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Life During Class Wartime

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Re: Life During Class Wartime

#231

Post by cestith »

7e wrote: post #136

Inequality is rising, but is absolute wealth also rising? Median incomes inflation adjusted?

Inequality of some level is perfectly acceptable in the societies being discussed. It’s a real problem, though, when it becomes a crisis of affordability for the median earner. It’s a problem when the ultra wealthy can leverage their fortunes not just for private power but also for control of the public sector. In the US right now we’re looking at both.

Citizens United and public capture in general are forming an aristocratic class in the United States.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#232

Post by AnimalMuppet »

cestith wrote: post #229
AlexandrB wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the west, the prevalent idea is that socialism/communism lost and that there is nothing beyond capitalism. It didn't just "lose", it killed millions of its own people in the process. Having been born in a communist state, I'd rather clean toilets in American than do anything else in the USSR. Edit: It's basically impossible to communicate the day-to-day misery and deprivation of late stage Communism without soun…

Was it communism that killed people in the Soviet times, or was it authoritarianism? You can have authoritarians no matter your economic structure. They have killed people around the world in the name of communism, capitalism, fascism, race, culture, religion, colonialism, and just general jingoistic control for millennia.

Ask it the other way around. Can you have (Marxist/Leninist) communism without authoritarianism? The answer certainly seems to be no. And since the Marxist/Leninist flavor is what almost everyone thinks of when they say "communism", then one could say that, absent any qualifiers like "voluntary" or "non-Marxist", communism is authoritarian, and did in fact kill all those people.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#233

Post by suttontom »

stavros wrote: post #220
ponector wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If all wealth of top 10 will be distributed equally it will add 5-10k per person. Will it make any difference in amount of pure people?

Yes, 5k will make a difference. How about the top 1000?

How about the top 10,000? How about any wealth you personally have? At what point does it stop being OK for you to take people's wealth? When someone becomes a billionaire?

This reminds me of when Bernie Sanders was asked why it's OK for him to be a millionaire and he said something akin to "If you write a popular book like I did, you can be a millionaire too." Well maybe if you reinvent electric cars and space travel or build a company that ships you almost anything you can think of within 2 days then you can be a billionaire.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#234

Post by suttontom »

BobbyJo wrote: post #73
pitaj wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My hot take is that wealth inequality is the least bad problem we could have, if it is even a problem at all. What people are actually experiencing is not wealth inequality, but cost disease. Vital things (housing, healthcare, education) are more expensive - and that's mostly the fault of state action.

Two things: 1) You have to get it out of your head that it is enough when everyone has X standard of living. It isn't. It's enough when less than a critical threshold of the population is dissatisfied, and that dissatisfaction can come no matter what the median/lowest standard of living is. This is just how societies work, uniformly. 2) Money is a ledger supported by a social contract. Spending wealth in ways that er…

How do you run a society based on who is dissatisfied? It seems reasonable to say that, even though there's a massive wealth gap, if the poorest are healthier, wealthier, and generally better off than they were a generation ago (that might not be true though with this current generation, who it seems may die earlier than their parents did), then changing laws because those people are "dissatisfied" seems kind of arbitrary, because dissatisfaction is kind of the human condition.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#235

Post by stavros »

suttontom wrote: post #233
stavros wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, 5k will make a difference. How about the top 1000?

How about the top 10,000? How about any wealth you personally have? At what point does it stop being OK for you to take people's wealth? When someone becomes a billionaire? This reminds me of when Bernie Sanders was asked why it's OK for him to be a millionaire and he said something akin to "If you write a popular book like I did, you can be a millionaire too." Well maybe if you reinvent electric cars and space trave…

We can decide the point collectively. After you have enough to live a comfortable, fulfilling life, you don't need more money.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#236

Post by piva00 »

ponector wrote: post #219
stavros wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone says that really poor people are caused by the existence of really rich people. The argument, as I understand it, is that spreading the wealth of billionaires around would mean fewer really poor people.

