9 ms·

What gets me is the job holders in the upper 20% who actively support a system that benefits the non-working (or don't need to work) top 1%. I make a pretty hi

What gets me is the job holders in the upper 20% who actively support a system that benefits the non-working (or don't need to work) top 1%. I make a pretty high wage compared to a cashier at a store, but my interests align with them a lot more than a Walton. Yet my peers are convinced that because they have the trappings of the petite bourgeoisie and a well funded 401k that they have more in common with a Koch. I'm not familiar with a society that experienced such high inequality and did not have very disruptive upheaval afterwards. One would think the wealthy would advocate for universal health care, education and safety nets as a small price to pay for their own self preservation. On the other hand, they haven't had much to fear from the lower classes for a long time now.

joejerryronnie 9y ago
Why do you think so many 1%ers are advocating for Universal Basic Income? It's not due to some altruistic notion that everyone should be able to follow their dream. It's out of fear of a populist revolt. Their backup plan is New Zealand based prepper compounds.
- PopsiclePete 9y ago
  Populist revolt? In America? 50% of the population would gleefully shoot the other 50% dead as soon as their Masters tell them it's just "treasonous liberal Marxists". The 1% are super-duper safe. They've got nothing to fear from the "temporarily embarrassed millionaires".
- AnthonyMouse 9y ago
  A UBI is literally the purest form of redistribution of wealth. It takes money disproportionately from the rich and then gives it equally to everyone. There are only three classes of people who oppose it: 1) people who oppose all redistributive programs, 2) people who favor the centrally planned farce of the existing welfare system because it allows them to covertly insert corrupt industry-specific subsidies into the system, and 3) people who don't actually understand how it works. If the 1% favor it they must like income redistribution, dislike opportunities for political corruption, or not understand what they're asking for.
  - throwaway1748 9y ago
    I don't think there are only 3 groups of people that oppose it. You can draw some nuance here. For example, many people believe that work helps give people a sense of purpose, and a mere basic income might enable people to make poor life decisions. A "basic minimum job" might still be a re-distributive system, but with some nuance.
    - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
      Half the point of a basic income is that it doesn't discourage people from working, unlike welfare systems that suspend payments to working people including a basic job that de facto prevents you from taking a real job because if you stop doing the makework job you no longer get the redistributive subsidy. A basic income even eliminates the need to have a minimum wage, which allows people whose labor is not worth a living wage to nonetheless trade it for whatever they can get and still not starve. A basic job is economically damaging because by definition the value derived from the work is less than the compensation (or it would just be a regular job). Which creates all kinds of terrible incentives where, basically, people choose the basic job over more actually productive work because it's government-subsidized and the real job isn't.
    - imtringued 9y ago
      >For example, many people believe that work helps give people a sense of purpose, and a mere basic income might enable people to make poor life decisions Working as a teacher and having a second job to subsidise the first is considered purposeful. Working as a teacher and receiving the rest of the income as UBI is suddenly no longer purposeful? The pro UBI argument is: UBI removes the incentive for people to work at jobs they hate. It gives them negotiation power. If people are looking for purpose in their work then arguably not being restricted by financial considerations is allowing them to find purpose and be more happy. People get to decide what purpose means to them. I believe this is what women are doing in exchange for lower pay. The anti UBI argument is: Someone must force their own definition of purpose on them and if they weren't forced to work bad jobs they wouldn't have any purpose at all. They need someone that "thinks" for them because they are unable to "think" for themselves.
hueving 9y ago
Because there has been a successful campaign to vilify the 1%. When you look at income levels, the 1% includes doctors, lawyers, lots of small business owners, and even many software engineers that got good stock grants in Silicon Valley. So picking 1% as the threshold was very ill-conceived because now it includes many expert professionals and small business owners. So it's very easy to relate to them if you are also an expert or small business owner.
- frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
  What? No, you're arguing for a winnowing down to 0.1% or 0.01%, but our problem is the other way around as the parent described. The problem is the 10% or 20% who support the same basic policies as the 0.1%.
- evanlivingston 9y ago
  er, small business owners making $800,000+ a year? I don't think that's very easy to relate to. Who is waging this campaign? I don't think is a campaign to vilify the 1% as much as it's an increased awareness by the 99% that no one needs to be making $800,000 a year. As people see home ownership being increasingly implausible, healthcare difficult to afford, fulfilling work unable to be found and less than $1000 in savings, is it any wonder people are upset, bothered and judgemental of people who make an impossibly larger amount of money than 99% of people?
  - hueving 9y ago
    The number you're looking for is $465k. https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-top-1-5-10/ https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-t... >that no one needs to be making $800,000 a year. And that's where the mistake is. A significant number of people (including me) are fine with someone creating a company, selling it for a few million, or just having 10 good years of operation and retiring. The rewards for creating something new need to be worth the risk of complete failure and loss of income for those years. This is the problem with using 1%. The bottom of the 1% is filled with normal professionals that took huge risks (starting businesses) or spent a significant amount of time in training (brain surgeon). >As people see home ownership being increasingly implausible Not if you give up on living in the most expensive parts of the US. Even then, a housing shortage is hardly attributable to income inequality. Just look at the bay area where there are people making good money. The housing shortage has caused prices to sky rocket to absorb up all of that difference. If you have 1000 people fighting for 100 houses, 900 people are going to get screwed