Income Inequality.

[Koldo]

Are you under the impression that if we had less rich people, we would have less poor?

If the money was distributed from the rich towards the poor, yes, definitely.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

You said

if someone is a brain surgeon - that's something that most people wouldn't be able to do, so they earn a higher salary for that. They provide a valued service to society, so I don't think too many people would begrudge a brain surgeon a high salary. Or if someone is a scientist or inventor, if they create something truly momentous and beneficial, then by all means, let them have their reward. I don't think very many people would object to that.

Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Jeff Bezos have all invented something truly momentous and beneficial; so according to what you said, by all means let them have their reward, and nobody should object to that!
Lots of comments; I will try to get to the rest later

None of them invented anything. They took ideas by actual developers and used angel investors amd seed money from rich parent connections to profit from those developer's work. And in some cases sued the company so they could have a founding credit. Lol

Bill Gates did not create MS DOS, literally the micro systems Microsoft became, it was an acquired product. Popularizing an invention is not inventing.

Jeff Bezos recognized the branding of garage success stories and so got his parent's wealthy investment firm to raise 1 million for him to build a "garage" where Shel Kaphan and Paul Davis did the actual inventing.

Elon Musk didn't invent anything. All his major successes were acquired businesses. He did not invent PayPal and he did not invent Tesla, he bought them with daddy's emerald mine seed money.

This notion that we reward inventors is a story made up by the businessmen profiting on their work. And don't get me wrong, advertisement and networking are important skills, but we idolize charming door to door salesmen who reaped the reward of being the public darling, not the workers who made the things we use.

 

[metis]

I've always considered it as practiced in the United States to be a good thing. But I know a lot of people seem to think it is bad; why?

K

It's a matter of degrees, imo. Some competition is good, but some can be quite destructive.

 

[Nakosis]

I love getting to post this image.
View attachment 78821
The reason I love this image is that whether or not you agree with it, it illustrates a fundamental difference on what people call 'generated wealth' and 'freedom' vs immoral practices of theft and living through the labor of others, otherwise known as exploitation.

And so saying that people hate what Elon Musk represents as someone who lives through not creating wealth but benefiting from unchecked exploitation, 'just envious of Elon Musk,' just sound like people who are also ******** who want the 'freedom' to exploite people to death.

This comes from a very odd understanding of economics. An understanding taught by college professor who never had to run a business themselves but relied on taxes to support their economic welfare.

However neat graphic to illustrate the thinking regardless of it's lack of experiential awareness.

Wish I had such a graph to illustrate in a simple way the actual reality.

The problem is, the entrepreneur or business provides the working space, tools and equipment necessary to produce the product. This all comes at a cost to them. Now if you only paid for this direct cost to them, they get nothing for their labor which went into acquiring all of the means necessary to produce the produce. You want them to expend their labor and get nothing in return for it because you consider their labor cost as being surplus.

The thing is there is nothing stopping you from getting the work place for yourself, acquiring all the tools and materials yourself to produce the product except for the cost in labor and materials necessary which the owner pays for themselves out of their own pocket. You want the owner to do all of this and get nothing for it. Somehow this is fair in your view.

Not only is the owner providing all of the resources you need to produce the product but they are also taking all of the risks. If the company fails, if the company gets sued for the product you created, the owner has to pay the costs, not you, the person who created the product.

Yes, you and these college professors see this as surplus because they don't understand the actual costs involved in running a company.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

This comes from a very odd understanding of economics. An understanding taught by college professor who never had to run a business themselves but relied on taxes to support their economic welfare.

However neat graphic to illustrate the thinking regardless of it's lack of experiential awareness.

Wish I had such a graph to illustrate in a simple way the actual reality.

The problem is, the entrepreneur or business provides the working space, tools and equipment necessary to produce the product. This all comes at a cost to them. Now if you only paid for this direct cost to them, they get nothing for their labor which went into acquiring all of the means necessary to produce the produce. You want them to expend their labor and get nothing in return for it because you consider their labor cost as being surplus.

