[quote]Inner Hulk wrote:
The problem lies in the fact though, that there’s a distinct difference between wealth and ridiculous excess. No man should have a billion dollars. No one. Not one single person. There’s no reason for such concentrated amounts of money.
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This reasoning has one distinct flaw. It sounds like you think they have it all in their pocket, or in an easy access bank account. Most of the money like this is tied up in stocks, real estate, or other assets. Trump has a lot of money tied up in real estate, so he cannot just sell it tomorrow, and give it away.
If Gates were to sell too much of his Microsoft empire, another person may end up buying a controlling interest.
But even if they did have it all in some checking account, who are you to decide what is too much? They did not get there by accident, and they didn’t spend their weekends bullshitting in the bars.
Also if a person is told they are only allowed to make a certain amount, does that not mean their company must shut down if they made that in the first month? 11 months with employees out of work, and potential shortages of the product in question.
Seriously why is this anybody business? Too often the same people who say, “you have no right to say what goes on in my bedroom!” will turn around and say, “I have a right to say what goes on in your wallet.”
What hypocrisy. Without bringing in other people, why is a person not allowed to have massive wealth? But the poor? Again without bringing in other people. This is not a question of how he will use it, nor of how he got it, it is a question of why he is not allowed to have it.
Soup kitchen? Sounds like you are getting your beliefs about the poor from movies. I’ve seen some of these food distribution centers, and they ain’t given out soup. (And many of the recipients ain’t poor.)[quote]
As for my economic doom scenario, I meant that overpayed and concentrated wealth played a part. Small wages for the majority of Americans has led to the buy now pay later escapade which will eventually burst. [/quote]
Uh, no. This is related to the emotional IQ, and a big determining factor for wealth. This buy now pay later scenario is why so many people are not wealthy. It may be the single biggest factor that keeps Americans from being wealthy. Gee, I can’t afford to buy this, so I will pay an 18% (or more) premium so I can have it now.
What a great idea. How many people are still paying on the meal they ate months ago? Blaming others for your own financial foolishness is just scapegoating.[quote]
Also, companies with excessively compensated CEO’s have shown to hurt productivity among their work force.[/quote] It has? Where? [quote]Count that in with the fact that so many companies are sending US work offshores to cut employer costs and to avoid certain taxes, this goes back to meager income among a lot of Americans. US production is dropping, imports are rising, exports dropping, and the dollar is dropping against the yen and euro. How is this not a set up for economic disaster??[/quote]
Why do they always bring up outsourcing, while ignoring insourcing? (My spell checker doesn’t even know the word.) I don’t think US production is falling. Plus many people just do not understand about trade at all, The purpose of trade is not to sell our shit, its to get their shit. (Notice my eloquent language?) Rising imports are actually a sign of a good economy. And the dollar is being manipulated.
Clinton did it, and Bush is doing it too. A weaker dollar makes American products more attractive, and imports less so. You should be cheering for a weaker dollar as it will support less imports, and more exports.
I am not worried about the trade deficit. I am worried about the Federal Debt. The true debt, not the BS number they keep giving us.[quote]
Then again, there’s a possibility I have no idea what I’m talking about as I will admit my knowledge in this area is pretty limited. I’m just going on what I have read. Plus, I just know that someone having a bank account reading 500 million dollars is just wrong when my city’s poverty rate is higher than that of the state and national average and rising. I see too many people suffering while too many have so much to spare. It’s not right.
When is mankind going to progress?[/quote]
When we quit trying to solve the worlds problems in foolish ways. I have known poor, been poor, and married poor. The single biggest mistake I made was accepting help from my parents.
Here is an analogy we should all understand. Lets say you were going to do the bench press. You lay down under the weight, and another person grabs the bar, and does half the lifting for you. How is this going to help you get stronger? This is exactly what we are doing right now.
It’s the same in life. I avoid elevators, and get annoyed when people do not walk up the escalator in front of me. Too many people want it to be easy. The government is spending tons of money to take away the school of hard knocks. They are keeping people week, lifting the weight for them.
Then there are the people who know how to work the system, and they are a much larger portion of the â¿¿poorâ¿¿ then you think. There are plenty of ways to get paid under the table, and some of them actually legal. I have known people who used to budget out exactly how much they spent at the grocery store, only because they wanted the total to end in a nickel or less. This gave them as much as 99 cents of change out of their food stamps.
And that would mean splitting up the purchases between the whole family, and going to the store more often. And then their cigarettes or booze were indirectly covered by food stamps. This is one of the reasons they went to the cards. No more change.
Not to mention the fact that many of the poor are addicted to something or other. I am not saying being poor causes a person to become and addict. I am saying being an addict makes a person poor. I guarantee we should not be giving money to these people.
Maybe not helping people, or helping people less, makes people like me sound mean, rude, and even evil. But it may be the best thing we could do for a person, not helping them.
Seriously I do believe it is good to help people, but too often what is being done turns into codependence.
