It isn't at all groundbreaking, but we haven't figured out how to apply the concept to society very well. Bertrand Russell's 1932 essay on the topic has been di

It isn't at all groundbreaking, but we haven't figured out how to apply the concept to society very well. Bertrand Russell's 1932 essay on the topic has been discussed here before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6513765 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6513765 What we need is an inversion of the "diminishing marginal returns" concept to permeate economic theory. Maybe some people just call that Keynesian theory? I think the real takeaway isn't about upper middle class versus regular middle class. Rather there is quite a lot of negative value / lost opportunities by drawing the poverty line so low.