I think it's become popular to talk about the issue of accumulation of wealth, and make this kind of dramatic wealth comparison to point out how uneven the distribution is. I wish wealth wasn't treated so abstractly as if it's some kind of universal measure of evil. I would like to learn about some specific cases of hyper wealthy people and what they are actually up to. Seems like some very rich people do really useful things with their money. Couple other thoughts that hang around my head:
- Though the bottom half of humanity may be poor, on average they have a quality of life that has risen dramatically over the past century thanks in large part to the deployment of technologies and aid originating from the wealthier nations.
- Historically the only time the trend of wealth accumulation reverses is during massive crises, wars, and civilizational collapse which make life worse for everyone and nobody with any sense would wish for.
- It seems to me a lot of people channel their unhappiness into resentment of the wealthy, based on this same flavor of folk economics as old as time "the rich get richer". And that unhappiness is usually uncoupled from their position in the economic ladder.
> Historically the only time the trend of wealth accumulation reverses is during massive crises, wars, and civilizational collapse which make life worse for everyone and nobody with any sense would wish for.
Yes. Which is why the question of social responsibility of the rich matters far more, because they can't help getting involved in politics. And a lot of them seem surprisingly pro-collapse, or at least pro-authoritarian. It's a common pattern in South American countries where demands for rights and equality scare the property owning class, because they might have to share a bit with the general population; this results in coups, dictators, suppression of protests etc, which results in an equally violent retaliation. You don't get Castro without Batista.
Since the general agreement that money = speech = votes, the habit of rich people buying news media to be their personal propaganda (e.g. Bezos with WaPo, the Berlusconi media empire, Murdoch etc), has also made the world a lot worse.
AI accelerates the problem, since part of the pitch is "we're going to obliterate a large amount of white collar and lower middle class work entirely, while also removing the state safety net". Not clear whether that will actually happen as promised to the shareholders, but it could be hugely disruptive.
The power of wealth certainly comes with a lot of responsibility. Which is why I would be curious to have a more detailed view on what all these hyper-rich people are actually doing with their money, and how they came to be so wealthy. We have some obvious examples of power accumulation and evil, and some clear examples of doing great good in the form of philanthropy. So while It doesn't make sense to me that so few individuals should have so much money and power, I still don't think we should count them all as defacto evil.
I'm more saying there's a sort of historical inevitability in the whole situation and we might benefit by taking that into consideration. And that some degree of nuance and tolerance of unfairness might play into a realistic solution.
Regarding landlordism, it's another tricky issue where yes there are bad big landlords, but the policies I've seen that put in place to tackle them tend disincentivize renting altogether and the first ones out of the market are the little guys, exasterbating the housing crisis in most cities. It seems to me an area where tolerating the bad actors is necessary to avoid crashing the whole system, to my point.
> I wish wealth wasn't treated so abstractly as if it's some kind of universal measure of evil.
Wealth equals influence. So yes, it kinda is a measure of evil. It goes so far as Musk turning of Starlink at a critical moment to help the Russians for example. Or buying access to POTUS. Or donating money to groups to help undermine labor rights.
Basically, the type of person that can get this rich is in 99% of all cases also the type of person that doesnt give two shits about other people.
> Basically, the type of person that can get this rich is in 99% of all cases also the type of person that doesnt give two shits about other people.
This is mostly because we’re ruled by elites that hate us. Noblesse oblige is a thing and wealth disparity is not necessarily a bad thing. What’s bad is our current elites using wealth to enrich themselves instead of planting trees (so to speak) for America.
There are humans out there who are much better than the rest of us at doing things. I’d like the subset of those that care for their people to have money and power.
The missing piece from this conversation is our current elites have made all the elements that produce good rulers taboo. The term “blood and soil” is a big no no, but it’s also the kind of cultural bond that’s needed to produce good rulers. What more noble cause is there than sacrificing for your land and people? Its been a rallying cry for all of human history.
The oligarchs that run society know exactly what kind of ideas will remove them from power and make sure these ideas are effectively banned.
I don't see why influence is evil per se. Gates did a lot with his fortune that seems unambiguously good. Musk also seems to have done at least some good in terms of sustainability tech. Doesn't mean there isn't lots of bad as well, but I don't see that wealth itself is a measure of evil.
If it's true that all these .001 percent of the population are indeed self-serving sociopaths, I'll eat my hat. But I just assume things are more complex than wealth = evil.
I could say with certainty that wealth magnifies the qualities and intention of whoever controls it. And we might argue nobody should have so much power. But I don't see why tremendous wealth could not also be good or neutral, and so with the accumulation of wealth.
About my own money, I worry. About other people's money, I rather try to think carefully. "Worrying" about money is the emotional basis that fuels a lot of populist rhetoric. And It seems to me economics is often counterintuitive to our emotional intuition of how things should be.
Well, the poor seem to have smartphones as well XD — Uganda for example has 54% smartphone ownership. But in terms of vaccination rates, education, access to clean water, access to electricity yes things are ever improving if we look at statistics on global wellbeing. "In 1981, 44% of the global population lived in extreme poverty. By 2019, that figure had dropped to just 9%." So inequality may be huge today, but it doesn't mean the bottom hasn't also risen dramatically.
> I wish wealth wasn't treated so abstractly as if it's some kind of universal measure of evil.
It is evil, the vast majority of people don't become rich without exploiting other people, and just about everyone in that position then leverages their wealth to exert even more power over people and politics.
> technologies and aid originating from the wealthier nations.
We run sweatshops in poor countries, exploit their people and natural resources to death, then we send them a few crumbs of aid to paint ourselves as the good guys for the history books, how noble of us!
