281–290 of 606 posts
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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.
"but look at how much better the human quality of life is compared to even 50 years ago." There is more to life than autonomous vacuum cleaners and possibility of having a talk with your light bulb. But to be serious - yes, many things have improved, yet we re losing many others.
And there are many more of such indicators!
This "we are all better off" is partially true but helps to neglect valid criticism.
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> 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…
> Do you really understand just how unequal it is? 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…
Is that because they're older? Or is it because when 70 yo's were young they could go through college on part time work, buy a house with an average wage, and then have that house skyrocket in value because housing was turned into an investment vehicle?
Dig into those statistics, and look at how much of the €400k net worth is tied up in their homes, homes which they owned outright at 25-27 years old. That's unimaginable today. People that age are living with their parents.
Look at those statistics and compare the median to the average - the distribution is extremely skewed - you could even call it 'unequal'. 'Record levels of inequality' even.
Age isn't as much of a factor as the 'nerdwallet' blog seems to think; and to the degree to which it is, is a natural consequence of having had more time to work and invest during a boom period, then having a certain generation and class of people 'pull up the ladder' after them.
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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 think Russia in 1917 is a more recent and valid parallel. But it takes hunger rather than disapproval to fuel such a revolution.
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.
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How very Marxist. How have those Marxist governments fared in the past?
Marxism is when people stand up for their rights I guess?
To read about people standing up for their rights in a Marxist State read Robert Conquest's 570 pages of 'The Great Terror' - an account of the crimes committed against humanity in the name of the Soviet Communism that emerged from the 1917 revolution. 'We'll do it differently' is the usual response. Sadly this always leaves out appreciation of the human factor whereby charismatic leaders arise and are convinced they know the truth and the way. Before considering a revolution, ensure there's a solution for this human problem of leaders who lead the masses (they regard the latter as such) down a path that in retrospect is seen to be a disaster. Pol Pot, The Great Leap Forward, the Iranian Revolution. We need to sit down and think about this before taking to the streets.
How about evolution rather than 'eggs in one basket' revolution?
As for the slight drift in US wealth distribution since 1980, it’s wholly explained by the change in age demographics. Since 1980 we’ve gone from a nation of people 30 years old to 40 years old. 10 years is a lot of time when it comes to compounding returns on productive assets (stocks, etc). Due to compounding, wealth held by each age group also gets more Pareto-extreme heading into retirement age.
Adjust that out, and this is mostly a nothing burger. But emotionally people don’t feel that way so nothing I say will change that. Narrative zeitgeist always wins over objective reality.
Average Americans are wealthier than they've ever been. Another chart to drive this home, the percentage of Americans who have a passport since 1989 (Note, this is also influenced by age demographics, but not as dramatically as wealth): https://www.statista.com/statistics/804430/us-citzens-owning...
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Also the rich have cash flow and can continuously invest during crashes. The top 10% aren’t losing their jobs in a crash, but the bottom 50% might. So while the top 10% keeps investing and will maximize the recovery, the bottom 50% will cash out at the bottom and won’t return to invest for years after their emergency fund has recovered.
> the rich have cash flow and can continuously invest during crashes There are a lot of levered rich people. Musk would be screwed if he got margin called on Tesla.
Even if Musk filed bankruptcy yesterday, he would still end his life a multi-billionaire.
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Also the rich have cash flow and can continuously invest during crashes. The top 10% aren’t losing their jobs in a crash, but the bottom 50% might. So while the top 10% keeps investing and will maximize the recovery, the bottom 50% will cash out at the bottom and won’t return to invest for years after their emergency fund has recovered.
> the rich have cash flow and can continuously invest during crashes There are a lot of levered rich people. Musk would be screwed if he got margin called on Tesla.
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In fairness; there is an ongoing strategy of printing money and distributing it to asset owners. That may also be contributing to asset owners accounting for most spending.
This is basically what happened during the covid low interest mania. Not realizing what had happened, in three years I went from "almost enough to buy a house in the city in cash" to "have to buy vacant rural wasteland then develop it myself from scratch." The latter worked out, but cost me two years of my life of hard labor. Those two years of manual labor more or less represent what home owners took from non owners…
Ignoring the meta economy lessons etc, how was it? Do you love what you've done?
How did you do it? Where is it? What was surprisingly hard and what was surprisingly easy? Etc etc etc, please tell all!
Love this kind of stuff :D (An HNer just embarking on a house self-building project)