Starbucks CEO Howard Schulz grew up in a Brooklyn Housing project, George Soros survived the holocaust and worked waiting tables, David Murdock of Dole Foods was homeless. There’s tons of examples.
Here’s a fun article that ranks the whole Fortune 400 list. 80% of them inherited their wealth or at least grew up middle class.
Jeff Bezos actually scores high on the list because his Mom had him when he was 17, he flipped burgers in high school and by and large did not grow up rich.
Now how many are utter psychopaths (or “just” people without empathy)?
They’re an evil bunch and that’s about it IMO. Don’t kill them or anything but being able to have already a Billion dollars is just breaking our social contract, so tax that away from them. They can argue who’s got 56 millions instead of 56 billions, for them it will be the same game.
We’d have to stop demanding the money for it to become worthless. Again, no contract would be broken, because not wanting something does not require a multi party agreement. Anyone can unilaterally decide not to want something.
My parents never could’ve either but $500k household net worth only puts you in the top 20% of households so it’s not like they were exceptionally wealthy and we don’t know if they borrowed to invest or what exactly their specific situation was. Miguel Bezos was a Cuban refugee and then worked as an engineer for Exxon and Jackie Bezos was a secretary so i mean this is pretty middle class IMO.
That doesn’t mean that all billionaires clawed their way to the top as i mentioned above, or that we shouldn’t make progressive changes to the tax code. It’s just important that we separate truth from fiction to make educated decisions.
But their net worth was a hell of a lot more than 500K. 500K was the seed capital they gave Bezos. They didn’t empty their bank accounts and mortgage their house to do it.
It’s very fascinating that someone can grow up in abject poverty, gain a tremendous amount of power over their lifetime, and decide to make it their life’s work to push down as many other people into abject poverty as possible.
Most households living below the poverty line have at least one unemployed person, so giving people jobs is pulling them out of poverty. Whether or not they are treated fairly at work and are satisfied with their working conditions is another story.
The long-term trend is that the average person’s income is rising but we’ve seen recent declines due to high inflation. Can you expand on your line of thinking? I’m not sure I follow your reasoning.
First of all, that graph you showed is not average persons income like you claim. Your graph is average household income, and the average number of persons working per household is increasing, and the average number of jobs per person is increasing. So yes, where a household might have had one income previously, it may now have two income earners working two jobs each. I don’t know who needs to hear this, but four jobs bringing in more income than one job is not a flex.
What is my line of reasoning? Wealth inequality is straight up increasing. The rich are getting richer. The poor are getting poorer. Do you think it’s the rich who have engineered this, the rich, or the poor? I’ll let you decide.
Curious why you made the distinction about real personal income when it is also rising. I agree wealth inequality is rising but not that it is coming at the expense of real personal incomes.
Starbucks CEO Howard Schulz grew up in a Brooklyn Housing project, George Soros survived the holocaust and worked waiting tables, David Murdock of Dole Foods was homeless. There’s tons of examples.
Here’s a fun article that ranks the whole Fortune 400 list. 80% of them inherited their wealth or at least grew up middle class.
Jeff Bezos actually scores high on the list because his Mom had him when he was 17, he flipped burgers in high school and by and large did not grow up rich.
His mother had him when he was 17?
That must have hurt.
Now how many are utter psychopaths (or “just” people without empathy)?
They’re an evil bunch and that’s about it IMO. Don’t kill them or anything but being able to have already a Billion dollars is just breaking our social contract, so tax that away from them. They can argue who’s got 56 millions instead of 56 billions, for them it will be the same game.
A contract requires at least 2 party consent. A “social contract” is more like a ransom.
Well if we decide we don’t accept the contract then their money is worthless so…
We’d have to stop demanding the money for it to become worthless. Again, no contract would be broken, because not wanting something does not require a multi party agreement. Anyone can unilaterally decide not to want something.
I don’t think we’re really discussing the same thing :-/
No, we don’t. I think we’re finally getting somewhere!
Bezos may have grown up poor, but his parents did finance Amazon to the tune of $250k which is closer to half a million now.
He still effectively inherited the capital to start a business. My parents could never just invest half a million in a business I would want to start.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/02/how-jeff-bezos-got-his-parents-to-invest-in-amazon--turning-them-into.html
My parents never could’ve either but $500k household net worth only puts you in the top 20% of households so it’s not like they were exceptionally wealthy and we don’t know if they borrowed to invest or what exactly their specific situation was. Miguel Bezos was a Cuban refugee and then worked as an engineer for Exxon and Jackie Bezos was a secretary so i mean this is pretty middle class IMO.
That doesn’t mean that all billionaires clawed their way to the top as i mentioned above, or that we shouldn’t make progressive changes to the tax code. It’s just important that we separate truth from fiction to make educated decisions.
But their net worth was a hell of a lot more than 500K. 500K was the seed capital they gave Bezos. They didn’t empty their bank accounts and mortgage their house to do it.
It’s very fascinating that someone can grow up in abject poverty, gain a tremendous amount of power over their lifetime, and decide to make it their life’s work to push down as many other people into abject poverty as possible.
Narcissists.
Most households living below the poverty line have at least one unemployed person, so giving people jobs is pulling them out of poverty. Whether or not they are treated fairly at work and are satisfied with their working conditions is another story.
Working people are getting poorer, wealthy people are getting richer.
Giving people jobs is just a way to suck up more money from the economy.
The long-term trend is that the average person’s income is rising but we’ve seen recent declines due to high inflation. Can you expand on your line of thinking? I’m not sure I follow your reasoning.
First of all, that graph you showed is not average persons income like you claim. Your graph is average household income, and the average number of persons working per household is increasing, and the average number of jobs per person is increasing. So yes, where a household might have had one income previously, it may now have two income earners working two jobs each. I don’t know who needs to hear this, but four jobs bringing in more income than one job is not a flex.
Second, inflation is a poor metric, because necessities like rent far outpace inflation.
What is my line of reasoning? Wealth inequality is straight up increasing. The rich are getting richer. The poor are getting poorer. Do you think it’s the rich who have engineered this, the rich, or the poor? I’ll let you decide.
Curious why you made the distinction about real personal income when it is also rising. I agree wealth inequality is rising but not that it is coming at the expense of real personal incomes.
What do you think this graph that you’re linking to represents?
I’ll give you a hint: “real personal income” is not what I was talking about, which was “average income of a single person and not a household”.