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Real, actual workers have their livelihood endangered by out-of-touch billionaires going back and forth on serious economic policies hastily carried on made up

Real, actual workers have their livelihood endangered by out-of-touch billionaires going back and forth on serious economic policies hastily carried on made up grounds of "cutting waste" and "anti-wokeness" while keeping the lion share of the economy for themselves. This enrages me, and I can't comprehend how anyone needing a wage to live can side with them. Don't they understand that Trump, Musk and cie's interests are diametrically opposed to theirs?

Larrikin 2y ago
The temporarily embarrassed millionaire is a real mind set for a lot of people. There was some truth to it, for select groups of people, throughout certain times in the US.
jfengel 2y ago
It is out of touch billionaires, but it's also a vast swath of misinformed non-billionaires who seem convinced that the only thing they need to know about government is that it's bad. They're the ones who put the out of touch billionaires in charge, and they remain thrilled. Even when people don't get fired, they like the way the randomness keeps everyone else terrified.
- staplers 2y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Tsar,_bad_Boyars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Tsar,_bad_Boyars
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- voidhorse 2y ago
  It's not really surprising when both parties continue to promulgate the lie that "hard work" and "intelligence" correlate with wealth, when in reality, luck and legacy correlate much more strongly, meanwhile the top 10% of households in the USA hold 67% of the wealth while the bottom earners have to make due with a measly 2.5%. This leads all those people into thinking the government must not work (because it is unable to curb the insane uneven distribution of wealth, which they don't see but feel the direct side effects of) simultaneously thinking mr. big businessman must be able to fix it, because the standard narratives tell everyone to do nothing but worship such people because wealth = smart = good, right? .
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
Reagan explained it all to everyone more than 40 years ago. Let the rich get even richer, more breadcrumbs fall from their tables, which means more for everyone. I mean, how are you even going to have a job if the billionaires are all out business? The problem was that the Laffer curve had a vague ring of truth to it (enabled by the lack of any labels on the axes), and millions of Americans have bought into the bullshit it has implied for decades now. "If they do better, we do better". It sounds so simple, so lovely, so true. But it's a lie.
alaxhn 2y ago
Government (local, federal, state) spending as a percentage of GDP is 34% and as a total amount is 6.75 trillion. According to wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_the_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_the_num... there are ~756 billionaires in the US (interestingly the state-like region with the highest amount of billionaires per capita is Washington DC). The total wealth of these billionaires is ~6.72 trillion. I don't think there is a reliable estimate of billionaire spending so I will use 5% of assets for what I consider a high estimate which yields 336 billion. In reality I would guess that these people are far too greedy to spend enough money that they risk depleting their assets over time. So to be clear, you think that control over ~336 billion (or feel free to provide a better estimate?) in spending is the "the lion share of the economy" and that we should not take a hard look at the 6.75 trillion in spending by an organization that includes the pentagon and is famous for funding forever wars in the middle east? Those of us siding with the billionaires here (really just two that you have identified, not all of them - others such as Gates are clearly on the other side of this issue) recognize that there are people earning a living wage from the current status quo but we believe that the country would better be served by having these individuals earn a living wage in a more productive endeavor than what we see as staffing an unproductive and oversized bureaucracy.
- voidhorse 2y ago
  Are we going to ignore the fact that part of that government spending funded private companies owned by Musk? Wealth inequality in America is worse than any of its peer nations and has only been getting worse since the 80s (see Pew research on this). Americans on the ground feel this more than they feel the effects of bloated government spending that funds, well you know, stuff that's supposed to be in the public interest (like social security and other programs). Are we further going to ignore that all the cuts they have made so far are on things that are not even a fraction of that spending and that the billions of taxpayer dollars funding Tesla will likely go untouched while actual people trying to make a living lose their jobs? I agree that the military apparatus is a massive problem but I fully expect spending in that area to stay roughly the same. I think all that will happen there is a swap in who is getting the contracts. I'm not going to pretend I can't be wrong on this and sure some cuts may well be good, but you have to be extremely out of touch with reality and its consequences for real people if you think this is the right way to do it. The only people cool with this are prepubescents and immature adults who seem to think that life is like a video game full of NPCs and not of people who live actual meaningful lives like themselves.

