Fat cats out of control: 1% owns 82% of wealth

[Deletedaccount1]

That's not exactly surprising when half of the world lives hand to mouth. A billionaire getting rich in the US has really nothing to do with someone living a destitute life in the third world.

[XangXu]

Capitalism works fine, I hear.

[Stelio Kontos]

Capitalism works fine, I hear.

Capitalism and mixed capitalist systems are the worst systems there are, except for the other ones that have been tried (like Communism).

[Raakel]

Obviously there's no way to run an experiment like this, but I wonder if a lot of social problems would just kind of fix themselves if 80% of the wealth was owned by 20% of the people, instead of 82% being owned by 1% of the people. It's like people can't tolerate perfect equity, but they also can't tolerate the 1% owning everything. I wonder if the best balance is an 80/20 distribution. Just a thought.

I think that's quite interesting.

The more you look at it the more it get's clearer to me that we might not live in real democracy at all in the west.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutocracy

In a way we also have to thank Trump for lifting the curtains by putting industry leaders and establishment in direct power. He doesn't like charades...

While that might sound rather conspiratorial it might not necessarily be a bad thing. But there has grown an imbalance like mentioned in the above quote that need's to be fixed.

[Deleted]

Fine by me, I am doing absolutely great in life. Life is full of opportunities and chances, especially in today's day and age.

If you are feeding off breadcrumbs and waiting for anything to trickle down, you are screwing yourself out of a great life.
Know what you want, grind it out, get rewards.

[Independent voter]

If you make over $32,000 a year you are in the world's 1%

[GrinnersGrin]

This thread REEKS of Anti-semitism.

[d00mGuArD]

Fine by me, I am doing absolutely great in life. Life is full of opportunities and chances, especially in today's day and age.

I have to agree. I don't get why people complain about wealth inequality, when they themselves have a chance to make wealth
The opportunities are there for everyone.
This "wealth gap problem" sounds like pure jealousy to me, and nothing else

[Deleted]

Global poverty is going down, but people care way more about how much other people have. This is rarely about pulling poor people up, but envy wanting to pull rich people down.

Stop whining and start your own company.

[d00mGuArD]

If they generated wealth for others, their own wouldn't be relatively increasing year after year. They are literally impoverishing everyone else in the world by making themselves wealthier.

The article itself says that from the NEW wealth the rich 1% of the world (which may even include you) got 82% of it. The rest of the world became RICHER by 18%.
It is the rate of increase that is different (which widens the gap), but the rest of the world also got INCREASE in wealth from the new wealth created, not decrease

[Deleted]

What leaves me baffled isn't that the superrich are draining the planet dry of all wealth, but that people who will never be anywhere near as wealthy keep defending the rich people as if they owe those rich people something, or as if those rich people are somehow better than them. I suppose it's the delusion that "hey, one day I'll be rich, so we better not rock the boat until I get on it as well!"

[Regalia]

Global poverty is going down, but people care way more about how much other people have. This is rarely about pulling poor people up, but envy wanting to pull rich people down.

Stop whining and start your own company.

Global Poverty is down, Middle Class is down. Rich not down ROFL.

[Mormolyce]

trickle down economics would work, in an environment that encourages business to exist. In America, it is cheaper to tear down your factory, rebuild it in a different country, pay those workers peanuts, and ship your product back to America. That means that business's jobs are gone from the country, and all those people either find a new job or go on financial assistance. The business owner becomes richer, and the poor become poorer. Business 101.

We've really gone through the fucking looking glass when people are defending trickle down economics by saying that trade protectionism isn't strong enough to make it work.

Bill Gates popularised computation for the entire world. That means he definitly deserves his money.

It is impossible to deserve money. You just have it, or don't.

P.S. Bill Gates made his money by exploiting a virtual monopoly that he got by cutting the makers of CP/M out of the deal with IBM. He did this by hiring a guy who ported a version of CP/M to IBM machines without CP/M's permission. He didn't contribute shit to the world, he just profiteered from it.

[Regalia]

Do you understand what you just said?

You're talking about per person.

[Tiwack]

Shit's bonkers.

Relevant as this train of thought is global, widespread and taken advantage of in countries without good regulations. Capitalism will strangle itself without them.


Ownership =/= Wages

Look up fx. the duke of Westminister or consider why there's a saying that the first million is the hardest. The rich earn money when they sleep and on average you'd have to work for a month to make what a CEO makes in an hour.

[Blobfish]

Quite a few of the 1% of the Worlds Rich are involved in philanthropy.

Philanthropy is the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes.

Bill Gates is a good example of a philanthropist, in giving some of his millions to good causes.

Other notable philanthropists include: George Clooney, Bono & Richard Branson.

Here is the Wikipedia list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philanthropists

[Regalia]

Quite a few of the 1% of the Worlds Rich are involved in philanthropy.

Philanthropy is the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous donation of money to good causes.

Bill Gates is a good example of a philanthropist, in giving some of his millions to good causes.

Other notable philanthropists include: George Clooney, Bono & Richard Branson.

Here is the Wikipedia list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_philanthropists

There are good and honest Philanthropists like you mentioned.

I would say most are fake like Donald Trump, and or only donating a very small percentage compared to total personal net income.

[Deleted]

We get this tread every few days/weeks but never anything good comes out of it. Just people saying the same shit over and over "Love the trickle down shit".

I wish for once we talked about any good ideas coming out of this instead of tax the rich by 99%, they don't deserve that money anyway.

- - - Updated - - -

There are good and honest Philanthropists like you mentioned.

There are also fake ones, like Donald Trump.

Only took 2 pages for the Donald to be bashed.

[Regalia]

Only took 2 pages for the Donald to be bashed.

It's not bashing if it's true.

I wish for once we talked about any good ideas coming out of this instead of tax the rich by 99%, they don't deserve that money anyway.

Okay but before that let's talk about how Beneficial Governmental Social Services can be when done right.

[Deleted]

It's not bashing if it's true.



Okay but before that let's talk about how Beneficial Governmental Social Services can be when done right.

1. Donald has nothing at all to do with this tread, his wealth is nothing compared to the really rich people.
You just took your opportunity to bash the cheeto lord just because you don't like him. Which is fine, just wish people would be more original when it comes to the most talked subject on this forum.

Take a look at countries like Denmark/Netherlands/Sweden etc.
The only problem I can see is rolling that out for a country with 300 million people instead of the 20 million that live in the Netherlands.