Earlier quoted context omitted.
So, are young people buying their 1st home now? If not, is it actually easier for them to buy?
> So, are young people buying their 1st home now? If not, is it actually easier for them to buy? No, young people are not buying their first home. Despite that, yes, it is actually easier for them to buy. What is stopping them? I would say mainly the expectation that housing prices will drop further as the economy is going further down the drain, leading to better buying opportunities at a later time.
The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
521–530 of 606 posts
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#522Earlier quoted context omitted.
Then, you can always blame the libtards and the Bidens harder .
It’s not about liberals or conservatives. When a poor person votes for a ultra rich person that it is completely against the poor persons self interest because the rich person will make policy to favor himself as a rich person rather then others as poor people. I hate extremist liberalism too and this is completely orthogonal to that.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#523Earlier quoted context omitted.
The American people, the Constitution, Ukraine, Europe, the whole world probably. The US is about to drag the world into a recession or a War Economy.
Why would that change for the better if Elon lost a lot of money? People become more aggressive when they lose a lot, not less.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#524Earlier quoted context omitted.
When you’re that rich you aren’t motivated by more money. He’s motivated by power, and the fear of power being taken away.
That doesn't seem likely to me as I don't see how someone can get to be that rich without being incredibly motivated by more money. Surely a normal person would get a few million and decide that they had more money than they'd ever need? But yes, likely motivated by power too.
The people who get to be billionaires are motivated differently to normal people. They are more like feudal kings.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#525Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They aren’t even aware wealth inequality is the problem. "Wealth inequality" in the sense that there are several billion people and the net worth of each and every one of them is not exactly the same? That can't be it. "Wealth inequality is increasing over time" seems like it could be a bad thing, but if that's the problem then what's the cause ? Let's consider how that happens: When you buy something for $100, par…
This is an excellent post. I think the competition idea works at the level of a country if people by and large play by the rules (a big if ). It does not work at the level of macro economics. If you (as a country) insist on competition and absence of mega corps in your country while a country next to you subsidizes mega corps that outcompete your smaller companies - you will lose. Thus in a world of competition, ever…
The assumption here is that megacorps are a competitive advantage. Let's look at a counterexample.
Suppose solar manufacturing is a growth industry. China wants to dominate it, so they subsidize it. Is there now a single megacorp in China that makes all the solar panels? No, it's a competitive industry there, but because of the subsidies that industry outcompetes the industries in other countries, with the result that China as a whole makes 80% of the world's solar panels. Others can't compete because of the subsidies, not because of a monopolist. Or, after the subsidies have existed for long enough, because the whole supply chain ends up in that country and other countries don't have the local knowledge or infrastructure to even do it anymore. So that kind of subsidization is a problem, but it's a different problem and "you need your own megacorps" is no solution.
Now let's go back to Oracle. How is it that they make so much money? The premise of copyright is you get a temporary monopoly in exchange for creating something and that allows you to recover your costs. Originally this was 14 years; it's not so temporary anymore. Also, the premise was that you sell a copy and get money and then if you want more money you need to create more works.
How does Oracle actually work? They don't sell you a copy, they sell you a license. The law allowing this was a choice, and a bad one. Having a monopoly isn't illegal under the antitrust laws; abusing one is. But doing that with the copyright monopoly is largely ignored, which is what license terms more restrictive than the copyright statue do. So instead of buying some database software for a one-time fee and then being able to use it as long as you're satisfied with that version of it, you get a temporary license that expires if you stop paying a recurring fee. Meanwhile your data is now in a proprietary database with high costs to extricate it, so you're locked in.
Is Oracle then out-competing all of their smaller competitors? Not really. Tons of people use Postgres or MariaDB or SQLite, and there are several other proprietary databases as well. But Oracle still gets to stick it to all the organizations that are locked in to Oracle, because the industry lobbied for laws that allow them to.
And then you also see Oracle sticking it to organizations in e.g. Europe. Is that because Oracle's size allows them to outcompete smaller companies this time? No, the same competitors are still there, it's because Europe has similar laws that allow the company screw their customers in similar ways, instead of limiting copyright to the selling of copies.
By contrast, if you look at something like Visa and Mastercard, that's a major duopoly in the US. And those cards are accepted in many other countries, but they often have competitors there, when those countries have laws that facilitate competition. Because the companies get big by laws that thwart competition, but when that's their advantage, the advantage doesn't stick where those laws don't exist. If anything it puts them at a disadvantage because being insulated from competitive pressure domestically makes them unresponsive and inefficient.
