4 ms·

"And let’s face it: older people have all the wealth in the world anyway so they’re more likely to be fruitful targets." Your comment would have resonated with

"And let’s face it: older people have all the wealth in the world anyway so they’re more likely to be fruitful targets." Your comment would have resonated without the unnecessary last line that I don't even believe - are they they the ones who built all the technology companies in the last two decades?

kennywinker 3y ago
In a capitalist system, you don’t have to build anything to have all the wealth. Statistically I believe op is correct, wealth is more concentrated in older demographics, and it has been increasing in concentration for quite a while now.
organsnyder 3y ago
Baby boomers and Silent Generation people hold over 60% of the wealth in the United States. Gen X-ers have about 30%. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/more-than-half-of-us-wealth-belongs-to-baby-boomers:-will-other-generations-catch-up https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/more-than-half-of-us-wealth-...
- dragonwriter 3y ago
  > Baby boomers and Silent Generation people hold over 60% of the wealth in the United States. Gen X-ers have about 30%. It would be more significant that the first two groups have twice as much aggregate wealth as the last if they didn't also have over a time and a half the population. (>30% vs. <20%.) https://www.statista.com/statistics/296974/us-population-share-by-generation/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/296974/us-population-sha...
- neilk 3y ago
  Millennials hold about 9%. Fun fact: Mark Zuckerberg personally holds over 1% of that 9%. (That is, he holds ~0.09% of all the wealth of US citizens, and happens to fall into the group of Millennials who as a group have ~9%. This from rough calculations and googling. There's an old reddit post that has about the same numbers. https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/nbqfvn/request_does_zuckerberg_hold_2_of_all_millennial/ https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/nbqfvn/requ...)
radlad 3y ago
https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2020/10/02/wealth-inequality-across-age-and-class-in-2019/ https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2020/10/02/wealth-inequ... Data comes from https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm
ryandrake 3y ago
If you were a scammer, and your cold call console had three buttons: “20-40 year old”, “40-60 year old” and “60-80 year old”, which one would you push to optimize your chance of finding someone with the right combination of wealthy, trusting, and lonely? Even ignoring things like cognitive decline and loneliness, I’d hit the older button every time, despite the fact that yes some wealthy 20-60 year olds do exist.
- boringg 3y ago
  "And let’s face it: older people have all the wealth in the world anyway" My argument is that your comment is incorrect (hint: they don't have all the wealth in the world) and your tone. I don't disagree that they are the best target if you are a scammer its how you delivered the comment awfully close to blaming the prior generation for all our woes .. i.e. doesn't matter anyways because they "have all the wealth in the world anyways" flippancy.
  - ryandrake 3y ago
    Come on. “All the wealth” is obviously a benign exaggeration, just like if I were to have said “I do this all the time” or “You always do that”.
  - michaelt 3y ago
    You haven't looked at the statistics on this, have you? Imagine vastly simplified world where people are in full time education (with no income and zero net worth) until age 20, then they start earning wealth at a constant rate. At age 30 they'd have 10 years of savings. At age 60 they'd have 40 years of savings, and that's 4x as much.

kennywinker 3y ago

In a capitalist system, you don’t have to build anything to have all the wealth. Statistically I believe op is correct, wealth is more concentrated in older demographics, and it has been increasing in concentration for quite a while now.

organsnyder 3y ago

Baby boomers and Silent Generation people hold over 60% of the wealth in the United States. Gen X-ers have about 30%. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/more-than-half-of-us-wealth-belongs-to-baby-boomers:-will-other-generations-catch-up https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/more-than-half-of-us-wealth-...

dragonwriter 3y ago
> Baby boomers and Silent Generation people hold over 60% of the wealth in the United States. Gen X-ers have about 30%. It would be more significant that the first two groups have twice as much aggregate wealth as the last if they didn't also have over a time and a half the population. (>30% vs. <20%.) https://www.statista.com/statistics/296974/us-population-share-by-generation/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/296974/us-population-sha...
neilk 3y ago
Millennials hold about 9%. Fun fact: Mark Zuckerberg personally holds over 1% of that 9%. (That is, he holds ~0.09% of all the wealth of US citizens, and happens to fall into the group of Millennials who as a group have ~9%. This from rough calculations and googling. There's an old reddit post that has about the same numbers. https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/nbqfvn/request_does_zuckerberg_hold_2_of_all_millennial/ https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/nbqfvn/requ...)

radlad 3y ago

https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2020/10/02/wealth-inequality-across-age-and-class-in-2019/ https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2020/10/02/wealth-inequ... Data comes from https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scfindex.htm

ryandrake 3y ago

If you were a scammer, and your cold call console had three buttons: “20-40 year old”, “40-60 year old” and “60-80 year old”, which one would you push to optimize your chance of finding someone with the right combination of wealthy, trusting, and lonely? Even ignoring things like cognitive decline and loneliness, I’d hit the older button every time, despite the fact that yes some wealthy 20-60 year olds do exist.

boringg 3y ago
"And let’s face it: older people have all the wealth in the world anyway" My argument is that your comment is incorrect (hint: they don't have all the wealth in the world) and your tone. I don't disagree that they are the best target if you are a scammer its how you delivered the comment awfully close to blaming the prior generation for all our woes .. i.e. doesn't matter anyways because they "have all the wealth in the world anyways" flippancy.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  Come on. “All the wealth” is obviously a benign exaggeration, just like if I were to have said “I do this all the time” or “You always do that”.
- michaelt 3y ago
  You haven't looked at the statistics on this, have you? Imagine vastly simplified world where people are in full time education (with no income and zero net worth) until age 20, then they start earning wealth at a constant rate. At age 30 they'd have 10 years of savings. At age 60 they'd have 40 years of savings, and that's 4x as much.