regardless of income inequality. > healthcare difficult to afford, A broken healthcare system can't be fixed by fewer rich people. >fulfilling work unable to be found and less than $1000 in savings Capping incomes of successful professions will not add more fulfilling professions nor will it increase their savings. >Who is waging this campaign? Well people like you who claim nobody needs to make a lot of money and then blame a bunch of unrelated issues on income inequality. I can't tell if it was just the mathematical ignorance of who started the movement or if it was partially orchestrated by the super-rich. But by making it include skilled professionals that had to put in huge risks to get where they are, they lost significant support of the population within 50% of that income. >is it any wonder people are upset, bothered and judgemental of people who make an impossibly larger amount of money than 99% of people? I don't know what "impossibly larger" is supposed to mean in this context. Someone who makes $250k will not see someone who makes $500k as making an "impossibly larger" amount of money than them. If this whole movement had been more carefully crafted to exclude people that had to go to medical school and go $350k into debt, I don't think there would have been very much disagreement from a significant chunk of the US. As it stands, it just looks like an arbitrary cut-off screwing the people who managed to secure a good life rather than being focused on people with enough money to hire full-time Washington lobbyists.
malvosenior 9y ago
> What gets me is the job holders in the upper 20% who actively support a system that benefits the non-working (or don't need to work) top 1%. It's not a zero sum game. Just because the 1% benefit from a particular policy, it doesn't mean other non-1% people supporting it don't benefit as well.
- and0 9y ago
  In some cases they might benefit from the same policies, but usually disproportionately so. What was labelled the "death tax", which somehow became a grassroots issue, was taxes on inheritance over roughly 5 million. It's now doubled to 11 million with the new tax bill. This is not in the interest of well over 99% of people.
  - malvosenior 9y ago
    > In some cases they might benefit from the same policies, but usually disproportionately so. If I benefit from something, it doesn't bother me at all that someone benefits even more. Should I forfeit my benefits out of spite? > What was labelled the "death tax", which somehow became a grassroots issue, was taxes on inheritance over roughly 5 million. It's now doubled to 11 million with the new tax bill. This is not in the interest of well over 99% of people. Maybe people feel it's fair to get to pass your wealth onto your children and that if they were rich they would support this idea. There's something to be said about sticking to your moral values and not being a hypocrite especially when what is being debated is having the state take a private citizen's money away from them.
    - and0 9y ago
      The choice isn't between no benefits and the status quo for lower classes / income brackets. It's about lower classes getting a bigger piece of the pie. You're acting as though questioning how resources are divided among a populace, which is almost entirely what politics is, is irrational or pointless, as though we've arrived to the current state of things via some other perfect, entirely natural process that we're foolish to tamper with.
ryandrake 9y ago
Old article but probably still relevant today: 39% of Americans think they either are (19%) or one day will be (20%) among the top 1% incomes [1]. You can’t get someone to oppose enriching the richest if that person thinks he’s one of them! 1: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/12/opinion/the-triumph-of-hope-over-self-interest.html http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/12/opinion/the-triumph-of-hop...
- AnthonyMouse 9y ago
  That's because a surprisingly large fraction of them are right. At any given time a person is more likely to be a student, in an entry level position, or retired, than be at the height of their career. 39% in the top 1% is still an overestimate, but it's probably not far wrong to say that 39% of people will at some point in their lives be in the top 5%. The problem is with using "1%" as the threshold, because that just means you and your spouse are successful professionals at the height of your careers, when the real problem is the top <0.001% and, even more than that, the accumulating wealth of large corporations relative to individuals.
  - ryandrake 9y ago
    According to old (2014-2015) measurements, to be in the 1% you need to be pulling in at least $455k a year[1], $1.4M on average[2]. It’s probably even higher today. That’s way way beyond the typical “professional at the height of his career.” 1: https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-top-1-5-10/ https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-t... 2: http://equitablegrowth.org/research-analysis/u-s-top-one-percent-of-income-earners-hit-new-high-in-2015-amid-strong-economic-growth/ http://equitablegrowth.org/research-analysis/u-s-top-one-per...
    - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
      That's household income, including your spouse's income. Your half of that is significantly less than what a senior cardiologist or senior partner at a law firm makes.
kermittd 9y ago
I apologize for the reddit level of discourse...here here!
- wavefunction 9y ago
  It's "hear! hear!"
forinti 9y ago
That's exactly what happens in Brazil. The middle class fears the introduction of inheritance tax more than the lack of universal health care or good public schools.
jeffdavis 9y ago
I'm disturbed that you are talking purely in terms of one's interests, as though priciples have no place. You may disagree, but many people do have priciples that include private property rights, limited government, and flatter tax schemes.
- evanlivingston 9y ago
  Sure, and many people also have principles that include extremely limited private property rights, limited government and flatter social hierarchies.
  - jeffdavis 9y ago
    I'm not sure what your point is. I was criticizing another comment for neglecting the role of principles in political choices. So it seems like you agree with me?
l33tbro 9y ago
Indeed. The advocacy for Universal Basic Income for the top 1% has always struck me as a wealth insurance move on their behalf. Sustain the status quo and the great unwashed won't sack your property portfolio.
- gdix 9y ago
  Or maybe they just think it makes sense? I don't get the insistence of applying a selfish motivation for everything.
  - l33tbro 9y ago
    You're arguing that the vast majority of the 1% are not selfish actors? I would need serious convincing to take your point. Btw, I don't see being "selfish" as a bad thing or value judgement. It's kind of what we do as humans.
RickJWag 9y ago
Why not vilify George Soros or ultra-rich Hollywood as well?

