7 ms·

This is oddly seen as something to be proud of rather than an embarrassment among some of the media: >It is encouraging that a man whose family first got rich

• blfr 7y ago
  Because this is the only positive aspect. In most continental countries family wealth doesn't go that far back not because of enlightened equality but because it was burned in a war or confiscated in a revolution.
  • benj111 7y ago
    Agreed, I'm not particularly convinced that socially speaking its a good thing. But the fact that you have that stability for that long is impressive.
    • phs318u 7y ago
      It’s certainly impressive to the families that have benefited and more importantly continue to benefit from this stability. If I was a scion of one of these families it would make absolute sense that I would do anything within my power to maintain this status quo. Looking at that history it’s easy to think that might be how the “born to rule” mentality among the aristocracy in the UK became so entrenched.
    • jlawson 7y ago
      To attach this to stability is to implicitly assume that what's important is that the wealth itself was passed down between generations. This would require stability, because if the wealth was all lost in one event, the chain would be irrevocably broken. The alternative view is that the people in these families have the personal characteristics that allow one to build wealth, and that those characteristics are passed down (either by some kind of conditioning, or genetically, or some combination). This doesn't require much stability at all, since the wealth can all be lost but the capacity to build it is not as long as the person survives. Examples of the second view can be found in diverse examples like: Wealthy Irans who lost everything in the '79 revolution, moved to America, and rebuilt from nothing to become wealthy again, often not even speaking English to start. Jews after the Holocaust, who lost everything and rebuilt from nothing to now become >17% of global billionaires on 0.1% of global population. And so on. Though both views are obviously in effect, given the massive instability present throughout history, I'm inclined to say the second causality is dominant over the long term, while the first is only effective over the short term (e.g. trust-fund babies who lose everything in one generation, pro sports players or lottery winners who get millions and lose it all within a few years, etc). I think it's important to keep both causalities in mind.
      • benj111 7y ago
        Good point, theres plenty of storys about aristocrats frittering their wealth away on cards. Genetics? I'll stay away from that one. I'm not sure it really changes the dynamic very much though. Even if the cream always rises to the top, theres no harm in shaking the milk bottle every so often.
      • Nasrudith 7y ago
        Education and development are essentially the most 'durable' of goods - it cannot be stolen once taken - only damaged or destroyed by killing the bearer. In the past nutrition also played a similar role where better nourished aristocrats would have a concrete advantage over peasants. With no cataclysms to prove their ability to rebuild if needed, wealth's ability to self perpetuate means ascribing it to stability makes sense. Since they would remain wealthy as both with and without the 'virtues' (in the sense of self-promotion as opposed to morality) its presence is irrelevant. All they need to do is avoid doing anything extraordinarily stupid and wasteful.
  • alistairSH 7y ago
    Is that true? This article seems to indicate wealth in Florence is fairly “sticky” across the generations. https://anarchimedia.com/2019/01/15/rich-families-in-florence-today-are-the-same-rich-families-from-600-years-ago/ https://anarchimedia.com/2019/01/15/rich-families-in-florenc...
    • contravariant 7y ago
      I think that's mostly because Florence was the one relieving the surrounding area of their family wealth.
  • deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
• whatshisface 7y ago
  That article reads like false-flag Communist literature... Millennium-long family wealth chains being an inevitable consequence of private property? You'd read that in one of those pamphlets.
  • danharaj 7y ago
    Are we going to blame orthodox capitalist ideology on communists now?
    • sgregnt 7y ago
      Most weath created in capitalism is a result of very recent development (see all IT companies that top S&P500). The generalizations that this article promotes, do seem akin to communist pamphlets. Those also use populist rethorics and half truth to steer hatred towards the rich.
      • kristopolous 7y ago
        There's a huge class element to startups. The rich well connected people get more funding faster. The equity distribution and contract negotiations is based on social connections and power dynamics. The access to the right higher education is based on parent's wealth. I totally have a preference during hiring and promotions whether I like to admit it or not if someone is like me in some substantiative way. I also put up with more bullshit from them. Power perpetuates itself even when you fight again it The entire silicon valley is dripping with classic robber baron style clubhouse capitalism enormously predetermined by class. Whenever everything is run by a bunch of similar looking white dudes who grew up in rich neighborhoods claiming it's some bountiful meritocracy of equal opportunity skill based free market Utopia requires some mighty fine rose colored glasses. There's an important reality here that organizes and filters the structure. And to ward off the classic responses: 1 It's not necessarily a bad thing. 2 I'm not saying there's something wrong with it 3 I'm blaming nobody 4 I'm not saying it needs fixing 5 I mostly vote libertarian This is just a reality and your personal politics shouldn't get in the way of acknowledging the sky is blue and water is wet.
• kristianc 7y ago
  > William the Conqueror has £9 billion today, 950 years later. It shows that our culture respects private property over government interference. I'd love to know how they think William came to acquire that property.
