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> The rich have polluted the planet Rich people aren't tipping over trashcans or shitting on my sidewalk. > raised the global temperature up a whole degree T

> The rich have polluted the planet Rich people aren't tipping over trashcans or shitting on my sidewalk. > raised the global temperature up a whole degree This doesn't actually affect you, you've just been brainwashed into thinking it's the most important thing ever. Emissions are going down in all of the most highly developed countries. As technology improves, this will improve as well. You're complaining about progress that has lifted billions of people out of squalor to having powerful computers in their pockets and being able to transport goods across the globe. > The damage is that now I can’t go outside in late summer, if it doesn’t rain the week before, because the air is poisoned by soot from forest fires. Maybe they should do some forest management with the billions in taxes they take every year, instead of giving it to street-shitting, drugged-out hobos. > The rich are the reason I couldn’t afford a place to rent in San Francisco, their speculative housing investment and gentrification raised the marked rate so much that a working class person from one of the richest country in the world couldn’t afford to live there. When demand goes up, and supply doesn't, the price goes up. This isn't rich people's fault, it's basic supply and demand. > The rich are the reason—unless you are one of them—that you are not making significantly more money from your current job, they consistently take away from your contribution to the wealth you generate in your current job without contributing anything of value. They provide you with a job. You are free to start your own business. Rich people can't stop you. No one owes you anything.

runarberg 6y ago
> Rich people aren't tipping over trashcans or shitting on my sidewalk. Are you seriously equating globally warming the planet with littering? Yes the latter is annoying but the former is literally killing a significant number of people around the world every day. You can’t blame the fires solely on bad forest management. Yes forests in California could (and should) be managed better, but with the climate disaster fueling them I think those effort would be futile. > They provide you with a job. You are free to start your own business. Rich people can't stop you. Again, seriously? Reality check, if this were an actual option more people would do it. How many people get rich (or are able to at least make a living) after starting a business from a working wage? In the real world, normal folks can’t afford to start a business, and even if we could, the risk of failure is too great for us to risk loosing everything and ending up in debt for it.
- smsm42 6y ago
  > if this were an actual option more people would do it. How much more? US has over 31M small businesses. How many do you need to conclude it's an option? 99.9% of businesses in the US are small businesses (obviously, since you only need one person to make a small business and 100K persons to make a Walmart). If normal folks can't afford it, who are all those? I know several people having businesses, in what way they are not "normal"? Not all of them are rich (in fact, most of them aren't, most are making a good living, some better than others, but none I know are billionaires so far) but how this is not normal? I think your picture here is very skewed.

runarberg 6y ago

> Rich people aren't tipping over trashcans or shitting on my sidewalk. Are you seriously equating globally warming the planet with littering? Yes the latter is annoying but the former is literally killing a significant number of people around the world every day. You can’t blame the fires solely on bad forest management. Yes forests in California could (and should) be managed better, but with the climate disaster fueling them I think those effort would be futile. > They provide you with a job. You are free to start your own business. Rich people can't stop you. Again, seriously? Reality check, if this were an actual option more people would do it. How many people get rich (or are able to at least make a living) after starting a business from a working wage? In the real world, normal folks can’t afford to start a business, and even if we could, the risk of failure is too great for us to risk loosing everything and ending up in debt for it.

smsm42 6y ago
> if this were an actual option more people would do it. How much more? US has over 31M small businesses. How many do you need to conclude it's an option? 99.9% of businesses in the US are small businesses (obviously, since you only need one person to make a small business and 100K persons to make a Walmart). If normal folks can't afford it, who are all those? I know several people having businesses, in what way they are not "normal"? Not all of them are rich (in fact, most of them aren't, most are making a good living, some better than others, but none I know are billionaires so far) but how this is not normal? I think your picture here is very skewed.