Should millionaires exist?

@shavixmir said
Couldn’t care less if they exist or not.

So long as if everyone else gets to go to school, eat healthy food, has proper shelter over their heads, lives in safety and doesn’t have to work more than 40 hours a week to live decently... I couldn’t care less about someone being a millionaire.

In other words, since we don't live in a utopia and never will, the answer is no.

@shavixmir said
Dude, so long as we keep the masses happy, healthy, entertained and productive, they won’t bother with revolutions and I don’t have to care what the hell they’re up to.

That some people are rich is only a problem if some people are poor.

Unfortunately this isn't the case. The Gini coefficient is a measure of inequality in a distribution [1]. Applied to wealth the Gini coefficient measures inequality, with a coefficient of zero meaning perfect equality of wealth and a coefficient of 1.0 or expressed as a percentage 100% being maximum wealth inequality. According to the Wikipedia page the Gini coefficient for the Netherlands is 28.6% [2], for the UK it is 34.1% and for the US it is 41.5%. The Wikipedia page uses figures from various sources, the ones I used were the ones copied from the World Bank.

Wealth is linked to status in a fairly obvious way. When the Gini coefficient becomes large the low status males become more violent, violence is a route to status - while cognitively it ought not to be, our limbic systems don't work like that [3]. So wealth inequality drives certain types of crime.

I tried looking up a list of countries by rate of violent crime. What I found [4] was a list of countries by rates of intentional homicide, which includes homicides that aren't driven by this - such as terrorist attacks and drugs cartels. The rate is the number of intentional homicides per 100,000 population per year.

For the Netherlands it is 0.8, for the UK 1.2, and for the US 5.3. The country with the highest Gini coefficient is South Africa at 63% and their rate of intentional homicide is 35.9. The country with the highest rate of intentional homicide is El Salvadore with 61.8 killings per 100,000 population and their Gini Coefficient is 40.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality
[3] This statement comes with a caveat, the limbic system is responsible for emotional regulation, but I'm not certain that the behaviour is entirely explained by it. If anyone wants to dispute this I'm not going to be able to defend that particular statement. I think I'm right, but I'm off my field so can be wrong. The rest I can provide references for.
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

@mghrn55 said
I guess it wouldn't get through to you if I told you that Liberalism is not Socialism.
And Socialism is not Communism.
Am I wasting my time on you ??
Let me know.
I can always try explaining string theory to my cat. 😴

Point taken,but to a died in the wool capitalist, there is capitalism, and then, there is everything else, which are concepts of dependence and failures of self reliance. Brrrr

Actually, the designation ‘Collectivism’ sorta says it all. All produce collected in one big basket. This seems to be the best word for the whole ball of misery.

@averagejoe1 said
You and the rich folks gonna guarantee happiness and health? And entertainment? That rocks. Well, that means the last item, productive, will not occur. I am productive, but if you and the rich folks are going to guarantee I am happy, entertained and healthy, I simply will stop being productive. Of course, I assume your premise means the rich folks, and you, need to kee ...[text shortened]... ogic a few times, but you still will not get it.

Actually, anyone who says Dude would not get it.

So you’re only productive if you’re miserable?

What sort of fukking life do you live, DUDE?

@shavixmir said
So you’re only productive if you’re miserable?

What sort of fukking life do you live, DUDE?

Well, people in Cuba are miserable and they are not productive. Are we on the same page, Shav.? Take a break. Pretend that "You are more productive if you are not miserable." It would help you if you could absorb some of Trump's optimism . Was he not great with his speech this morning? Do you not look upon Obama with more disdain every time you hear Trump speak?

@deepthought said
Unfortunately this isn't the case. The Gini coefficient is a measure of inequality in a distribution [1]. Applied to wealth the Gini coefficient measures inequality, with a coefficient of zero meaning perfect equality of wealth and a coefficient of 1.0 or expressed as a percentage 100% being maximum wealth inequality. According to the Wikipedia page the Gini coefficien ...[text shortened]... de references for.
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate

Sweet Jesus... haha.

I have no idea what you’re talking about!

@averagejoe1 said
Well, people in Cuba are miserable and they are not productive. Are we on the same page, Shav.? Take a break. Pretend that "You are more productive if you are not miserable." It would help you if you could absorb some of Trump's optimism . Was he not great with his speech this morning? Do you not look upon Obama with more disdain every time you hear Trump speak?

Yes. Exactly. You just seem to have skipped the sarcasm in my post.

@shavixmir said
So you’re only productive if you’re miserable?

What sort of fukking life do you live, DUDE?

What it means is that it's not just about absolute poverty, relative wealth inequality matters. If the rich get richer faster than the poorest are raised out of their situation then it creates problems. The question is what to do about it. The standard response from the left is wealth redistribution, but that screws up incentives, the standard response from the right is do nothing but the problem gets worse. So, any ideas?

