7 ms·

Author here if anyone has questions. This is a bit different from my usual posts...

by kens 2y ago

vzaliva 2y ago
Have you tried plotting it in log scale?
- byearthithatius 2y ago
  Why? So massive differences in wealth look significantly smaller? By graphing this in log scale you are admitting there is an "exponentially growing delta between rich and poor" and log makes it easier to even visualize (which is insane to begin with).
  - vzaliva 2y ago
    Now, it looks almost like a binomial distribution. Yet, an Uber driver may not feel like being in the same bucket as someone worth $499M. The diagram makes the point but misses subtlety.
    - byearthithatius 2y ago
      Disagree, the point is to visually show there is an exponential difference between LITERALLY EVERYONE (uber driver to Google engineer to VP) and like 100 people who have insane amounts of wealth. I agree Uber driver is not in the same bucket, but the way to fix it isn't going after VP its going after the other hump in the binomial where the wealth is being hoarded for generations.
      - vorpalhex 2y ago
        [flagged]
        rootusrootus 2y ago
        > The population is literally the wealthiest it has ever been. Elon Musk being more wealthy does not diminish your wealth. That's a big claim, and the wrong metric. I don't care if everyone is wealthier than they've ever been, I care how their wealth compares to what it would be if society's wealth were distributed more rationally. > jealousy That's a hot take. I want wealth to be distributed in a rational way so that I don't have to worry about the people near the bottom end of the curve having to worry about being jealous of people like me. I'm doing great, I don't have any real envy of Musk/Gates/whoever. I want all the people making less than me to feel like they can also live a good life. Framing it selfishly -- I want a peaceful, happy society, little crime, little hate, etc. The less people have to struggle just to live, the better all of our lives become.
        tzs 2y ago
        He's using a lot of that wealth to try to get people elected that say they want to do things that will significantly increase my costs over the next few years. Does that count?
        analognoise 2y ago
        There’s always somebody who defends this kind of absurd wealth distribution, and I never understand it. Even if everyone is wealthier, you’re getting screwed. I’ve always wanted to ask - why are you defending the ultra wealthy? Do you think that a fairer wealth distribution mechanism would hurt your personal wealth?
        ryandvm 2y ago
        A few hundred years ago peasants would gladly die for their lords and kings. The more things change the more they stay the same.
        bmgoau 2y ago
        My living standard is a function of my personal wealth/income and the health of the society and the functions the government provides. Elon Musks income (realised when he takes out personal loans against his equity), taxed at marginally higher rates trending to 100% above say $1 billion, would deliver more money to the government for schools, hospitals, transport, science, mental health etc, That would benefit everyone and not really change Mr Musk's purchasing patterns or standard of living due to the way "propensity to consume" works at extreme wealth levels. Significant personal luxury, mansions, jets, art, yachts, etc can be had for under $1 billion per year in realised income. So while it is true my personal wealth is not lessened by Mr Musk's success, my possible living standard and that of my countrymen is below what is possible by not effectively taxing him and deploying that money into government functions. Not to mention the way he and other high net worth individuals use their wealth to influence elections and lobby government legislation and policy...
    - zach_miller 2y ago
      I think the diagram on a linear scale makes the stark point that to Elon Musk, there is not really a difference between someone worth $499 and someone worth $499M, even though to me there is a massive difference between those people.
