Some dangerous but frequently expressed myths spotted in the media:
Wealth trickles down from the rich.... (it doesn't);
The state is like a household & must therefore 'balance the books'.... (it isn't & doesn't);
The poor have only themselves to blame...(no, poverty is often due to external factors);
The rich got there through hard work.... (no, mostly the rich have either benefitted form inheritance or have, unacknowledged, good luck)....
Just sayin'
@Colman @ChrisMayLA6 I take a different view - that most of the rich have inherited money, or family wealth or at least security. Meaning they can mess up a few times and it is not a big deal.
That is the "luck" they normally have - the ability to have lost a million on unsuccessful deals, and still be able to carry on.
I think the US and the UK are remarkably similar in this.
excellent point; and boosted
@SteveClough @Colman @ChrisMayLA6 I take exception to the idea that it's mostly luck in the sense above for a different reason:
It's mostly about evil.
Specifically, willingness and glee at harming others to advance their own status.
Being extremely rich comes at the intersection of luck, inherited wealth (also luck in a different form), and evil (usually also "inherited" - taught by parents, private schooling, etc.).
@SteveClough @Colman @ChrisMayLA6 You might reach the single or low to mid double digit millions just by birth lottery combined with luck of having an honest business plan & execution that works really well in the right place at the right time.
You don't go above that without being deeply evil.
@dalias @SteveClough @Colman @ChrisMayLA6 yeah I think one can somewhat ethically be a millionaire, esp when one factors in how regressive taxation can be in the UK/US (and house values, for that matter) allowing even relatively ‘modest’ ‘success’ to snowball.
But once you cross into the 10s of millions, not to mention 100s, …you've been underpaying someone, ‘minimising’ taxes somewhere, cutting some corner… — it's just not possible to ‘make’ that money any other way.
@Colman @ChrisMayLA6 yes, plus blaming the unsuccessful for their lack of success allows us to believe we deserve our success. Humans are not as complex as we want to think we are. The wealthy are as susceptible to this sort of simplistic self interest as the rest of.
Also, some of the wealthy know everything I'm saying, but it's in their interest to say all the same myths many believe in public, and they cynically do so.
@pmb00cs @ChrisMayLA6 some will acknowledge it, some lie about it but I think most simply believe the propaganda. It’s a lot easier that way. After you lie about it for a while it becomes a lot easier to believe.
Propaganda works, especially on the propagandists.
@ChrisMayLA6 quite agree, though, having worked for several years in debt, welfare benefits & housing advice, I would take issue with the “often” relating to external causes of poverty
Poverty, in my experience is systemic & structural. End of. Some poor people make what others may regard as poor choices but that is marginal at most & who amongst us, not least finger-pointing journalists, has never made a bad choice?
Yes, I only said 'often' because sometimes there are other issues at play.... but I agree mostly with your argument
@ChrisMayLA6 I thought you would be but thought the point worth underlining explicitly
And, of course, SM word limits never help…
Indeed; I like the limit - stops me ranting on - but does sometimes require terminological shortcuts....
@ChrisMayLA6
I'd like to argue that it is mostly not luck, but recklessness and a profound lack of empathy that creates wealth. As my sociology professor said in one of the first lectures:
How do people become rich? In order of descending probability:
1) fraud
2) inheritance
3) luck
In particular note the absence of hard work. (Or intelligence or skills, I would like to add.)
@ChrisMayLA6 "Wealth trickles down from the rich.... (it doesn't);"
Indeed, I suspect that 'trickle-up' would work as well if not better. If you were to give, say £1000, to everyone in the country, I am fairly sure most of that would eventually end up concentrated in the hands of a few. (But I am no economist)
But, also due to the multiplier effect it would help a lot more people on the way (finally) upwards
I suspect that’s because of where they chose to draw the line. $1m today is a good amount of money but there’s a huge gap between that and most of the people that you’d think of as ‘rich’. The median house price in seven US states is about half that. Someone working in a middle tier at a tech company can save that much in under a decade fairly easily. A million split between a house and a pension is at the moderately wealthy end of middle class. There are over 20M such people in the USA, around 1/15 of the population (and, remember, the population includes children, so the numbers are skewed).
The gap from there to a hundred million or a billion is immense. If you start with a million and you aren’t stupid, you will probably end up with a few million by the time you die. To turn it into a billion requires a lot of luck. But if you start with a hundred million, it’s much easier.
And often the benefits of inherit are much more than just receiving money. They include knowing other wealthy folks who would invest in your business or who would start you in well-paid jobs, opportunities to go to good schools and universities (where you’ll meet more people who can help your career), and so on.
That last one can be true, but it's the hard work of *other* people (poorly compensated) not theirs.
Wealth trickles down from the rich.... (it doesn't);
In fact wealth trickles up to the rich. Always. At best it might circulate through a number of small local businesses first but it's going to end up in a large conglomerate or bank
The rich got where they are by being sociopaths. Economy doesn't begin at home, it turns out.
Well, while the household has to 'balance the books' in the short/medium term, the states (well those that have sovereign power over money/credit creation) can expand the money supply to pay their debts... now you might call that 'balancing the books' in the long-term via monetary means, but that's an option unavailable to households & discounted by the economic balance the books brigade. If this is what you meant by 'out of macroeconomic view' we may be agreeing?
Well I would have agreed if I hadn't seen it twice mentioned in all seriousness this weekend....
would disagree.
the rich mostly got huge bank or government handouts - its what makes the rich rich in the first class. the privilege of the capitalist class is the money printer.
...this has othing to do with unacknowledged luck, unless lucl means being born into the money printer class or managing to make friends with the money printer class.
but bitcoin fixes this. it abandons class division, but doesnt yet fix th poor/rich divide, it just enables healing
I would definitely agree that part of the rich's luck is the ability to farm corporate welfare for their associated enterprises.... which is partly why they are clustered in cortina sectors that have receded implicit of explcit subsidies
i mean. the balance sheet of the average company has 50% usually nore like 70-80% debt and the average bank of course 95-99% debt.
the debt grows every year. ...and the noney printers worldwide... are running hot.
a big part of that is ever increased government spending or public debt. ...but an even bigger part is the ever increasing private debt.
and who gets that new money? the crediry worthy... the capitalist class to fund more nonsense and increase debt further & faster
Agreed, when I ran my economics course for non-economists we did a while week on private credit creation, and it came as a great surprise to many of my students....
the horror is it still does. the books will never change. the revolution wont be televised but also not taught. ...its the ppl leveraging the internet and a fixed 21 million that can end it. no banker or politician can ever change it. the incentives in the system are like one giant "prisoner dilemma" where anyone who even suggests a change will be expelled and the madness continues. system filters for those willing to continue and the ones in line to replace dissenters is endless
its absolutely ridiculous on every level - yet thats the world we live in and allmost all modern problems and widespread phenomena derive from it.
there is no way out other than bitcion.
bitcoin ends this forever and nothing else will.
but its the only way we can save this planet and save it from capitalisms all and everything devouring money expansion madness ...🤷♀️
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