The real horrors and injustice of inheritance

[tehox]

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* This neglects, of course, the wealth positions that have been accumulated through legalized plunder and mercantilism (political entrepreneurship rather than market entrepreneurship).

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But then George Bush wouldn't be a millionare.

[Riddick]

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* This neglects, of course, the wealth positions that have been accumulated through legalized plunder and mercantilism (political entrepreneurship rather than market entrepreneurship).

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But then George Bush wouldn't be a millionare.

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Welcome to the Politics Forum. I see you have met Borodog.

Now kindly pull your head out of your ass.

[tehox]

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* This neglects, of course, the wealth positions that have been accumulated through legalized plunder and mercantilism (political entrepreneurship rather than market entrepreneurship).

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But then George Bush wouldn't be a millionare.

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Welcome to the Politics Forum. I see you have met Borodog.

Now kindly pull your head out of your ass.

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Yeah I forgot that Bush made his money in the oil industry.

[moorobot]

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A: In the United States right now 1% of the people own 40-50% of the wealth, while 50% of the population have zero or a negative net wealth (If all their debts were called in they would be bankrupted). That is horrible and unjust, ethically and politically, for all the obvious reasons.
No, it isn't. Do you see why?

I've explained this before. The vast majority of "wealth" is tied up in capital, machines and tools and the like. The owners of the capital benefit through profits, while consumers benefit through the competition of capitalists to provide ever more newer and better products at lower prices, increasing everyone's standard of living. I gain the benefit of literally hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars of capital every day, without having to own any of it. Oil rigs, refineries, gas stations, car factories, mining operations, forests, mills, thousands of trucks and container ships, telecom infrastructure including orbiting satellites, radio and cell towers, power plants and transmission lines. I get the benefit of it all, and yet I own none of the capital.

The only way a capitalist accumulates a vast fortune is by greatly improving the lives of an enormous number of people.

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I've explained that I don't agree with the assumptions and ethical theory required to make this true before, and you never showed that I was wrong.

Nothing illustrates just how ridiculous this post is than this fact, amazingly quoted in your post: We are all benefiting from the concentration of wealth so much that half of us have absolutely no wealth at all, literally nothing but debt to our names. It's really trickling down to all of us, isn't it?

[FlFishOn]

"I for one know that I or my brothers would not be where I am in life if I weren't born into the family that I was."

How sad. You are a fraud and you know it.

I believe I could be anything I wish.

[FlFishOn]

Assume that wealth/income correlate well with intelligence (they do). Assume intelligence has some modest genetic component (it does IMHO). It might follow that wealth/income has some modest genetic component. If so, social engineering will not remove the inequity.

Here's something even more troubling. Switch wealth for poverty and intelligence for its opposite. Low intelligence people will have a genetic predisposition toward lower success/poverty. The water is getting deep. Off to bed.

[Borodog]

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A: In the United States right now 1% of the people own 40-50% of the wealth, while 50% of the population have zero or a negative net wealth (If all their debts were called in they would be bankrupted). That is horrible and unjust, ethically and politically, for all the obvious reasons.
No, it isn't. Do you see why?

I've explained this before. The vast majority of "wealth" is tied up in capital, machines and tools and the like. The owners of the capital benefit through profits, while consumers benefit through the competition of capitalists to provide ever more newer and better products at lower prices, increasing everyone's standard of living. I gain the benefit of literally hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars of capital every day, without having to own any of it. Oil rigs, refineries, gas stations, car factories, mining operations, forests, mills, thousands of trucks and container ships, telecom infrastructure including orbiting satellites, radio and cell towers, power plants and transmission lines. I get the benefit of it all, and yet I own none of the capital.

The only way a capitalist accumulates a vast fortune is by greatly improving the lives of an enormous number of people.

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I've explained that I don't agree with the assumptions and ethical theory required to make this true before, and you never showed that I was wrong.

Nothing illustrates just how ridiculous this post is than this fact, amazingly quoted in your post: We are all benefiting from the concentration of wealth so much that half of us have absolutely no wealth at all, literally nothing but debt to our names. It's really trickling down to all of us, isn't it?

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Um, is it your claim that 1/2 of Americans have "no wealth at all"? Because if it is, it is patently ridiculous. The majority of Americans have a standard of living higher than Queen Victoria in every way except the capacity to command servants. You have a very narrow and essentially meaningless definition of wealth.

And whose fault is it that any individual does not choose to save and accumulate capital? Is there a gun pointed at anyone's head forcing them to consume rather than save? Sure, there are incentives in place that point in the direction of consumption rather than savings, but those incentives are put in place by government, specifically an inflationary monetary policy (that enables the very debt load that you lament) and the very kind of kooky wealth redistribution schemes you advocate, not capitalism.

[andyfox]

"Is there a gun pointed at anyone's head forcing them to consume rather than save?"

Sometimes, yes, the proverbial gun of the bill collector, no?

[hmkpoker]

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"Is there a gun pointed at anyone's head forcing them to consume rather than save?"

Sometimes, yes, the proverbial gun of the bill collector, no?

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The bill collector can usually produce a document where you agreed to the bill collector's terms in exchange for his services.

[andyfox]

"Exploitation, conning, and abuse are not part of capitalism"

But didn't the classical political economists call for state interventions of one sort or another to inhibit people's ability to produce for their own needs, to deprive them of their traditional means of support? They were never willing to rely completely on the market to organize production; rather they called for measures of force to make those who were engaged in self-provisioning to integrate themselves into market capitalism. The "inventors" (if you will) of capitalism were not really advocates of laissez-faire, wer they?

What do you make of this, from Malthus?:

"We should facilitate . . . the operations of nature in producing . . . mortality. Instead of recommending cleanliness to the poor, we should encourage contrary habits. In our towns we should make the streets narrower, crowd more people into the houses, and court the return of the plague. In the country, we should build our villages near stagnant pools, and particularly encourage settlements in all marshy and unwholesome situations. But above all we should reprobate specific remedies for ravaging diseases, and those benevolent, but much mistaken men, who have thought they were doing a service to mankind by projecting schemes for the total extirpation of particular disorders. The necessary mortality must come, in some form or other."

He chided the Irish for having too few wants, for not having a sufficient taste for luxuries (not to mention the crime of supplying their wants "principally at home" "where the necessary food is obtained with so little labour").

The peasants would have to abandon their self-sufficient lifestyle and go to work for wages in a factory. Since they wouldn't necessarily do this willingly, they would have to be forced by the state to do so. Hasn't force been a part of capitalism ever since? Or is this not really capitalism?

If this gets on your nerves, my apology, but I really do want to hear your thoughts. Thanks.