  - xenocratus 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - byearthithatius 2y ago
      "I couldn't care less about the shock value. I just want to look at the distribution and do nothing with that information even though there is something incredibly shocking here."
    - contagiousflow 2y ago
      What does a linear scale not tell you about the object of the graph? I'm not sure what further insights you could glean from a logarithmic scale.
      - andriesm 2y ago
        I'd be curious to see it, just in case it helps with noticing something else.
    - piva00 2y ago
      The sources are there, you could probably plot one yourself and show us, improving the conversation perhaps? Or you can demand and whine about your demands, totally up to you.
  - endo_bunker 2y ago
    Additional wealth has diminishing marginal returns, obviously.
    - byearthithatius 2y ago
      No, according to economic theory, the law of diminishing marginal utility generally does not apply to money. Please cite a source that says having more AUM somehow decreases potential yield. Sounds retarded. People say stuff that needs evidence then say obviously like its a source.
      - enragedcacti 2y ago
        "The Marginal Utility of Income" > We have thus confirmed the (cardinalist) assumption of nineteenth century economists that marginal utility of income declines with income. https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp0784.pdf https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp0784.pdf People say stuff that needs evidence then say "according to economic theory" like its a source. (fwiw I agree that this isn't a good argument for a log scale)
      - dmoy 2y ago
        I think GP doesn't mean "returns" as in investment returns. I think they're talking about like... living. The utility of buying a second (or tenth) house/car/whatever is drastically lower return than the utility of buying your first one.
        atmavatar 2y ago
        However, the utility of money starts to drastically increase once you reach a tipping point where it can start allowing you to wield real political power. The graph of monetary utility may look like a logarithmic graph at first glance, but that's just because it's more like a C1 + (x-C2)^3 graph where you haven't followed x far enough to the right.
        JetSpiegel 2y ago
FactKnower69 2y ago
oops, this thread's just been censored off the front page, better luck next time
- ks2048 2y ago
  why?
  - rootusrootus 2y ago
    Why is it dropping, or why 'better luck next time'? The former is easy to answer. It's a hot, emotional topic and getting comments way faster than it's getting upvoted.
    - ks2048 2y ago
      I meant why "censored". I guess I don't know how the algorithm works - I guess being downvoted or flagged.
      - rootusrootus 2y ago
        I don't think it's getting censored intentionally, in the sense someone is taking that action specifically. It's falling quickly off the front page because the algorithm is biased against this kind of discussion. If it was getting killed by flags it would end up saying [flagged] in the headline as it disappeared. And you can't downvote submissions, so it's inferred from lack of upvotes.
- kens 2y ago
  Yeah, the "controversial" filter kicked in because the post has more comments than upvotes. I reverse-engineered the HN algorithm a few years ago: https://www.righto.com/2013/11/how-hacker-news-ranking-really-works.html https://www.righto.com/2013/11/how-hacker-news-ranking-reall...
Balgair 2y ago
Um, anyway for me to put in my money and see where I rank? I'd just love to know how bad things really are.
ks2048 2y ago
Have you come cross more fine-grained data of wealth or income data? (i.e histograms with many bins across whole range).
- kens 2y ago
  Unfortunately, no. Wealth data is usually very coarse (quartiles or quintiles) or one data point, which makes it hard to do most of the analysis that I'd like to do.