> Historically the only time the trend of wealth accumulation reverses is during massive crises, wars, and civilizational collapse which make life worse for everyone and nobody with any sense would wish for
Nobody wishes for this but people will reach a breaking point where they're desperate and can't take it anymore. If slaves try to resist they get beaten, would you advise them to keep their heads down and do as they're told to avoid the beatings? These are classic abuser tactics.
> based on this same flavor of folk economics
Which part of "The wealthy are getting wealthier, they're using that wealth to exert more power over us, and they're using that power to change the system to be even more favourable for them, so that they can get even richer, and even more powerful, at great cost to the rest of society" would you say is "folk economics"?
It is evil, the vast majority of people don't become rich without exploiting other people, and just about everyone in that position then leverages their wealth to exert even more power over people and politics.
Do you have any evidence to back this up? The cutoff for being in the richest 1% globally is about $1 million. What's the evil and exploitation you attribute to the average person with $1mm, who statistically is probably a retiree who had a pretty normal job?
We run sweatshops in poor countries, exploit their people and natural resources to death, then we send them a few crumbs of aid to paint ourselves as the good guys for the history books, how noble of us!
Can you name some of those countries that we've exploited over the last twenty years? Do me a favor and also look up their GDP per capita, or whatever other measure of financial well-being you prefer, and tell me how it's changed over the past two decades. I suspect what you'll find is that they've grown way, way faster than the developed countries who are "exploiting" them.
I'm not suggesting the world doesn't have problems, or that richer countries don't take advantage of poorer countries. But this "rich = evil" drivel is cartoonishly lacking in facts.
Please start by reading the title that contextualizes my comment instead of posting a snotty response that takes things out of context — The number is 0.001%, not 1%.
What do you get out of these childish straw man arguments? I made it perfectly clear which group I was talking about and you're asking me to defend an argument I didn't make.
I think it's a good starting point though. I like to try out the cheapest option and see how it really feels or tastes. For mattress shopping i always ask, "what's your second cheapest option?". For most consumer goods the diminishing returns kick in pretty quick
I think you point to the real problem: It's often not about taste or enjoyment but about using expensive things as a crutch for your feeble ego. Neatly expressed by the term "nouveau riche"
I think it's more to do with 'taste' as an indicator of social status. Not all things within the 'good taste' space or expensive. It's more about access to the secret club thinking, e.g. the secret hidden strip mall restaurant that has the best Bahn Mi.
I used to think i didn't like people — Until i met some people I liked.
I think it's a bit different from developing taste, what you describe. It's more about finding out who you are. I would say once you know your baseline for what makes chocolate/coffee/etc enjoyable, then taste is about experiencing the nuances within that spectrum. Some people also have a greater tolerance for things that aren't really tasty due to coming up in a culture where things generally taste plain or bad (netherlands and UK come to mind).
compounded by the fact that reviews, awards, and any institution which formerly served to find good and worthy books or movies seem to have become completely detached from genuine popular interest and quality.
My two cents as an armchair architect: The Original Gaudi façade is a masterpiece, astonishing to behold in both technical excellence and artistic originality. The sculptural spires are also excellent where they follow the law of weirdness and surprise. The rest is a valiant tribute, but ultimately lacking in the subtlety and freedom of Gaudì himself. It was based on his design as closely as possible, but we can only imagine him re-thinking and warping the design at each stage to create those original details and surprising moments that characterize the works he personally supervised. I found the interior boring, and the newer modernist façade was just an echo of the style in vogue at the time. I would skip going inside next time.
The only reason I can find for anyone to be bored by the inside is if they visited on a cloudy day. The way the light enters through the stained glass and colors the environment (and how the light changes during the day) is astonishing, never experienced something similar tbh.
The problem with "trust your gut" is that intuition is a skill which needs to be honed. Everyone has different levels of blockage to being genuinely in touch with their "gut". I think some people are more naturally synthetic thinkers and already live in a more body-guided way. For the walking heads like most of us here on HN we would need to spend time re-learning how to calibrate the body to give precise readings. So the advice needs some caveats.
seems pretty telling that the article is all about Britain and the UK, but the author calls it a "European" problem. While afaik european countries do not have "free speech" in the american sense they do each have differing levels of tolerance, criminalization, and enforcement.
I think the social side is even more important than the legal aspects. Orwell wrote his 1984 about England, after the social repression he experienced. And I would say the same or stronger repression and conformism exists in north america, despite the law.
What I've seen in europe is that day-to-day freedom of expression is far and away greater than anywhere in Canada or the US i've been. Including the UK sphere. So I think it's a serious error to conflate the law itself with the "tyranny of the majority", and to conflate one country or region with "europe".
At least in Germany there is definitely a „free speech problem“. There are several crimes such as „Volksverhetzung“ (agitation of the people) that do serve a legitimate purpose but which are very vaguely defined. Also, trying to ban a party like the AfD, which is the second largest in Germany, for things that are not illegal to say (I‘m not judging their politics here, I‘m just saying the assessment has been leaked and there are no illegal things in there) doesn’t exactly scream free speech
The weird thing about the whole AfD issue is that the other parties don’t realise that censoring and excluding AfD will likely make it stronger. Strange they didn’t consider that outcome.
- Though the bottom half of humanity may be poor, on average they have a quality of life that has risen dramatically over the past century thanks in large part to the deployment of technologies and aid originating from the wealthier nations.
- Historically the only time the trend of wealth accumulation reverses is during massive crises, wars, and civilizational collapse which make life worse for everyone and nobody with any sense would wish for.
- It seems to me a lot of people channel their unhappiness into resentment of the wealthy, based on this same flavor of folk economics as old as time "the rich get richer". And that unhappiness is usually uncoupled from their position in the economic ladder.