joejerryronnie 9y ago

Why do you think so many 1%ers are advocating for Universal Basic Income? It's not due to some altruistic notion that everyone should be able to follow their dream. It's out of fear of a populist revolt. Their backup plan is New Zealand based prepper compounds.

PopsiclePete 9y ago
Populist revolt? In America? 50% of the population would gleefully shoot the other 50% dead as soon as their Masters tell them it's just "treasonous liberal Marxists". The 1% are super-duper safe. They've got nothing to fear from the "temporarily embarrassed millionaires".
AnthonyMouse 9y ago
A UBI is literally the purest form of redistribution of wealth. It takes money disproportionately from the rich and then gives it equally to everyone. There are only three classes of people who oppose it: 1) people who oppose all redistributive programs, 2) people who favor the centrally planned farce of the existing welfare system because it allows them to covertly insert corrupt industry-specific subsidies into the system, and 3) people who don't actually understand how it works. If the 1% favor it they must like income redistribution, dislike opportunities for political corruption, or not understand what they're asking for.
- throwaway1748 9y ago
  I don't think there are only 3 groups of people that oppose it. You can draw some nuance here. For example, many people believe that work helps give people a sense of purpose, and a mere basic income might enable people to make poor life decisions. A "basic minimum job" might still be a re-distributive system, but with some nuance.
  - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
    Half the point of a basic income is that it doesn't discourage people from working, unlike welfare systems that suspend payments to working people including a basic job that de facto prevents you from taking a real job because if you stop doing the makework job you no longer get the redistributive subsidy. A basic income even eliminates the need to have a minimum wage, which allows people whose labor is not worth a living wage to nonetheless trade it for whatever they can get and still not starve. A basic job is economically damaging because by definition the value derived from the work is less than the compensation (or it would just be a regular job). Which creates all kinds of terrible incentives where, basically, people choose the basic job over more actually productive work because it's government-subsidized and the real job isn't.
  - imtringued 9y ago
    >For example, many people believe that work helps give people a sense of purpose, and a mere basic income might enable people to make poor life decisions Working as a teacher and having a second job to subsidise the first is considered purposeful. Working as a teacher and receiving the rest of the income as UBI is suddenly no longer purposeful? The pro UBI argument is: UBI removes the incentive for people to work at jobs they hate. It gives them negotiation power. If people are looking for purpose in their work then arguably not being restricted by financial considerations is allowing them to find purpose and be more happy. People get to decide what purpose means to them. I believe this is what women are doing in exchange for lower pay. The anti UBI argument is: Someone must force their own definition of purpose on them and if they weren't forced to work bad jobs they wouldn't have any purpose at all. They need someone that "thinks" for them because they are unable to "think" for themselves.