Author here if anyone has questions. This is a bit different from my usual posts...

by kens 2y ago

Author here if anyone has questions. This is a bit different from my usual posts...

vzaliva 2y ago

Have you tried plotting it in log scale?

byearthithatius 2y ago
Why? So massive differences in wealth look significantly smaller? By graphing this in log scale you are admitting there is an "exponentially growing delta between rich and poor" and log makes it easier to even visualize (which is insane to begin with).
- vzaliva 2y ago
  Now, it looks almost like a binomial distribution. Yet, an Uber driver may not feel like being in the same bucket as someone worth $499M. The diagram makes the point but misses subtlety.
  - byearthithatius 2y ago
    Disagree, the point is to visually show there is an exponential difference between LITERALLY EVERYONE (uber driver to Google engineer to VP) and like 100 people who have insane amounts of wealth. I agree Uber driver is not in the same bucket, but the way to fix it isn't going after VP its going after the other hump in the binomial where the wealth is being hoarded for generations.
    - vorpalhex 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - rootusrootus 2y ago
        > The population is literally the wealthiest it has ever been. Elon Musk being more wealthy does not diminish your wealth. That's a big claim, and the wrong metric. I don't care if everyone is wealthier than they've ever been, I care how their wealth compares to what it would be if society's wealth were distributed more rationally. > jealousy That's a hot take. I want wealth to be distributed in a rational way so that I don't have to worry about the people near the bottom end of the curve having to worry about being jealous of people like me. I'm doing great, I don't have any real envy of Musk/Gates/whoever. I want all the people making less than me to feel like they can also live a good life. Framing it selfishly -- I want a peaceful, happy society, little crime, little hate, etc. The less people have to struggle just to live, the better all of our lives become.
      - tzs 2y ago
        He's using a lot of that wealth to try to get people elected that say they want to do things that will significantly increase my costs over the next few years. Does that count?
      - analognoise 2y ago
        There’s always somebody who defends this kind of absurd wealth distribution, and I never understand it. Even if everyone is wealthier, you’re getting screwed. I’ve always wanted to ask - why are you defending the ultra wealthy? Do you think that a fairer wealth distribution mechanism would hurt your personal wealth?
        ryandvm 2y ago
        A few hundred years ago peasants would gladly die for their lords and kings. The more things change the more they stay the same.
      - bmgoau 2y ago
        My living standard is a function of my personal wealth/income and the health of the society and the functions the government provides. Elon Musks income (realised when he takes out personal loans against his equity), taxed at marginally higher rates trending to 100% above say $1 billion, would deliver more money to the government for schools, hospitals, transport, science, mental health etc, That would benefit everyone and not really change Mr Musk's purchasing patterns or standard of living due to the way "propensity to consume" works at extreme wealth levels. Significant personal luxury, mansions, jets, art, yachts, etc can be had for under $1 billion per year in realised income. So while it is true my personal wealth is not lessened by Mr Musk's success, my possible living standard and that of my countrymen is below what is possible by not effectively taxing him and deploying that money into government functions. Not to mention the way he and other high net worth individuals use their wealth to influence elections and lobby government legislation and policy...
  - zach_miller 2y ago
    I think the diagram on a linear scale makes the stark point that to Elon Musk, there is not really a difference between someone worth $499 and someone worth $499M, even though to me there is a massive difference between those people.
- xenocratus 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - byearthithatius 2y ago
    "I couldn't care less about the shock value. I just want to look at the distribution and do nothing with that information even though there is something incredibly shocking here."
  - contagiousflow 2y ago
    What does a linear scale not tell you about the object of the graph? I'm not sure what further insights you could glean from a logarithmic scale.
    - andriesm 2y ago
      I'd be curious to see it, just in case it helps with noticing something else.
  - piva00 2y ago
    The sources are there, you could probably plot one yourself and show us, improving the conversation perhaps? Or you can demand and whine about your demands, totally up to you.
- endo_bunker 2y ago
  Additional wealth has diminishing marginal returns, obviously.
  - byearthithatius 2y ago
    No, according to economic theory, the law of diminishing marginal utility generally does not apply to money. Please cite a source that says having more AUM somehow decreases potential yield. Sounds retarded. People say stuff that needs evidence then say obviously like its a source.
    - enragedcacti 2y ago
      "The Marginal Utility of Income" > We have thus confirmed the (cardinalist) assumption of nineteenth century economists that marginal utility of income declines with income. https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp0784.pdf https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp0784.pdf People say stuff that needs evidence then say "according to economic theory" like its a source. (fwiw I agree that this isn't a good argument for a log scale)
    - dmoy 2y ago
      I think GP doesn't mean "returns" as in investment returns. I think they're talking about like... living. The utility of buying a second (or tenth) house/car/whatever is drastically lower return than the utility of buying your first one.
      - atmavatar 2y ago
        However, the utility of money starts to drastically increase once you reach a tipping point where it can start allowing you to wield real political power. The graph of monetary utility may look like a logarithmic graph at first glance, but that's just because it's more like a C1 + (x-C2)^3 graph where you haven't followed x far enough to the right.
        JetSpiegel 2y ago

FactKnower69 2y ago

oops, this thread's just been censored off the front page, better luck next time

ks2048 2y ago
why?
- rootusrootus 2y ago
  Why is it dropping, or why 'better luck next time'? The former is easy to answer. It's a hot, emotional topic and getting comments way faster than it's getting upvoted.
  - ks2048 2y ago
    I meant why "censored". I guess I don't know how the algorithm works - I guess being downvoted or flagged.
    - rootusrootus 2y ago
      I don't think it's getting censored intentionally, in the sense someone is taking that action specifically. It's falling quickly off the front page because the algorithm is biased against this kind of discussion. If it was getting killed by flags it would end up saying [flagged] in the headline as it disappeared. And you can't downvote submissions, so it's inferred from lack of upvotes.
kens 2y ago
Yeah, the "controversial" filter kicked in because the post has more comments than upvotes. I reverse-engineered the HN algorithm a few years ago: https://www.righto.com/2013/11/how-hacker-news-ranking-really-works.html https://www.righto.com/2013/11/how-hacker-news-ranking-reall...

Balgair 2y ago

Um, anyway for me to put in my money and see where I rank? I'd just love to know how bad things really are.

ks2048 2y ago

Have you come cross more fine-grained data of wealth or income data? (i.e histograms with many bins across whole range).

kens 2y ago
Unfortunately, no. Wealth data is usually very coarse (quartiles or quintiles) or one data point, which makes it hard to do most of the analysis that I'd like to do.