5 ms·
> So the question then, as I see it, is "how do we make it more likely?" We'd have to change the structure of society. Its a class structure, and there's only
by kylebrown 14y ago
> So the question then, as I see it, is "how do we make it more likely?"
We'd have to change the structure of society. Its a class structure, and there's only so much room at the top. The wealth of the upper class comes from extracting rents from the lower class. This happens on a global scale (core countries exploiting the periphery) as well as a local scale (landlords with good credit collect more in rent than they pay on the mortgage).
- celer 14y agoSo, the core(rich) countries include South Korea, Japan, Western Europe, and the United States. What exactly is the periphery? I don't think that there exists the geographic bias you imply.
- kylebrown 14y agofwiw, the terminology comes from Immanual Wallerstein. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World-systems_theory#Periphery_nations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World-systems_theory#Periphery_...
- lupatus 14y agoWrong. If this were true, then when the colonists from "core" countries left a colonized area, then that area should have seen an increase in wealth because those rent monies would have remained in the colony. The history of numerous areas, such as Haiti, Kinshasa, and Zimbabwe say that this did not happen. The wealth of the upper class comes from courage, determination, intelligence, organization, and productive use of time. Furthermore, following your rule, Mark Zuckerberg, who is formerly a long time renter, should be less rich than his former landlords.
- eli_gottlieb 14y agoActually, in most cases, former colonists immediately stuck the decolonized nation with massive debts conjured up for the "theft" of the national assets. That's why Haiti is still poor: they've been in debt to France for the "theft" of "French" assets in colonial Haiti ever since their revolution.
- lupatus 14y agoSorry for the late rebuttal... Actually, according to Wikipedia, Haiti paid off their debt to France that resulted from the Haitian Revolution in 1883: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_debt_of_Haiti http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_debt_of_Haiti. Free of their French "landlords" the Haitian "renters" should have seen increasing prosperity since they were sitting on one of the most agriculturally productive (in terms of sale price for crops grown, not total amount of all products grown) regions of the New World. So, what went wrong?