The thing is there is nothing stopping you from getting the work place for yourself, acquiring all the tools and materials yourself to produce the product except for the cost in labor and materials necessary which the owner pays for themselves out of their own pocket. You want the owner to do all of this and get nothing for it. Somehow this is fair in your view.

Not only is the owner providing all of the resources you need to produce the product but they are also taking all of the risks. If the company fails, if the company gets sued for the product you created, the owner has to pay the costs, not you, the person who created the product.

Yes, you and these college professors see this as surplus because they don't understand the actual costs involved in running a company.

Ah yes the 'if you only knew how hard it is to create and run a business you'd understand the massive needless exploitation,' said to leftists who are business owners without massive exploitation. Ironically my business is more successful now that there are more workers in my field standing up to exploitive franchises who were underpaying them for the same amount of work I do. And now those franchises are dying off because workers decided to take demand onto their own hands and circumnavigate the 'risk taking poor rich franchise owner' lol

 

[Nakosis]

It's a matter of degrees, imo. Some competition is good, but some can be quite destructive.

This is true. Unfortunately a lot of business owners/mangers don't know the difference between good and bad competition.
They think competition of whatever kind is a healthy way to run a business.

There have been business I've worked for which openly allow workers to input their ideas.
Of course there have been business I've worked for who's owners see themselves as lord and savior as well.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

I've always considered it as practiced in the United States to be a good thing. But I know a lot of people seem to think it is bad; why?

K

You must have quite some wealth to believe such a ridiculous thing.

 

[Nakosis]

Ah yes the 'if you only knew how hard it is to create and run a business you'd understand the massive needless exploitation,' said to leftists who are business owners without massive exploitation. Ironically my business is more successful now that there are more workers in my field standing up to exploitive franchises who were underpaying them for the same amount of work I do. And now those franchises are dying off because workers decided to take demand onto their own hands and circumnavigate the 'risk taking poor rich franchise owner' lol

You are still seeing it through a singular pov. No one is promoting exploitation here. Needless or otherwise.

 

[Nakosis]

None of them invented anything. They took ideas by actual developers and used angel investors amd seed money from rich parent connections to profit from those developer's work. And in some cases sued the company so they could have a founding credit. Lol

Bill Gates did not create MS DOS, literally the micro systems Microsoft became, it was an acquired product. Popularizing an invention is not inventing.

Jeff Bezos recognized the branding of garage success stories and so got his parent's wealthy investment firm to raise 1 million for him to build a "garage" where Shel Kaphan and Paul Davis did the actual inventing.

Elon Musk didn't invent anything. All his major successes were acquired businesses. He did not invent PayPal and he did not invent Tesla, he bought them with daddy's emerald mine seed money.

This notion that we reward inventors is a story made up by the businessmen profiting on their work. And don't get me wrong, advertisement and networking are important skills, but we idolize charming door to door salesmen who reaped the reward of being the public darling, not the workers who made the things we use.

Yes, they acquired the tools and the funding and resources and took all of the financial risks and you, for some reason think they should do all of this for free.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

Yes, they acquired the tools and the funding and resources and took all of the financial risks and you, for some reason think they should do all of this for free.

No, they assumed no financial risk because they were using wealth they obtained with no risk. And despite undergoing far less risk than the workers who really were all or nothing, and the real ones responsible for the product, the already well connected and well funded rich kids got to be the Uber rich. Not the people who actually made things.

Worse, the rich kids got an entirely unfounded 'rags to riches' story that's used to tell other people to 'pull yourself up by your bootstraps' (with irony considering the actual origin of that phrase

 

[ADigitalArtist]

You are still seeing it through a singular pov. No one is promoting exploitation here. Needless or otherwise.

