Never mind the 1 percent Let's talk about the 0.01 percent (2017)

> Is anyone else getting bored with this kind of

People who write don't earn a great deal of money. Nor (typically) do they have the potential to do so. Other professions can at least dream that they will hit it big or earn a good steady income if that is not the case. People at the bottom can't even dream but 'they know their place'. News articles with head lines like that draw readers sure but I think it's more than that ('people who write...'). This is human nature. Very generally the middle class that are employed and not taking on credit card debt and spending over their means (which they do) don't care that there are super wealthy people.

What is to stop people in some dirt poor foreign country from talking about how it's not fair that people in the US, even our poorest, very likely have it better than they do? (Well nobody other than the writers in our country will say anything and quite frankly nobody in our country would care enough to give them anything that we have so it doesn't matter). When was the last time you heard of a tax specifically to help people in dirt poor countries? (Not talking about aid but actual 'we will take your income', well never).

You know what has changed more than anything? What we know about what others are earning and what they have that is what material goods.

As many older HN readers will probably agree when I was growing up their were the Rockefellers, Howard Hughes and maybe a few other people. There were movie stars and the Beverly Hillbillies. You didn't really care that they were wealthy it was just the way it was. There was no revolt of the masses. Sure there are more people will money today but what there is grossly more of is attention and that it's in everyone's face (and of course the people who write and broadcast about it).

In America the top 1% control about 40% of the money, with most of that, as this article shows going to the wealthiest. In Denmark its roughly 20% of the money to the top 1% - the lowest inequality of any of the OECD nations. At the same time we have political movements dedicated to wrecking our social safety nets in an attempt to get us back to "The Jungle" style nastiness - often funded by that same fraction of a percent at the top.

So, some bitterness there. :D

Or, more simply, your country doesn't have anywhere near the same systemic and cultural issues the US does currently.

Eh, what are you saying is mutable here, exactly?

The only way of getting a 0.5 Gini ("absolute equality") is if everyone is earning the same, which is ridiculous. As soon as you throw any randomness in there, well, all of a sudden you get inequality.

Next, there are the (totally reasonable) winner-take-all mechanics of skilled labor. Are you a better CEO (where "better" here could just mean better at pitching/selling/hiring/picking a market)? Then you can end up capturing all of the market share vs your competitors. That ends up paying nicely.

You still could have rent-seekers and people who cheat, but from the article itself, the top driver is differentiation based on skills.

Don't like winner-take-all mechanics? Introduce income pooling. But I wouldn't expect that to be the revolutionary change people are looking for, just a way to guarantee people on the same skill ladder end up in roughly the same outcome bracket. I don't think "guarantee top ivy leaguers make >$400k/yr" is what you're looking for.

Lots of people "work hard", and almost none of them are rich. So obviously it's not "working hard" that gives you that money.

At some point very early on, your money starts making money and you cease to do "work" to make that number grow. It seems inappropriate to equivocate capital gains with gainful employment.

My guess is that such a list is probably mostly the same as the wealthiest people due to the nature of capital gains. If you have a billion dollars, you get probably 10 million a year with the most conservative investments (in reality it's probably closer to a 5-15% rate of return). On top of that, the favorable tax treatment of long term capital gains means you pay way less in taxes than the schmuck who gets paid 10 million a year as salary.