@deepthought said
What it means is that it's not just about absolute poverty, relative wealth inequality matters. If the rich get richer faster than the poorest are raised out of their situation then it creates problems. The question is what to do about it. The standard response from the left is wealth redistribution, but that screws up incentives, the standard response from the right is do nothing but the problem gets worse. So, any ideas?

Personally I see humans as a virus with shoes on.

So, I’d just have a majority shot.

@deepthought said
What it means is that it's not just about absolute poverty, relative wealth inequality matters. If the rich get richer faster than the poorest are raised out of their situation then it creates problems. The question is what to do about it. The standard response from the left is wealth redistribution, but that screws up incentives, the standard response from the right is do nothing but the problem gets worse. So, any ideas?

One of your better posts,.. Why do the rich get richer? Through work. No time to fly kites, spend all their money on saturday night, a choice usually made by the poor (discounting the folks that will never get ahead, maybe 40 million people, whom I think the government should totally take care of.)

You are right, redistribution would be catastrophic. Our stock market is up 56% since the election, we would not Want to tinker with wealth, would we. Or tinker with the wealthy, for that matter.

I take issue with the comment that the rich do nothing. They work. They caused the increase in the huge wealth of this country. Everyone including poor, benefit from the wealth. Why would people want to cut the knees off of the rich people?

My idea, then, is to take care of the poor people. Everyone else work, or choose to not work, or choose to do something in the middle. Some people like to sleep on park benches. I love this country, you can do what you want to do. It has been working for many many many years, and all of a sudden Bernie and Warren want to change fundamentally the workings of the United States of America. Change what?. And I am sick of the minimum wage discussion. A job pays what it is worth. If you want to make more money, you improve your job situation.

Thankyou for your post. I had a good debate going with Kazet, but he bailed after a curious soliloquy. Handy was kindvenough to venture a comment in the vacuum.

@AverageJoe1
Noone gets rich through hard work alone. Privilege, luck,work in a specific direction and connections but most importantly laws that allow exploitation of a workforce to build your product. Or inheritance.

Money has an abstract meaning to the exchange of trade because over the centuries since it was devised its been reproduced. The coins themselves now have no value initially the money itself had the value it represented in precious metals.

Can't you see this system isn't working for anyone, noone is living in a world that feels safe and the billionaires are feeling guilty, that's why they give a little away. If things could be equalised, everyone could be happy. We don't have to have people sleeping on benches.

Noone chooses to sleep on benches! In the UK workers are 2 pay checks away from homelessness. Rents are half of tenants income very often leaving them hand to mouth because they're not paid a living wage.
Its kind of astonishing how you're saying these things, I wonder how you're so far removed from reality?

@yo-its-me said
@AverageJoe1
Noone gets rich through hard work alone. Privilege, luck,work in a specific direction and connections but most importantly laws that allow exploitation of a workforce to build your product. Or inheritance.

Money has an abstract meaning to the exchange of trade because over the centuries since it was devised its been reproduced. The coins themselves now hav ...[text shortened]... kind of astonishing how you're saying these things, I wonder how you're so far removed from reality?

The average wage in this country is $29/hour. That is almost $60K a year. A responsible person needs to plan their life. If they want to make that, they start with 2 jobs. They will move up in one or both jobs. They have to work. Be focused. Get rid of cell phone and do not waste money. There are 7M unfilled jobs here. The middle class is rocking.

What do you mean ‘if things could be equalized?’ Before responding, google the state of our economy.

@AverageJoe1
Equality, not such a gap between the rich and the poor. There will always be both by definition of one, but it doesn't have to be that one has more that its possible to spend in one lifetime and the other has so little that thier life is a stressful struggle which is also untimely cut short.
Which is #our# economy?

@yo-its-me said
@AverageJoe1
Equality, not such a gap between the rich and the poor. There will always be both by definition of one, but it doesn't have to be that one has more that its possible to spend in one lifetime and the other has so little that thier life is a stressful struggle which is also untimely cut short.
Which is #our# economy?

It will ;never be equal, so no discussion there. So the rich are usually those who work harder than others. Many on this forum continue to rail against those who inherit wealth. Yeah, there they are, and not much can be done about those trust-afarians. But we speak here of the other 98% of society. Work hard, make money, plan, invest, have only the kids you can afford, save for the future, that complicated stuff. It aint that hard. Nor is it that hard to understand.

@averagejoe1 said
It will ;never be equal, so no discussion there. So the rich are usually those who work harder than others. Many on this forum continue to rail against those who inherit wealth. Yeah, there they are, and not much can be done about those trust-afarians. But we speak here of the other 98% of society. Work hard, make money, plan, invest, have only the kids you can affor ...[text shortened]... save for the future, that complicated stuff. It aint that hard. Nor is it that hard to understand.

In fact, U.S. people in the top 5% of income work fewer hours than the group in the 40-95% top incomes:

https://www.epi.org/publication/ib348-trends-us-work-hours-wages-1979-2007/