Governments do what we need to do (give to other people) but not by stealing and pocketing of our donations at the same time...
Right now we're anyway paying ourselves and others with our own energy... and funding the rich to oppress us.
So I suggest reducing the bad money people and holes in between, and more creating reasons to spread things among ourselves
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@freeschool Its not the rich who are oppressing us. Everyone oppresses us, rich, poor, middle class. People are just assholes.
@freemo But not equally oppressive or equally assholes.
There is an equation / structure that does the compound damage so you or I as assholes isn't much but those who are rich massacre in finance anything compared to that, or even hammer / delete / erase years worth of good people's work. It's not equal also as the 'who has more resources to be an asshole' and following more structurally enforcing things and threatening using that system does way more damage that your 'we're all equal' sounding stuff seems to be saying...
Though for sure people are born erroneous - we just need a system and more people that lean the tree toward better ways (and not pure-profit ways which is not even neutral and opposite to accepting our own imperfections and magnifying it)
@freemo @freeschool Far between, but wealth accumulated more than the lower half of the total population. It's moving towards upper class and lower class, the middle class is diminishing. Wealth transfer has already been confirmed, the upper class gained 30% on average since the start of Covid.
That means there are even fewer rich assholes and even more poor assholes. So doesnt really change the crux of the argument here.
That said uneven wealth distribution is not the issue and never has been. The true measure should be the oppertunity afforded to the poor and middle class and their quality of life.
Lets not forget more than half of the wealthy people started out in life as poor or middle class.
@freemo @freeschool That's not what I read, unless you are born into the top 1% you aren't going there statistically, ever. There was a time when this was possible, back when the tax on the rich was around 70%, and you had effective laws to counter cartels and monopolies, that time is gone.
What you just said is not contrary to what I said.
The vast majority of the rich were born poor and middle class. But there are very few rich people, ergo, your change of becoming rich is still low.
Lets face it, the rich represent (mostly) the people who are the absolute best at making money. Not everyone can be the best, most people cant be the best, but being the best is open to anyone no matter how you started.
By the way to give you specific numbers: 68% of people who have 30 million dollars or more started out as poor or middle class.
@freemo @freeschool They aren't the best at making money, they use their wealth to make it impossible for the rest of us to get there, the game is rigged the way I see it.
That assertion is in direct contradiction to the fact that the overwhelming majority of the rich started as poor or middle class.. so you point is simply false.
@freemo @freeschool Not sure where you get that info from, most rich people come from wealthy families.
I get that number and numbers like it from countless studies I've read. Plus it is quite obvious as I deal with rich people every day, the vast majority of whome are self-made.
Here is one such report for you out of a great many that all reaffirm the same data: https://www.wealthx.com/report/world-ultra-wealth-report-2019/
Now more importantly, what study or professionally executed report do **you** get your data from to suggest most wealthy people are born to it?
@freemo @freeschool Wealthy to me is when you can buy politicians legally through donations and use lobbying, not that you can afford two cars, house and family.
30 million is more than enough to buy politicians. My step dad is worth 25 million and both Trump and Biden were over his house and spent the night in an attempt to get money from him. So yea, more than enough to buy politicians.
@freemo @freeschool In other words, we share an opinion, democracy is failing.
This is true, but where we disagree is whose fault it is. I argue its everyones fault, you seem to think the blame mostly lies on the wealthy.
@freemo @freeschool If you can buy politicians to gain advantage for your business then there's the fault right there, it's unethical to do so, and it should be illegal. Shared blame for corrupt politicians and the rich who uses the system. In the end only a revolution can even things out, my guess it will happen soon, unless the rich invent some world war to divert attention from the class war, exciting times ahead.
The problem is that it isnt a problem isolated to the rich. Many politicians start out very much not rich and take advantage of the system (ultimately becoming rich if they are good or staying poor if they arent). As such they, as middle-class and below are equally to blame for taking the bribes in the first place.
Never mind the fact that the rich buying off politicians is a small fraction of the overall problem which extends well beyond bribery or the rich.
@freemo @freeschool As the class gap increases the rich get fewer, and more people get poor. This will eventually lead to revolution in some form (doesn't have to be violent). The big problem is to beat corruption in a system which is corrupt, it can't be done from within. Perhaps unrelated, but I'm pretty sure that if you and me met in real life we would become buddies with slightly difference views.
I dont agree. It isnt the wage gap that leads to revolution. It is the quality of life and quantity of the lowest paid tier of society. As long as the poor have a good overall quality of life the wage gap wont matter, particularly if the system is fair and the rich represent self-made rich people (As it currently does)
@freemo @freeschool When half the population barely gets by to make ends meet, and can't afford more than a USD$ 400 emergency on average, that's bad over all quality.
@freemo Feels like it's a big trap to get into numbers and stats mainly for much longer... I wrote a bunch of points here
https://qoto.org/@freeschool/109001778219023127
...just in case it gets hidden in the interface as people click and sometimes see only the direct reply
@freemo @freeschool I actually don't mind a system where some people make more than others, it doesn't even seem unfair that if you work more you get more. The difference is when one person have more wealth than a whole country, and since money means power, that's wrong in my opinion.
@freemo I'd add these points which radically change that:
- They (The mindset of war/feeding harshly from people and those before us) have helped design and build a structure of unsaid violence / systematic violence and evolve something where you as a mere individual are simply born into it and actually can't see or there is too many things / tricks to keep up on. This is incredibly unfair and the other side is much more formidable compared to a few new borns with barely any history, having less and less land etc.
- As for deliberate mistakes or not from any individual, it's probably because of system also in it's bad ways and bad training also. Lack of choice for one, but restrictions and rules makes people suffer / frustrated / violent / choked.
- Considering a built system means seeing increment going to those bad things, things simply increase bad things in bad hands (of course). So even if you're neutral/oblivious, your energy nd existence are being funneled into uncaring things (and back around again for the next gen). This perpetuates it way more as life-threatening thing than individuals! (
- The bottom also increasingly relies on top so even if they were angels you need bad people / banks. No choice other than death currently which is a reflection of how system treats it's people (ultimatum).
- poor / middle class don't even know what construct they are in. The damage is mostly to themselves.
- The main point that one massive-accumulated-clever system that enforces, funnels and trains people into certain behavior seems very little versus what people do which even at worst doesn't amount to much other than self-damage (even if you see this as the training of system itself making 'bad products' of how it treats it's own and feed from them like vampires leaving them feeling ill and exhausted constantly)
Can't discount the evolution of 'system' or 'patterns that work better for them' much like a tool made for cutting people, it's a lot better at some things more than other things (and some things it doesn't do and was never designed to do at all).
@freeschool Rich people have more power, so for an equal measure of asshole you might argue they do more damage on an individual basis. But there are is also far fewer of them, so collectively this balances out.
In reality I'd say the huge masses of poor to middle class assholes do equal societal damage overall when compared to the very small number of rich assholes.