8 ms·
Fun list, but it is pretty impossible to compare riches across history. Augustus personally owned Egypt, the breadbasket of the Mediterranean at that time. How
by goto11 8y ago
Fun list, but it is pretty impossible to compare riches across history. Augustus personally owned Egypt, the breadbasket of the Mediterranean at that time. How to you even assign a dollar amount on that? How do you compare the purchasing power over time, when some valuables like gold or salt have become much more abundant, and other things like slaves cannot legally be traded anymore?
- rebuilder 8y agoAnd, of course, when some things we now take for granted wouldn't simply not have been available to even the richest of people. Say, air travel.
- peteretep 8y agoAir travel is a luxury compared to the availability of antibiotics, and not getting plague.
- 4thaccount 8y agoPlague like epidemics are coming back due to the anti-vax movement. Fully preventable too.
- idointernet 8y agoOff topic much?
- 4thaccount 8y agoNo. Parent talking about how they didn't have plagues. Just a note that we're moving back in that direction.
- littlestymaar 8y agoNobody has ever been vaccinated against plague in developed countries (where the antivax are an issue) and plague hasn't been eradicated through vaccination but prophylaxis. So the gp is both off topic and factually wrong.
- 4thaccount 8y agoPlague-like epidemics.
- littlestymaar 8y agoPlease: plague epidemics were massive outbreaks that lasted a somewhat short amount of time. No diseases of this kind had ever been prevented by vaccination (you just don't have time to develop/distribute a vaccine, think Ebola last time). Vaccines aren't made for epidemics: they are for _endemic_ diseases, and especially the ones which target children. Vaccines are good for things like polio, smallpox and Measles. But plague, Cholera, SARS, etc. are delt with emergency measures: quarantine, not vaccines. The problem (and there is indeed a problem) with antivaxs, is child mortality, not «plague-like epidemics».
- Nasrudith 8y agoAntibiotics I believe would best be valued as "magic/miracle" in the distant past.
- Tsubasachan 8y agoThis brings up a question: does Trump own the American Treasury? I see the PM of my country at Starbucks sometimes and he looks like any other office drone but he makes billion euro decisions every day.
- mcherm 8y ago> does Trump own the American Treasury? Depends on what you mean by "own". I would use "able to decide how it is used". So I would say that Mark Zuckerberg "owns" Facebook because he has a controlling interest (although he does not own 100% of the stock). I would say that Donald Trump does not "own" the US Treasury because our form of government contains checks and balances.
- dcdanko 8y agoStill not applicable to Trump because the U.S. Congress has power of the purse, not the President.
- craftyguy 8y agoNot true, the president can declare an 'emergency' and circumvent Congress.
- amdavidson 8y agoReferring to no specific case in particular: that is not a circumvention but an application of the authority that Congress delegated to the President in the National Emergencies Act. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Emergencies_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Emergencies_Act
- craftyguy 8y agohttps://www.dictionary.com/browse/circumvent https://www.dictionary.com/browse/circumvent
- 8y ago
- tzfld 8y agoEven the ownership is a very relative term. Once I meet a homeless man who owned the whole universe, but the liquidity if this asset was nearly 0 as his ownership wasn't recognized by anyone.
- mrec 8y agoThen you've got people like Joshua Norton who fall somewhere in between: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Norton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Norton
- s_dev 8y agoWas Crassus not the wealthiest Roman ever?
- LoSboccacc 8y agodepending on how you count, likely yes: as far as private property accrued trough commerce he would. the issue is figure of power in history accumulated wealth based on their domains, so while their treasure was a separate entity from their national treasure, the lines get progressively blurred as the political structure gets more totalitarian and the difference between state and dominion vanishes.
- baxtr 8y agoMaybe a good KPI is: What’s the share of people living that work for you?
- cm2187 8y agoAnd Truman didn't have a penny to his name though headed the US at the top of its might and unleashed more firepower on its ennemies than any army in history. It doesn't mean much.
- maxxxxx 8y agoWasn’t Truman the reason that US presidents received a pension after leaving office?
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoThat was Grant. Grant finished his memoirs on his deathbed so that his widow would be provided for by money from their sale. He was also a damn good writer and Mark Twain published it which didn't hurt.
- amdavidson 8y agoWhile Grant was financially troubled, the pension wasn't passed until Truman was destitute in 1958. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Former_Presidents_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Former_Presidents_Act
- yboris 8y agoComparing riches across history is precisely what Branko Mlianovic did: The Haves and the Have-Nots: A Brief and Idiosyncratic History of Global Inequality Really clever stuff: looking at the amount of labor one could buy, etc. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0047T869M/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0047T869M/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?...