don't care. Maybe it's cause I went from This idea that people will rise up and replace what we've got now with better is part of the problem. You literally do not know how lucky you are to live in this time because you are living in the middle of a golden age and don't even realize it. Because when you're in the middle of a golden age it feels normal. And fo…

> I watched them become millionares by simply getting up and working hard. If it was that easy, every office cleaner or bank clerk would be a millionaire. > living in literally the best time ever to be a human being Sure, but we're also watching the rise of a new oligarchy, and their latest innovation appears poised to put a lot of people out of work, making their lives materially worse.

It literally is. People just have no discipline or skills with money. Go on the fire subreddit. 25k saved per year is a million after twenty years with a modest very conservative amount. And if you can double that with a spouse you're looking at a million in only ten years. People who stretch that to 20-25 years end up with 3-5 million.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#133

Post by WalterBright »

mlsu wrote: post #110
WalterBright wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a summary of Piketty's argument? We could start off with how are you worse off because of people wealthier than you?

Piketty argues that if r > g, wealth will accumulate into fewer and fewer hands over time. R is the rate of return of capital (rents, stocks, bonds, etc) and g is the growth of the economy over time. If the economy grows at a higher rate than the rate of return, the pie gets bigger at a higher rate than wealth can concentrates. If the rate of return accumulates capital at a higher rate than the growth of the economy,…

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Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#134

Post by crossbody »

srean wrote: post #114
WalterBright wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There have been many attempts at taking from the rich and giving to the poor, and the result was always everybody was worse off except the people who ran the government.

Norway seems to be doing swell.

Well, if Norway managed to pull it off, we can just ignore all the countless counter examples

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#135

Post by satvikpendem »

sevenzero wrote: post #71
WalterBright wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a summary of Piketty's argument? We could start off with how are you worse off because of people wealthier than you?

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"Educate yourself" is almost always a shibboleth that the speaker of the phrase actually doesn't even know how to explain it to someone. It is a phrase of moral superiority and is not interested in whether the other person actually educates themselves or not. Or they might educate themselves and come to the opposite conclusion as you, in which case, maybe you should have educated (or indoctrinated) them first.

https://www.persuasion.community/p/why-i-refuse-to-educate-m...

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#136

Post by srean »

WalterBright wrote: post #81
10000truths wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The inequality doesn't come from the creation of wealth so much as the destruction of it. Inflation and rising prices of staple goods (there is some covariance, but the latter seems to be outpacing the former) impact poor people disproportionately hard because staple goods are more or less fixed costs. The marginal utility of an extra dollar is much higher for someone on the poverty line vs. someone who is a multi-mi…

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Grain prices are today set by derivative markets that have very little connection to actual produce.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#137

Post by satvikpendem »

sevenzero wrote: post #119
WalterBright wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read my responses here.

I did, which made me come to this conclusion. You seem to think value is created by extracting money from a product, while value actually is created by the work it takes to create said product. How much money one does extract has nothing to do with a products value. In your Tailor Swift example earlier, the value was created by her recording the music, not by her selling tours.

The value is absolutely in how much you can sell it. Otherwise every startup that subscribes to the "build it and they will come" philosophy would've been successful, which is obviously not the case and is a common problem that YC specifically tells founders to look out for. There is no value in building anything if you cannot convince others it is valuable. The labor theory of value is not valid.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#138

Post by _carbyau_ »

WalterBright wrote: post #22
ares623 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"create"

???

Me giving you a dollar doesn't create.

The rich extracting wealth from the poor doesn't create.

Investors buying existing housing stock doesn't create.

Mine it. Make it. Improve it. Brings wealth into existence.

Note that financially large businesses/individuals are a mix of wealth creation and transference.

That one word comment implies a lot of the wealthiest people have not created much wealth in comparison with how much they managed to transfer.

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#139

Post by demritocracy »

thothless wrote: post #77
WalterBright wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about a summary of Piketty's argument? We could start off with how are you worse off because of people wealthier than you?

your first question was better. "how does creating wealth hurt others?" most of this "wealth" is not "created" out of thin air. nor created at all. more like, transferred.

looks like a lot of wealth was created out of thin air about 6 years ago https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M1SL

Re: American capitalism has taken an apocalyptic turn

#140

Post by stopping »

WalterBright wrote: post #124
stopping wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the top 10% of people suddenly had their wealth double overnight, it would have absolutely disastrous effects for the lower 90% of people. Prices for scarce goods (e.g. housing) would increase dramatically. The price increase dampens the overall demand for housing since a large fraction of the 90% are now priced out. The wealthy homeowners have an incentive to maintain that scarcity, and freely use their resources…

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Is anyone else having trouble parsing this comment or is it just me?
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