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So do we keep bikeshedding and tweaking little levers or do we actually try and fix the fundamental problem? I can't be the only one who is tired of seeing all

So do we keep bikeshedding and tweaking little levers or do we actually try and fix the fundamental problem? I can't be the only one who is tired of seeing all of these snippets about small parts of a large system. We need to deal with wealth inequality. We live in a world... hell, we live in countries, in cities with 10 orders of magnitude wealth difference. A western person earns 10e6 - 10e7 over a lifetime, revenue. A western person stashes away 10e0 - 10e7 over a lifetime, balance sheet. Why? It is predominantly not about decision making and choices to save. Yes, people do make suboptimal decisions. But mostly, people are simply unable to save because the baseline of living sucks up all of their work. In the UK a poor person rents instead of owning because we allow the group of capitalists to own all housing and restrict new building. Until we deal with that we are just pissing around.

happyscrappy 11y ago
>You are either a serf or a lord. It really is that simple... No, that is the foolish narrative that keeps this mess going. No amount of money can compensate for parenting.
- stegosaurus 11y ago
  Parenting without money is disallowed.
Yakimoto 11y ago
>do we actually try and fix the fundamental problem? >I can't be the only one >We need to deal with wealth inequality. Shill harder.
- stegosaurus 11y ago
  Reading my post again I can see why you would think that. I just feel frustrated, that's all. It feels like the premise is just so obviously silly.... like these articles are just fluff. Am I insane? Of course people with wealth do better at everything. It's definitional. That is what wealth is... better schools, better food, better holidays... bigger better more. I don't see the value in continually studying how bad the poor have it and how well the rich have it. It feels to me like a textbook example of a fruitless endeavour. Like trying to make a human powered bicycle that's faster than a fighter jet, or something. It's just... daft! Even if you think of a way to do it it's bloody silly. Stick both people in the same vehicle.
  - yummyfajitas 11y ago
    That is what wealth is... better schools, better food, better holidays... No, that's consumption. Wealth is ownership of stocks, bonds, REITs, and other investment vehicles. It provides no value whatsoever to the holder until it is consumed. If consumption is what you are worried about, you should focus on consumption inequality, which is vastly lower than either wealth or income inequality and has not risen anywhere nearly as sharply. http://www.voxeu.org/article/economic-inequality-during-recessions http://www.voxeu.org/article/economic-inequality-during-rece...
    - anigbrowl 11y ago
      You can't consume if you don't have any wealth to spend. Conversely, the wealthier one is the lower one's marginal propensity to consume. Very wealthy peoplewho literally have more money than they know what to do with end up investing the rest, but thanks to financialization (among other things) that investment doesn't generate as much demand for labor as it used to, making it harder for people without surplus capital to accumulate wealth. I know you love to characterize poor people as living high on the hog but it's a bullshit characterization. The least educated are the most vulnerable to the constant imperative to consume with which people are confronted in western society.
      - yummyfajitas 11y ago
        Conversely, the wealthier one is the lower one's marginal propensity to consume. I'm glad you agree that stegosaurus is wrong, and that increased wealth inequality isn't a strong driver of consumption inequality or educational inequality. I know you love to characterize poor people as living high on the hog... Since you are using the phrase "high on the hog", I think you actually meant to respond to my other post. But that post characterizes rich people (namely Americans) this way, not poor people (Chinese, Indians).
        anigbrowl 11y ago
        I'm confused about the 'high on the hog thing' from your other post (I just didn't feel like replying to both), because stegosaurus was talking about inability to save during the baseline cost of living, which you went on to suggest was treated very differently in the US. I think you're equating the US being a rich society compared to others with all the people in the US being rich in absolute terms, disregarding their relative poverty within the US. But you know very well that absolute measures of wealth are pretty meaningless given the fact of geographic dispersion. If you're talking to someone who doesn't know how to get ahead in the US and feels pinched by a lack of disposable income, observing that they're far better off than a peasant in some other country isn't responsive to their problem, notwithstanding the truth of the matter. It's not like this person struggling with poverty in the US can just relocate to the peasant area and start leveraging his capital advantage.
yummyfajitas 11y ago
Savings rates: US 17% India 32% China 51%. Apparently the Chinese manage to save without having that "baseline of living" sucking up all their work. Yet Chinese people earn far less than Americans . How is that possible? It's almost as if your "baseline of living" is actually "living high on the hog as if tomorrow doesn't exist". http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.ZS http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.ZS
- mauricemir 11y ago
  Depends on how much disposable money you have not the absolute value plus cultural issues are in play eg putting savings into gold as you don't trust the banks
- stegosaurus 11y ago
  The average person in the UK cannot save 51% of net income. It is totally impossible. Difficult even for someone earning above the median wage. Is paying the rent 'living high on the hog'? I don't get it. Rent alone on a studio flat in loads of places is 10K. If you move away you earn less than you save on the rent. What's the suggestion? Live 2 to a room? Live in a car? Theoretically possible if you're determined I suppose.
  - yummyfajitas 11y ago
    The 5'th decile in the UK earns a little under double what the 1st decile does. Since the people in the 1st decile aren't dying, that suggests that yes - someone in the 5'th decile could live like a person in the 1'st decile and save 50%. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/mar/25/uk-incomes-how-salary-compare http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/mar/25/uk-incomes-how-... Pretty much every story you could tell to explain this away (e.g., folks in the City earn 2x as much but cost of living is 2x higher) kind of undermine any real inequality story.
    - stegosaurus 11y ago
      How does that follow? A person working in London cannot live like a person working in Preston (for the same amount). The same quality of life costs more. Surely you understand this? Do you work FT? I don't really know how to go further with this, it feels a bit like trying to prove that the sky is blue.

happyscrappy 11y ago

>You are either a serf or a lord. It really is that simple... No, that is the foolish narrative that keeps this mess going. No amount of money can compensate for parenting.

stegosaurus 11y ago
Parenting without money is disallowed.