hueving 9y ago

Because there has been a successful campaign to vilify the 1%. When you look at income levels, the 1% includes doctors, lawyers, lots of small business owners, and even many software engineers that got good stock grants in Silicon Valley. So picking 1% as the threshold was very ill-conceived because now it includes many expert professionals and small business owners. So it's very easy to relate to them if you are also an expert or small business owner.

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
What? No, you're arguing for a winnowing down to 0.1% or 0.01%, but our problem is the other way around as the parent described. The problem is the 10% or 20% who support the same basic policies as the 0.1%.
evanlivingston 9y ago
er, small business owners making $800,000+ a year? I don't think that's very easy to relate to. Who is waging this campaign? I don't think is a campaign to vilify the 1% as much as it's an increased awareness by the 99% that no one needs to be making $800,000 a year. As people see home ownership being increasingly implausible, healthcare difficult to afford, fulfilling work unable to be found and less than $1000 in savings, is it any wonder people are upset, bothered and judgemental of people who make an impossibly larger amount of money than 99% of people?
- hueving 9y ago
  The number you're looking for is $465k. https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-top-1-5-10/ https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-t... >that no one needs to be making $800,000 a year. And that's where the mistake is. A significant number of people (including me) are fine with someone creating a company, selling it for a few million, or just having 10 good years of operation and retiring. The rewards for creating something new need to be worth the risk of complete failure and loss of income for those years. This is the problem with using 1%. The bottom of the 1% is filled with normal professionals that took huge risks (starting businesses) or spent a significant amount of time in training (brain surgeon). >As people see home ownership being increasingly implausible Not if you give up on living in the most expensive parts of the US. Even then, a housing shortage is hardly attributable to income inequality. Just look at the bay area where there are people making good money. The housing shortage has caused prices to sky rocket to absorb up all of that difference. If you have 1000 people fighting for 100 houses, 900 people are going to get screwed regardless of income inequality. > healthcare difficult to afford, A broken healthcare system can't be fixed by fewer rich people. >fulfilling work unable to be found and less than $1000 in savings Capping incomes of successful professions will not add more fulfilling professions nor will it increase their savings. >Who is waging this campaign? Well people like you who claim nobody needs to make a lot of money and then blame a bunch of unrelated issues on income inequality. I can't tell if it was just the mathematical ignorance of who started the movement or if it was partially orchestrated by the super-rich. But by making it include skilled professionals that had to put in huge risks to get where they are, they lost significant support of the population within 50% of that income. >is it any wonder people are upset, bothered and judgemental of people who make an impossibly larger amount of money than 99% of people? I don't know what "impossibly larger" is supposed to mean in this context. Someone who makes $250k will not see someone who makes $500k as making an "impossibly larger" amount of money than them. If this whole movement had been more carefully crafted to exclude people that had to go to medical school and go $350k into debt, I don't think there would have been very much disagreement from a significant chunk of the US. As it stands, it just looks like an arbitrary cut-off screwing the people who managed to secure a good life rather than being focused on people with enough money to hire full-time Washington lobbyists.

malvosenior 9y ago

> What gets me is the job holders in the upper 20% who actively support a system that benefits the non-working (or don't need to work) top 1%. It's not a zero sum game. Just because the 1% benefit from a particular policy, it doesn't mean other non-1% people supporting it don't benefit as well.

