The people in the 10% changes wildly over time, on average people about to retire have way more than people about to start their first job.
The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
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Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#332So 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.
Heck no. This would cause the rich to evacuate their wealth into real estate, pumping the market even further.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#333Earlier quoted context omitted.
All major banks paid back all those loans with interest. That was actually net income for governments that lended those money. Who really lost money directly were all those speculators who had 10 mortgages on them and just kept taking more and more. Look, I am all for hatin' the big man when he deserves it and he often does, but lets be a bit smart and not just throw random angry spits without checking the facts, sha…
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Whether they deserved the loans or not is irrelevant to whether the loans were paid back. Which they were, I'm not sure why people keep repeating the lie that they didn't.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#334Earlier 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…
I think that's a very narrow and largely inaccurate view of revolutions. A lot of revolutions were carried out by people with very little resources - Mao led his army from under-developed hills, the October Revolution didn't have much of an industrial base either, nor did the left in the Spanish civil war (although the military eventually won, but hey, they had a fighting chance). And aside from that, many revolution…
Historical nitpick: the Spanish civil war kicked off when the right - most of(police + military + church + rich people) - rebelled against a constitutional republican government. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader whether that best fits their definition of a "revolution".
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#335The people in the 10% changes wildly over time, on average people about to retire have way more than people about to start their first job.
No most of them inherit their wealth and keep it in the family.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#336Earlier quoted context omitted.
How's China's Marxist-Leninist society working out right now? Last I checked their economy was on pace to grow larger than the US.
You think China's economy runs on Marxist-Leninist ideas? It's capitalism with authoritarian characteristics.
To someone who thinks "Laborer coordination and workforce strikes." are "very Marxist", China is indeed Marxist.
I know you're not the person who responded with that conflation, but if you were, to ask if Lenin would agree with that assessment is a motte-and-bailey fallacy.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#337I 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…
To me the question now is rather individual level related, instead of mass organization and action: what is threshold beyond which one - while having lost job, health[care], housing, social services and maybe even family member(s) - decides that s/he won't have absolutely anything else to lose, to then "pull a Luigi" on someone who s/he may feel responsible for his situation? Then iterate from 1 to n -> where would "n" make a real difference?
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#338I 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…
Thank you for this take, which I haven't seen before.
I believe it will help me deal with the current doomsday news (and be more stoic in general).
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#339Earlier quoted context omitted.
Liquid money is only good if the bank stays solvent. Which SVB was not, and neither were many banks in 2008 until the federal govt stepped in and backstopped all deposits beyond the $250K limit.
Rich people use different banks than the general population
Those banks are very far from being more trustworthy.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#340Earlier quoted context omitted.
George Washington didn't have Lockheed Martin's hand in his pocket. Wars were much cheaper when all you needed were men, horses and small arms.
And when you didn't have to fight the war on the other side of the planet.
Britain and America are not exactly close...