Yakimoto 11y ago

>do we actually try and fix the fundamental problem? >I can't be the only one >We need to deal with wealth inequality. Shill harder.

stegosaurus 11y ago
Reading my post again I can see why you would think that. I just feel frustrated, that's all. It feels like the premise is just so obviously silly.... like these articles are just fluff. Am I insane? Of course people with wealth do better at everything. It's definitional. That is what wealth is... better schools, better food, better holidays... bigger better more. I don't see the value in continually studying how bad the poor have it and how well the rich have it. It feels to me like a textbook example of a fruitless endeavour. Like trying to make a human powered bicycle that's faster than a fighter jet, or something. It's just... daft! Even if you think of a way to do it it's bloody silly. Stick both people in the same vehicle.
- yummyfajitas 11y ago
  That is what wealth is... better schools, better food, better holidays... No, that's consumption. Wealth is ownership of stocks, bonds, REITs, and other investment vehicles. It provides no value whatsoever to the holder until it is consumed. If consumption is what you are worried about, you should focus on consumption inequality, which is vastly lower than either wealth or income inequality and has not risen anywhere nearly as sharply. http://www.voxeu.org/article/economic-inequality-during-recessions http://www.voxeu.org/article/economic-inequality-during-rece...
  - anigbrowl 11y ago
    You can't consume if you don't have any wealth to spend. Conversely, the wealthier one is the lower one's marginal propensity to consume. Very wealthy peoplewho literally have more money than they know what to do with end up investing the rest, but thanks to financialization (among other things) that investment doesn't generate as much demand for labor as it used to, making it harder for people without surplus capital to accumulate wealth. I know you love to characterize poor people as living high on the hog but it's a bullshit characterization. The least educated are the most vulnerable to the constant imperative to consume with which people are confronted in western society.
    - yummyfajitas 11y ago
      Conversely, the wealthier one is the lower one's marginal propensity to consume. I'm glad you agree that stegosaurus is wrong, and that increased wealth inequality isn't a strong driver of consumption inequality or educational inequality. I know you love to characterize poor people as living high on the hog... Since you are using the phrase "high on the hog", I think you actually meant to respond to my other post. But that post characterizes rich people (namely Americans) this way, not poor people (Chinese, Indians).
      - anigbrowl 11y ago
        I'm confused about the 'high on the hog thing' from your other post (I just didn't feel like replying to both), because stegosaurus was talking about inability to save during the baseline cost of living, which you went on to suggest was treated very differently in the US. I think you're equating the US being a rich society compared to others with all the people in the US being rich in absolute terms, disregarding their relative poverty within the US. But you know very well that absolute measures of wealth are pretty meaningless given the fact of geographic dispersion. If you're talking to someone who doesn't know how to get ahead in the US and feels pinched by a lack of disposable income, observing that they're far better off than a peasant in some other country isn't responsive to their problem, notwithstanding the truth of the matter. It's not like this person struggling with poverty in the US can just relocate to the peasant area and start leveraging his capital advantage.

yummyfajitas 11y ago

Savings rates: US 17% India 32% China 51%. Apparently the Chinese manage to save without having that "baseline of living" sucking up all their work. Yet Chinese people earn far less than Americans . How is that possible? It's almost as if your "baseline of living" is actually "living high on the hog as if tomorrow doesn't exist". http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.ZS http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GNS.ICTR.ZS

mauricemir 11y ago
Depends on how much disposable money you have not the absolute value plus cultural issues are in play eg putting savings into gold as you don't trust the banks
stegosaurus 11y ago
The average person in the UK cannot save 51% of net income. It is totally impossible. Difficult even for someone earning above the median wage. Is paying the rent 'living high on the hog'? I don't get it. Rent alone on a studio flat in loads of places is 10K. If you move away you earn less than you save on the rent. What's the suggestion? Live 2 to a room? Live in a car? Theoretically possible if you're determined I suppose.
- yummyfajitas 11y ago
  The 5'th decile in the UK earns a little under double what the 1st decile does. Since the people in the 1st decile aren't dying, that suggests that yes - someone in the 5'th decile could live like a person in the 1'st decile and save 50%. http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/mar/25/uk-incomes-how-salary-compare http://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/mar/25/uk-incomes-how-... Pretty much every story you could tell to explain this away (e.g., folks in the City earn 2x as much but cost of living is 2x higher) kind of undermine any real inequality story.
  - stegosaurus 11y ago
    How does that follow? A person working in London cannot live like a person working in Preston (for the same amount). The same quality of life costs more. Surely you understand this? Do you work FT? I don't really know how to go further with this, it feels a bit like trying to prove that the sky is blue.