and0 9y ago
In some cases they might benefit from the same policies, but usually disproportionately so. What was labelled the "death tax", which somehow became a grassroots issue, was taxes on inheritance over roughly 5 million. It's now doubled to 11 million with the new tax bill. This is not in the interest of well over 99% of people.
- malvosenior 9y ago
  > In some cases they might benefit from the same policies, but usually disproportionately so. If I benefit from something, it doesn't bother me at all that someone benefits even more. Should I forfeit my benefits out of spite? > What was labelled the "death tax", which somehow became a grassroots issue, was taxes on inheritance over roughly 5 million. It's now doubled to 11 million with the new tax bill. This is not in the interest of well over 99% of people. Maybe people feel it's fair to get to pass your wealth onto your children and that if they were rich they would support this idea. There's something to be said about sticking to your moral values and not being a hypocrite especially when what is being debated is having the state take a private citizen's money away from them.
  - and0 9y ago
    The choice isn't between no benefits and the status quo for lower classes / income brackets. It's about lower classes getting a bigger piece of the pie. You're acting as though questioning how resources are divided among a populace, which is almost entirely what politics is, is irrational or pointless, as though we've arrived to the current state of things via some other perfect, entirely natural process that we're foolish to tamper with.

ryandrake 9y ago

Old article but probably still relevant today: 39% of Americans think they either are (19%) or one day will be (20%) among the top 1% incomes [1]. You can’t get someone to oppose enriching the richest if that person thinks he’s one of them! 1: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/12/opinion/the-triumph-of-hope-over-self-interest.html http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/12/opinion/the-triumph-of-hop...

AnthonyMouse 9y ago
That's because a surprisingly large fraction of them are right. At any given time a person is more likely to be a student, in an entry level position, or retired, than be at the height of their career. 39% in the top 1% is still an overestimate, but it's probably not far wrong to say that 39% of people will at some point in their lives be in the top 5%. The problem is with using "1%" as the threshold, because that just means you and your spouse are successful professionals at the height of your careers, when the real problem is the top <0.001% and, even more than that, the accumulating wealth of large corporations relative to individuals.
- ryandrake 9y ago
  According to old (2014-2015) measurements, to be in the 1% you need to be pulling in at least $455k a year[1], $1.4M on average[2]. It’s probably even higher today. That’s way way beyond the typical “professional at the height of his career.” 1: https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-top-1-5-10/ https://www.investopedia.com/news/how-much-income-puts-you-t... 2: http://equitablegrowth.org/research-analysis/u-s-top-one-percent-of-income-earners-hit-new-high-in-2015-amid-strong-economic-growth/ http://equitablegrowth.org/research-analysis/u-s-top-one-per...
  - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
    That's household income, including your spouse's income. Your half of that is significantly less than what a senior cardiologist or senior partner at a law firm makes.

kermittd 9y ago

I apologize for the reddit level of discourse...here here!

wavefunction 9y ago
It's "hear! hear!"

forinti 9y ago

That's exactly what happens in Brazil. The middle class fears the introduction of inheritance tax more than the lack of universal health care or good public schools.

jeffdavis 9y ago

I'm disturbed that you are talking purely in terms of one's interests, as though priciples have no place. You may disagree, but many people do have priciples that include private property rights, limited government, and flatter tax schemes.

evanlivingston 9y ago
Sure, and many people also have principles that include extremely limited private property rights, limited government and flatter social hierarchies.
- jeffdavis 9y ago
  I'm not sure what your point is. I was criticizing another comment for neglecting the role of principles in political choices. So it seems like you agree with me?

l33tbro 9y ago

Indeed. The advocacy for Universal Basic Income for the top 1% has always struck me as a wealth insurance move on their behalf. Sustain the status quo and the great unwashed won't sack your property portfolio.

gdix 9y ago
Or maybe they just think it makes sense? I don't get the insistence of applying a selfish motivation for everything.
- l33tbro 9y ago
  You're arguing that the vast majority of the 1% are not selfish actors? I would need serious convincing to take your point. Btw, I don't see being "selfish" as a bad thing or value judgement. It's kind of what we do as humans.

RickJWag 9y ago

Why not vilify George Soros or ultra-rich Hollywood as well?