Which is why corporations are always lobbying to have the laws that prop up their concentrated markets enshrined into international treaties.
> Somebody will rule
This is the assumption most in need of being challenged. "There must be a king" is a fallacy. There will either be a king, or there will be a population of people dedicated to preventing anyone from establishing a throne.
The latter is what you get from a system of well-devised checks and balances, one of which is competitive markets. Emphasis on competitive.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#526Earlier quoted context omitted.
> * See, for example, the vast gulf between public opinion on issues like Israel, public healthcare, free education and housing for all, vs the opinion of the political and media class. While i agree with you generally (blaming domestic problems on unpopular minorities or foreign enemies is a playbook as old as time), im not sure i agree that those issues are based on class division. Large swathes of America seem to…
> im not sure i agree that those issues are based on class division. Rule of thumb: it always, always goes back to class. No war but class war is a cliche for good reason. > Large swathes of America seem to be genuinely opposed to public healthcare. That may be kinda true, but most Americans actually want it [0]. They just have basically no representation in media or politics. These days we're 'lucky' if a Democrat g…
If its politically convinent to view things in terms of class then of course everything gets traced back to class. But i think that is more about trying to fit every peg into a round hole no matter how square it is. As the cliche goes, if all you have is a hammer.
> That may be kinda true, but most Americans actually want it [0]
I dont think the poll supports your contention. Only 57% wanted it. I'm not sure where you are drawing the line between classes here, but its hardly just the upper class saying no.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
My first job (2018) provided 2 weeks of PTO, with an increase to 3 weeks expected after _five_ years. Folks in the U.S. can't quite comprehend having more than that (or any at all, depending on the job). I am very grateful for my current company's "unlimited" PTO policy, it's life-changing.
How unlimited is it, really? How much do people take off in reality? I dislike these "benefits" that no one then dares to use in reality. We have 6 weeks off, and you are literally forced to take them. This basically prevents social norms from putting pressure on people to not go on holidays as much or not during certain times.
It can be a slippery slope for sure, I think it only works when the entire team buys into the notion that life is always more important than work (which can feel rare over here).
Happy to say this has been working for me and if the attitude started to change, I like to think I would speak up pretty quickly.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
Think what your priorities were when you were 15, 20, 25, 30 and so on. Personally for me, my priorities have been different at each stage. As I got older, I had more things to lose, loved ones to think about, deeper connections and etc., which made me more mindful while making specific decisions. I’m not saying that at the age of 30 (current global median age), every one of the same age think the same way. But it is…
I don‘t get which implications you derive from the changing needs over one’s life. In all of those phases, safety and health of yourself and beloved ones are likely at the top of your needs. Is there a contradiction to your ideals when you were young (unless you went all in on YOLO)? edit: Maybe it’s about the inclination towards uprise/revolution which might result in oppression and danger for those you want to prot…
I don’t think any of them were my priority when I was under 20. Health of my beloved ones became more important only recently, as my parents are way older now as well. And older people, on average, are more likely to have significant others to care about and etc.
But yeah, less time and thoughts on how to change the world and etc. as well. I’m not really sure how to explain it, if I’ll be honest, sorry. Just 10 years ago I was a different person. 20 years ago, I was even more different than today.
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#529It's only going to get worse.
The biggest reason it can't be stopped is because 1/2 of the bottom 90% of the population is screaming to get rid of social security, because... it's socialism!
Never mind that they have $0 saved for retirement. When you combine a sociopathic wealth class, and a multi-decade education deprived working class, it's a win-win for ever increasing wealth inequality.
For many in the top 10%, this is considered a good thing...
Re: The top 10% owns 87% of the stocks
#530Any system that allows humans agency will end up with a Pareto-style distribution in that thing (non-linear). Doesn’t matter if it’s wealth, HN upvotes, Crime, Traffic accidents, Productivity, Tetris scores, academic papers published, etc. 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…
It's not a slight drift, it's a massive change since the 1950's. Looking at averages is completely irrelevant when talking about inequality. Here's a video from 12 years ago: Wealth Inequality in America https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM
My point is that pareto distributions ("inequality") are not some evil to be eliminated, they're the direct memetic outcome of how humans work.
We can of course cut all the tall poppies to make everyone equal, but that's just cutting off your nose to spite one's face.
Allowing inequality to exist is why average Americans are the wealthiest people on the planet. Turns out all those tall poppies drive the productivity gains that accrue to all of us (hence why we've gone from near-zero Americans holding passports to 50% of people during the same time frame that inequality has increased).
I know, it doesn't fit with the narrative you have in your head so I won't convince you otherwise.