If all wealth of top 10 will be distributed equally it will add 5-10k per person. Will it make any difference in amount of pure people?

The distribution will go into services that compound the 5k-10k across society, not to individuals.

Education returns the investment to a nation at around 9%/year. Transportation infrastructure (especially if it's not only for roads in dense urban centres) also has a decent ROI. Investment in science, fundamental research that most private entities don't have the risk appetite for, has a massive ROI for a nation over time.

Providing public services and safety nets for a society also free up humans to take risks such as starting businesses, if you know you will be able to survive with dignity even if it all crashes and burns you are more inclined to try out that business idea instead of being stuck at a bad job. It makes bad jobs also more unattractive, requiring better salaries which reduces the gap between the haves and have-nots, this lowers crime, increases social cohesion, etc.

What exactly is the benefit for society of not taxing wealthy people out of 2% of their wealth? They mostly don't use that wealth to invest in risky ventures, they rely on banks for that.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#237

Post by cestith »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #232
cestith wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was it communism that killed people in the Soviet times, or was it authoritarianism? You can have authoritarians no matter your economic structure. They have killed people around the world in the name of communism, capitalism, fascism, race, culture, religion, colonialism, and just general jingoistic control for millennia.

Ask it the other way around. Can you have (Marxist/Leninist) communism without authoritarianism? The answer certainly seems to be no. And since the Marxist/Leninist flavor is what almost everyone thinks of when they say "communism", then one could say that, absent any qualifiers like "voluntary" or "non-Marxist", communism is authoritarian, and did in fact kill all those people.

Was it Leninism that was so deadly in the USSR or Stalinism? Stalin was a much different leader with much different politics and philosophies than Lenin and Trotsky. Don’t confuse the Communist party with communism, just like many Libertarians in the US are not actually libertarian these days.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#238

Post by suttontom »

stavros wrote: post #235
suttontom wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about the top 10,000? How about any wealth you personally have? At what point does it stop being OK for you to take people's wealth? When someone becomes a billionaire? This reminds me of when Bernie Sanders was asked why it's OK for him to be a millionaire and he said something akin to "If you write a popular book like I did, you can be a millionaire too." Well maybe if you reinvent electric cars and space trave…

We can decide the point collectively. After you have enough to live a comfortable, fulfilling life, you don't need more money.

I agree we can/should decide collectively. But when the vast majority of Americans have a place to live, air conditioning and heat, a refrigerator, enough to eat, etc. it's hard not to say that they're comfortable. As for fulfilling, that's describing a utopia.

I recognize there are still people who are food insecure, and I think it's an abomination how people are suffering (many poor rural black people in the south don't even have access to basic plumbing and end up with diseases like hookworm), but making wealthy people into a boogeyman just seems like an emotional argument so much of the time.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#239

Post by ponector »

stavros wrote: post #235
suttontom wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about the top 10,000? How about any wealth you personally have? At what point does it stop being OK for you to take people's wealth? When someone becomes a billionaire? This reminds me of when Bernie Sanders was asked why it's OK for him to be a millionaire and he said something akin to "If you write a popular book like I did, you can be a millionaire too." Well maybe if you reinvent electric cars and space trave…

We can decide the point collectively. After you have enough to live a comfortable, fulfilling life, you don't need more money.

A person does not need to own a house to live a comfortable fulfilling life. 400 sq. ft studio apartment is enough for a single person.

If there is no public transportation available, an old Toyota Yaris is also enough to have a comfortable commute.

Re: Life During Class Wartime

#240

Post by enoch_r »

vinyl7 wrote: post #146
enoch_r wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't appear to be true at all. Do you have a source?

https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/unitedhealth-prior-aut...

The claim was not "UHC made prior authorization easier for many procedures," the claim was "rejection rates by health insurance companies plummeted." I found several sources claiming that denial rates increased following the assassination:

- https://www.os-healthcare.com/news-and-blog/denial-rates-are...

- https://www.experian.com/blogs/healthcare/state-of-claims-20...

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