Why "x% of people have y% of the wealth" is irrelevant.

[latefordinner]

Am I being leveled?

[pokerbobo]

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Am I being leveled?

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You said capitalism proves that people cannot overcome obstacles...I provide you with a rags to riches story of a black homeless single parent who becomes a Wall Street legend....to prove even the most dire circumstances can be overcome and thats not good enuff?

How about Larry Flynt? Rags to riches building a porn empire. Capitalism at it's finest.

Oprah Winfrey....should I go on? Several Pro Atheletes...straight out of inner city poverty... Millionaires by 25. What the hell are you talking about when you claim capitalism does not allow for people to change their circumstances for the better with effort and hard work? I'm not buyin what you're sellin and I dont think the others in here are either.

[bills217]

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Nothing really, was just making an anecdotal point that $12/hr is actually -quite a lot- in the US labor market. I would say that at least 80% of my friends, most with at least undergrad degrees, make this much in the labor market

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Um - I made $12.50/hour as an INTERN during my FRESHMAN YEAR of college when I was 18 YEARS OLD. By junior year I was making $14.25, which was still well below median INTERN pay for my position, which was about $18/hr at the time, and the position clearly didn't require any special skills that an 18-year-old college freshman wouldn't have.

So - if you and your friends are making $12/hr with college degrees, it is clearly by choice or sheer ineptitude.

[PLOlover]

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Quote:
and btw when they adjust the dollars to compensate for inflation they take technological advancement into account I believe.



That's impossible. Doing so would be so subjective and nonscientific as to render the data entirely worthless.

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look up hedonics it is usedfor cpi and is how real or constant dollars are computed.

[pvn]

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I would say there is something fundamentally unjust about the second society's economic system that is allowing such massive disparities

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What? AC, for instance, does not "allow" such a state of affairs. It is merely not prevented. There is a big difference.

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such massive disparities could never exist in a society where people have equal control over the decisions that affect their lives.

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Yes, I'll just decide to be as rich as Bill Gates.

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where we disagree I don't think that these are the only two choices (ie; having an economy that results in an egalitarian distribution results in an overall standard of living lower than an economic system like capitalism that reliabily produces massive inequality )

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The evidence is against you. And the theory is as well. Constantly transferring wealth to equalize things cannot possibly *increase* total wealth, and in fact *must* consume wealth (those transfers don't happen without a lot of bureaucracy).

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where I also disagree with some of you is that I don't think happiness is ever increasing with productivity increases

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Since happiness cannot be objectively measured (despite moopropertarian's claims), and productivity can, trying to draw some correlation between the two is obviously impossible.

[PLOlover]

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I did about 30-minutes of research, and I found that multiple sources show that the US standard of living has risen since 1970.

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ok post them

[QuadsOverQuads]

Whenever you see great concentration of wealth, it's a pretty good indicator that large-scale wealth-transfer has already occured.

-- Unknown Usenet Guru, circa 1995


q/q

[hmkpoker]

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I also think that environmentally, anthropocentric capitalism is unsustainable and will eventually result in a massive die-off of humans and has already resulted in a massive die/off of other species because humans don't perceive their existence to have much value.

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I don't see why this is the case. Human beings are far and away the most populous mammals, despite all convenional odds against us. We have incredibly weak immune systems, little strength and speed, and have one of the lowest reproductive rates in the animal kingdom. The reason is that we can alter our environment to accomodate us better. I don't think it's far-fetched to believe that humans will one day create a fully self-serving ecosystem. Do we really need millions upon millions of species to generate oxygen and produce food? I doubt it.

[nietzreznor]

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I've seen this tired old horse trotted out so many times it's pathetic. It's time to finally put it out of my misery.

A) The pie is getting bigger. It does not matter if 3% of the people own 90% of the wealth (numbers from another thread which I will not bother to investigate or dispute, since it is irrelevent regardless of what the numbers actually are), if the standard of living of the individuals continues to go up, which it does in a capitalist society. It doesn't matter if the "Gini" coefficient, a measure of "wealth concentration" continues to go up, because the standard of living of all individuals in society continues to go up. Anyone who doesn't believe this is invited to compare the standard of living of a modern janitor in the United States to kings and queens of prior centuries. The standard of living of the janitor is higher in practically every respect, with the exception of the ability to command servants.

B) Wealth turns over. As pvn has pointed out before, empirical studies have shown that 90% of affluent families lose their fortunes within 3 generations. Under capitalism, fortunes can only be build by continually innovating and pleasing large numbers of customers. Once that process stops, say when dilletant children take over the family business, poor decisions accumulate and that capital stock is lost, spent. It finds it's way into the hands of other capitalists better able to provide consumers what they want.