  • devoply 7y ago
    Obviously bestowed upon him by god. Respect for private property eh? What about all the looting and plundering of the empire? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/04/east-india-company-original-corporate-raiders https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/04/east-india-com...
    • anigbrowl 7y ago
      Jolly good show! Pass the port, my dear fellow. I'm told it's a cheeky little vintage.
  • Frondo 7y ago
    You'd think the clue in the name would give them an idea...
    • devoply 7y ago
      You mean William the Bastard?
  • shoo 7y ago
    If you're open to a bit of interesting fiction, _The Wake_ by Paul Kingsnorth is a post apocalyptic novel set after the Norman invasion of 1066. Kingsnorth wrote the book in an invented version of old english: https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/27232308-the-wake https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/27232308-the-wake Here's Kingsnorth writing about the consequences of the Norman invasion upon England today: > [...] legacies of 1066 remain with us. Take that law enacted by Guillaume in 1067. In Anglo-Saxon England, the idea that one man — the king — literally owned the entire landbase of the nation would have been unthinkable. Today, it remains a legal reality: England is still owned, as a whole, by the Crown. The hereditary monarchy introduced by the Normans remains too, and the French concept known as ‘primogeniture’ — in which estates are inherited wholesale by the first-born son, rather than parceled out between children as was more common in Anglo-Saxon England > [...] Today, Britain is the country with the second most unequal distribution of land on Earth, after Brazil. More than 70 per cent of the land is owned by fewer than two per cent of the population. Much of this is directly traceable to Guillaume, whose 22nd-great-granddaughter sits on the English throne today. > [...] ask yourself whether the development of early modern capitalism in England would have been possible without that concentration of land, and therefore power and wealth. What about the consequent empire? Did the industrial revolution begin in England because that funnel of power and money made it possible? Or what about class, which is directly connected to all of those things? We are still one of the most socially and economically stratified countries in Europe. In today’s England, the rulers still drink wine and the ‘plebs’ still drink beer, just as they did in 1066. https://aeon.co/essays/why-1066-wasn-t-all-that-england-s-endless-resistance https://aeon.co/essays/why-1066-wasn-t-all-that-england-s-en...
• edflsafoiewq 7y ago
  Ha. Unless you were a Jew I guess. Or a monastery.
• speeq 7y ago
  So the 7th Duke of Westminster is estimated to be worth £9 billion (US$13 billion), making him the world's richest person under age 30. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Grosvenor,_7th_Duke_of_Westminster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Grosvenor,_7th_Duke_of_We... > Upon his father's death, in August 2016, as well as the peerages, he inherited a wealth currently estimated at £9 billion, with considerable trust funds for his sisters. This wealth is held in a trust, of which the Duke is a beneficial owner but not the legal owner — an arrangement which received considerable press attention due to the inheritance tax exemption this confers. The standard Inheritance Tax rate is 40% in the UK when above a certain threshold - https://www.gov.uk/inheritance-tax https://www.gov.uk/inheritance-tax Seems fair!
  • LanceH 7y ago
    I'm not sure why everyone thinks it's fair the government should get paid when a citizen dies.
    • specialist 7y ago
      Governments tax wealth and economic activity. Is there another system which is more fair? Lottery? Head count? Birthday?
    • peteretep 7y ago
      I think estate tax should be 100% because you sure as shit don’t need your money when you’re dead. Change my mind.
      • pdonis 7y ago
        You might not need your money when you're dead, but people you very much wanted to provide for and support, like your spouse or your children, certainly do need it if they survive you. Providing for one's family is one of the main motivations for people to do productive work and create wealth.
        • peteretep 7y ago
• onetimemanytime 7y ago
  all I'm thinking: it takes a lot of luck and discipline to keep a fortune for 950 years. You could say laws (might forbid sale unless...), but I imagine that they weren't enforced uniformly. Where do you store the title? Imagine what the country went through 950 years. IIRC, they only lease the land for as much as 999 years, don't sell.
• FearNotDaniel 7y ago
  Pandering to their readership. Daily Telegraph is mostly read by rich old white people who need constant reminders that they are upholding ancient and noble traditions to justify their choices.
  • Aeolun 7y ago
    I don’t need the daily telegraph to remind me of this. Worse than people that exploit others and don’t care are the people that do so and do care to some extend.
• caprese 7y ago
  Well not everyone cares, the media gets clicks from the hoards people who can never qualify to even aspire to be in the same situation, but not everyone sees it as an embarrassment
• Nasrudith 7y ago
  That isn't too surprising as an extension of the Upton Sinclair quote “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” Essentially those who benefit from the status quo will nearly always rationalize it as why it is a good thing even if it is transparently benefiting from and perpetuating travesties. It sadly takes a good deal of integrity and self-awareness to not do so. There seems to be a major cultural force in the UK of enforcing their own bubbles of hereditary elite self-justification at all costs - and that is sadly by no means unique. It has been seen many times throughout history and around globe and usually ends in utter disaster when reality comes along and slaps them in the face - often after many smaller disasters which should have been major warning signs were ignored.