Neverminding that all capitalism is needless exploitation, we are talking about wealth inequality in the US, which absolutely, positively is grounded in exploitation.

 

[Nakosis]

You must have quite some wealth to believe such a ridiculous thing.

Or a belief in their own ability to create wealth.
Look, I am not the greatest at creating wealth but I did ok.
I've seen people with much less in far worse circumstances than myself creating much, much more. So I know it is possible for anyone.

However, taking it from a possibility to a reality takes a belief. A belief in themselves and a system that most aren't able to muster.

 

[Nakosis]

No, they assumed no financial risk because they were using wealth they obtained with no risk. And despite undergoing far less risk than the workers who really were all or nothing, and the real ones responsible for the product, the already well connected and well funded rich kids got to be the Uber rich. Not the people who actually made things.

Worse, the rich kids got an entirely unfounded 'rags to riches' story that's used to tell other people to 'pull yourself up by your bootstraps' (with irony considering the actual origin of that phrase

That is simply not true for a majority of the wealthy.
How Millionaires Get Rich - businessnewsdaily.com

 

[ADigitalArtist]

That is simply not true for a majority of the wealthy.
How Millionaires Get Rich - businessnewsdaily.com

Neverminding that this statistic is total bull hockey because it only counts inheritance as not self-made, not angel investments or risk free loans by wealthy family and friends, I'm not talking about millionaires. I'm talling about billionaires. With a B.

 

[Nakosis]

Neverminding that all capitalism is needless exploitation,

That is what someone taught you.

we are talking about wealth inequality in the US, which absolutely, positively is grounded in exploitation.

So are you waiting for others to come along to prevent people from exploiting you?
Capitalism can't exploit you unless you allow it.
You can stop the exploitation whenever you want.

 

[Nakosis]

Neverminding that this statistic is total bull hockey because it only counts inheritance as not self-made, not angel investments or risk free loans by wealthy family and friends, I'm not talking about millionaires. I'm talling about billionaires. With a B.

So do you need to be a billionaire to be happy?

 

[ADigitalArtist]

So do you need to be a billionaire to be happy?

If Elon Musk is any indicator, billionaires aren't happy either. But more importantly, billionaires shouldn't exist.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

That is what someone taught you.



So are you waiting for others to come along to prevent people from exploiting you?
Capitalism can't exploit you unless you allow it.
You can stop the exploitation whenever you want.

This is victim blaming. Like holding a gun on someone and saying you don't have to do what I say but it's your fault if you get shot. Holding basic necessities of life behind growing gates and then saying you don't have to participate in the exploitive American work environment isn't a choice. It's coercion. I was privileged enough to be able to make being in a stable resource situation to start a business work. But it was privilege.

Wealth inequality is worse here than in most developing nations. We are quickly approaching oligarchy. This is not a problem of people not saving enough money lol. Anyone who thinks so is just really out of touch.

"They call it the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it."

 

[Stevicus]

You said

if someone is a brain surgeon - that's something that most people wouldn't be able to do, so they earn a higher salary for that. They provide a valued service to society, so I don't think too many people would begrudge a brain surgeon a high salary. Or if someone is a scientist or inventor, if they create something truly momentous and beneficial, then by all means, let them have their reward. I don't think very many people would object to that.

Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Jeff Bezos have all invented something truly momentous and beneficial; so according to what you said, by all means let them have their reward, and nobody should object to that!
Lots of comments; I will try to get to the rest later

I said that, not @Shadow Wolf.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Or a belief in their own ability to create wealth.
Look, I am not the greatest at creating wealth but I did ok.
I've seen people with much less in far worse circumstances than myself creating much, much more. So I know it is possible for anyone.

However, taking it from a possibility to a reality takes a belief. A belief in themselves and a system that most aren't able to muster.

Yeah, all those people who are working 2-3 jobs just to make the ends wave at each other and die before they're 65 because their bodies are so broken down, just didn't believe in themselves enough. What garbage.