Larrikin 2y ago

The temporarily embarrassed millionaire is a real mind set for a lot of people. There was some truth to it, for select groups of people, throughout certain times in the US.

jfengel 2y ago

It is out of touch billionaires, but it's also a vast swath of misinformed non-billionaires who seem convinced that the only thing they need to know about government is that it's bad. They're the ones who put the out of touch billionaires in charge, and they remain thrilled. Even when people don't get fired, they like the way the randomness keeps everyone else terrified.

staplers 2y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Tsar,_bad_Boyars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Tsar,_bad_Boyars
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
voidhorse 2y ago
It's not really surprising when both parties continue to promulgate the lie that "hard work" and "intelligence" correlate with wealth, when in reality, luck and legacy correlate much more strongly, meanwhile the top 10% of households in the USA hold 67% of the wealth while the bottom earners have to make due with a measly 2.5%. This leads all those people into thinking the government must not work (because it is unable to curb the insane uneven distribution of wealth, which they don't see but feel the direct side effects of) simultaneously thinking mr. big businessman must be able to fix it, because the standard narratives tell everyone to do nothing but worship such people because wealth = smart = good, right? .

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago

Reagan explained it all to everyone more than 40 years ago. Let the rich get even richer, more breadcrumbs fall from their tables, which means more for everyone. I mean, how are you even going to have a job if the billionaires are all out business? The problem was that the Laffer curve had a vague ring of truth to it (enabled by the lack of any labels on the axes), and millions of Americans have bought into the bullshit it has implied for decades now. "If they do better, we do better". It sounds so simple, so lovely, so true. But it's a lie.

alaxhn 2y ago

Government (local, federal, state) spending as a percentage of GDP is 34% and as a total amount is 6.75 trillion. According to wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_the_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_the_num... there are ~756 billionaires in the US (interestingly the state-like region with the highest amount of billionaires per capita is Washington DC). The total wealth of these billionaires is ~6.72 trillion. I don't think there is a reliable estimate of billionaire spending so I will use 5% of assets for what I consider a high estimate which yields 336 billion. In reality I would guess that these people are far too greedy to spend enough money that they risk depleting their assets over time. So to be clear, you think that control over ~336 billion (or feel free to provide a better estimate?) in spending is the "the lion share of the economy" and that we should not take a hard look at the 6.75 trillion in spending by an organization that includes the pentagon and is famous for funding forever wars in the middle east? Those of us siding with the billionaires here (really just two that you have identified, not all of them - others such as Gates are clearly on the other side of this issue) recognize that there are people earning a living wage from the current status quo but we believe that the country would better be served by having these individuals earn a living wage in a more productive endeavor than what we see as staffing an unproductive and oversized bureaucracy.

voidhorse 2y ago
Are we going to ignore the fact that part of that government spending funded private companies owned by Musk? Wealth inequality in America is worse than any of its peer nations and has only been getting worse since the 80s (see Pew research on this). Americans on the ground feel this more than they feel the effects of bloated government spending that funds, well you know, stuff that's supposed to be in the public interest (like social security and other programs). Are we further going to ignore that all the cuts they have made so far are on things that are not even a fraction of that spending and that the billions of taxpayer dollars funding Tesla will likely go untouched while actual people trying to make a living lose their jobs? I agree that the military apparatus is a massive problem but I fully expect spending in that area to stay roughly the same. I think all that will happen there is a swap in who is getting the contracts. I'm not going to pretend I can't be wrong on this and sure some cuts may well be good, but you have to be extremely out of touch with reality and its consequences for real people if you think this is the right way to do it. The only people cool with this are prepubescents and immature adults who seem to think that life is like a video game full of NPCs and not of people who live actual meaningful lives like themselves.