261–270 of 606 posts
The problem can be solved with transition to communism. No one will own anything and there will be no wealth.
Wrong. Small ruling class will own everything. And the majority will have nothing and no rights to have something. It has been tried before.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because the wealth is unequal, sure, but look at how much better the human quality of life is compared to even 50 years ago. What is wealth when everyone is fed, watered and entertained? Only stating this as an explanation to why there has not been a civil revolution. People are still dying in poverty with no way to escape every day, and we need to address it.
> the wealth is unequal, sure Do you really understand just how unequal it is? Most Americans vastly underestimate it [0]. And that's from 2013; inequality has rapidly worsened since. Do you understand the effects of that inequality? > look at how much better the human quality of life is compared to even 50 years ago. I don't think this is true. There is quality of life in owning a house, a family house. There is qua…
But the above blog post and study you linked to are misleading as well. For instance, wealth gets vastly skewed by age. The average net worth for people 65-75 is almost 10 times the average net worth of someone under 35[1]. For anyone who knows anything about investing, this isn't very surprising. Steady investment will cause people's savings to grow drastically from when they start to when they retire. A vulgar look at the numbers can have people saying "person A has 10 times the wealth of person B!", without considering that person B will also reach the level of person A when they get to the same age.
That's not to say that age alone would simply explain all of the inequality in society, but it's a major factor and an example of why you need to actually dive into the data rather than running with the baseline numbers. When it gets ignored it's likely people are pushing a polemic and aren't genuinely interested in what's happening.
[1] https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/average-net-worth...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think what you are trying to say is that the average American is absurdly poor.
Or that almost every person commenting in this thread should be aware that 'top 10%' means them.
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"they will want change by force" Won't happen in a society where elders are more numerous than young. In the past it required a lot of young males thinking they have not much to lose, but they are becoming extinct. Old people won't revolt, middle-aged fathers that need to think of their children and mortgage won't revolt.
Yet, my mother and my grandfather participated in the Romanian revolution, where real bullets have being shot against the people. I was almost 8 years old and I will be forever grateful for what they did. There is no other way, there is nobody else to help you if you accept what is happening. It's not on the same level, of course, but my anecdotal experience does not align with what you said. You can't fight lawless…
But don't you think that your (grand)parents may have been more motivated due to having children and grandchildren? Now, why an old, childless lady or man, living on pension, would take risks, especially when they lived their life watching things taking shape? Again, some will act on principles they believe in, but such people are always a minority. And I doubt people in age of your (grand)parents constituted a bulk of protesters.
I am from Poland. When mass workers protests were happening under communist regime, age median was under 30 yrs. Today it is over 40 yrs. Even excluding other aspects (like liberal ideology taking a firm hold here, and real economic growth that happened since), people today are much more complicit, and much less willing to take direct action, even if today's government is much less likely to beat you to death in jail.
I think about this from time to time and I suppose everything is cyclical in the end. Most of us would have been some peasant in the feudal age and when it gets really bad it always ends in a revolution of some sort. It's just on a global scale and timeframe now. As more of the population feels the effects of inequality they won't appeased by just fancy toys and shiny things, they will want change by force. My only s…
Nowadays is different from the feudal times you referred to. Because the majority of us are brainwashed by the media. When the brain is chained, there is no hope for a revolution.
I disagree, people were even more brainwashed in the past since their only source of information was what the church and the king would tell them (Plato's cave allegory) while now you have a plethora of independent unbiased sources of information plus leaks and whistleblowers out in the open to thanks to the internet and social media.
Sure, you have a lot of fake news and propaganda today form the mainstream and social media, but back then it was all exclusively fake news and propaganda, as only the ruling elites had the truth and they'd never share that with the peasants, while any peasantry who dared speaking the truth that went against the official narrative would be punished for heresy. That's why Europe spent so much time in the dark ages and the advent of freedom of thought also brought in the Renaissance era.
>When the brain is chained, there is no hope for a revolution.
I disagree, people in the west today have a lot more freedom of information and freedom of speech than in the distant past. Well, unless you live in the UK or Germany where the police arrests you for posting a meme online about a politician, try to ban encrypted chat and sources of information they consider "hateful" in order to control the narrative and restrict the population to only vote for the entrenched establishment.
So a stock market and/or real estate crash can actually be good to reduce inequality . In fact I think its about the only way to dramatically reduce inequality. Think about young people trying to buy their 1st home now, its becoming impossible.
No, because the richer one is the more one can endure. In a market crash, the rich can just survive with their own stash of liquid money and when the time is ripe they can sweep in and buy for cheap the stocks of middle class investors trying to liquidate to make ends meet
I think about this from time to time and I suppose everything is cyclical in the end. Most of us would have been some peasant in the feudal age and when it gets really bad it always ends in a revolution of some sort. It's just on a global scale and timeframe now. As more of the population feels the effects of inequality they won't appeased by just fancy toys and shiny things, they will want change by force. My only s…
I believe the ancient greeks called this anacyclosis https://anacyclosis.org/portfolio/what-is-anacyclosis/ For a more snappier version, see this video by a former professor of history, university of Wisconsin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqsBx58GxYY
I think about this from time to time and I suppose everything is cyclical in the end. Most of us would have been some peasant in the feudal age and when it gets really bad it always ends in a revolution of some sort. It's just on a global scale and timeframe now. As more of the population feels the effects of inequality they won't appeased by just fancy toys and shiny things, they will want change by force. My only s…
The population might not be happy, but they don't have the means to change it. Revolutions don't happen when people are mad, they happen when the ones who can afford armies and equipment sense the possibility of coming out on top. 250 years ago George Washington could have financed the entire Revolutionary War out of his own pocket and he still would have retained two thirds of his wealth. Instead he put the losses o…
I was very surprised by the holiday budget. Less than 2500$ for 80% of the population? Does that mean that no one from these 80% stays in a Hotel or AirBnB for longer than a week with their family? No one travels overseas, or if so, only every 5 years or so? 2000$ is what you can easily spend on plane tickets for a family of 4.
Yes? How long has it been since you checked what income percentile you are in? I would expect most of the posters here to be in the top 5%, with a short tail of unemployed and retirees. The number of Americans with passports is at an all time high of 48%, and some of that is simply for convenience ID for internal flights.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The population might not be happy, but they don't have the means to change it. Revolutions don't happen when people are mad, they happen when the ones who can afford armies and equipment sense the possibility of coming out on top. 250 years ago George Washington could have financed the entire Revolutionary War out of his own pocket and he still would have retained two thirds of his wealth. Instead he put the losses o…
Revolutions can happen if enough people show up. Massive amounts of people are difficult to deal with. Smaller groups you can outright kill in daylight, but better to get to them first to torture and kill them out of sight. Once you need to kill 500.000 who are protesting and if violence to quell the hoards wakes up more people who want to see the regime fail.