C) Concentrated wealth is good for consumers. Henry Ford started out with a capital investment of $25,000. By 1947 he was worth $1 billion. The reason he was worth $1 billion is because he provided consumers with what they wanted, a high quality inexpensive automobile. Better yet, he could provide high quality inexpensive automobiles because of the high productivity of his plants, which was only possible because of, you guessed it, a large capital accumulation; i.e. the factories and machineries whose value represented most of his $1 billion of "wealth". I.e. the vast majority of the "wealth" that all those evil capitalists have is the capital stock that they put to work for YOU. I don't have to own Ford to benefit from all of that capital. I don't even have to be a stockholder. All I have to do is buy a car, at far higher quality than I could build myself, and at far lower cost, and I gain the MASSIVE benefit of all that accumulated capital and productivity. I don't have to own Exxon's oil derricks, refineries, pipelines and trucks to gain the benefit of all that accumulated capital. All I need do is buy the gallon of gas at far lower cost and higher quality than I could ever hope to provide myself.

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I don't think it's irrelevant--the points you make about improved standard of living are certainly true, but when I look at statistics that say that that "3% of people own 90% of the wealth", as you say, I think thats bad.

I also think, though, that it's not a "natural" outcome--how could a mere 3% of the population own 90% of the stuff, without the coercive power of the State? Only with the State as its ally could the wealthy and the big businesses obtain such a large portion of the pie.

So, yeah, I agree with your basic points, but I don't really think that such wide disparity in wealth is something to be defended but rather shown to be another artifact of statism.

[ojc02]

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I've seen this tired old horse trotted out so many times it's pathetic. It's time to finally put it out of my misery.

A) The pie is getting bigger. It does not matter if 3% of the people own 90% of the wealth (numbers from another thread which I will not bother to investigate or dispute, since it is irrelevent regardless of what the numbers actually are), if the standard of living of the individuals continues to go up, which it does in a capitalist society. It doesn't matter if the "Gini" coefficient, a measure of "wealth concentration" continues to go up, because the standard of living of all individuals in society continues to go up. Anyone who doesn't believe this is invited to compare the standard of living of a modern janitor in the United States to kings and queens of prior centuries. The standard of living of the janitor is higher in practically every respect, with the exception of the ability to command servants.

B) Wealth turns over. As pvn has pointed out before, empirical studies have shown that 90% of affluent families lose their fortunes within 3 generations. Under capitalism, fortunes can only be build by continually innovating and pleasing large numbers of customers. Once that process stops, say when dilletant children take over the family business, poor decisions accumulate and that capital stock is lost, spent. It finds it's way into the hands of other capitalists better able to provide consumers what they want.

C) Concentrated wealth is good for consumers. Henry Ford started out with a capital investment of $25,000. By 1947 he was worth $1 billion. The reason he was worth $1 billion is because he provided consumers with what they wanted, a high quality inexpensive automobile. Better yet, he could provide high quality inexpensive automobiles because of the high productivity of his plants, which was only possible because of, you guessed it, a large capital accumulation; i.e. the factories and machineries whose value represented most of his $1 billion of "wealth". I.e. the vast majority of the "wealth" that all those evil capitalists have is the capital stock that they put to work for YOU. I don't have to own Ford to benefit from all of that capital. I don't even have to be a stockholder. All I have to do is buy a car, at far higher quality than I could build myself, and at far lower cost, and I gain the MASSIVE benefit of all that accumulated capital and productivity. I don't have to own Exxon's oil derricks, refineries, pipelines and trucks to gain the benefit of all that accumulated capital. All I need do is buy the gallon of gas at far lower cost and higher quality than I could ever hope to provide myself.

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I don't think it's irrelevant--the points you make about improved standard of living are certainly true, but when I look at statistics that say that that "3% of people own 90% of the wealth", as you say, I think thats bad.

I also think, though, that it's not a "natural" outcome--how could a mere 3% of the population own 90% of the stuff, without the coercive power of the State? Only with the State as its ally could the wealthy and the big businesses obtain such a large portion of the pie.

So, yeah, I agree with your basic points, but I don't really think that such wide disparity in wealth is something to be defended but rather shown to be another artifact of statism.

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I agree with you. I think the huge differences are caused by the states legislation regarding the currency and the massive fraud perpetrated by the banking system with fractional reserve banking.