I have to ask: Are we okay with ANYONE being financially successful?

[Writer]

Does it matter if they've worked their way from nothing? Or is it that you have an issue with those living off of trust funds? If that's the case, should it no longer be legal for a person to leave to their children all the money that they've earned?

Also - do you assume that everyone who is wealthy has cheated somehow?


How much is too much?

- Over a million?

- Simply more than the average person?


I'm curious about this... and I know I'll get flamed for asking, but I'd like to understand.

[stray cat]

1. I am - but I'm probably a minority on DU

People can use money to really promote good causes - its not evil in and of itself nor are those who have it.

[rug]

2. It's not about individuals, it's about the systemic exploitation.

[Writer]

7. That's a very good point.

The current economic problems don't lie in widespread individual behavior, but the entire system is askew at the moment - too much wealth is located at the top and the rest are left to fend for ourselves by taking on a lot of personal debt.

[TBF]

45. "Askew at the moment"

when has it NOT been askew? For most people I mean, not just you and your wealthy friends.

[Deja Q]

103. I had no idea she was wealthy...

[Quantess]

121. Writer is a woman?

Okay, I can buy that.

"Writer" assuming Stephen Colbert's avatar, though, feels like a rip-off. It's the same feeling I get when a-holes use the John Lennon avatar.

[DireStrike]

114. Attack aside, you are correct.

Not an inch of ground has ever been gained on the wealthy that wasn't either taken by force or other collective action.

Would YOU give up any wealth or power that you weren't forced to?

[TBF]

119. Hardly an attack, just a statement based upon

what was written in the OP & I bet I'm not far off.

Many give up wealth, but unfortunately it's usually those who really aren't that well off trying to give to various charitable organizations. The hard part is getting it away from those who have accumulated loads of it and have no interest in systemic change.

[closeupready]

133. I think the point is that if things have to change, they should change in favor of lower socioeconom

ic classes, not the wealthy. Instead, we have seen over the last 30 years changes happening in just the OPPOSITE direction.

[Ruby the Liberal]

23. +1 We need to go back to the days of 50:1 or even 100:1 ratios

Between the top dogs and the worker bees.

If an individual only trades and earns money on their wealth alone, then have at it.

It is the exploitation of the middle class that irks me.

[blindpig]

127. The middle class? What of the working class?

Who are the middle class, anyway? The term is the most amorphous in all of politics.

And why should we tolerate ratios of 50:1, 100:1? Is one person's time on earth worth 50, 100 times more than another's? Because in the end, that is what we are measuring.

Another question, how was this disparity accumulated? Did they acquire it sheerly by their own effort? Or are they skimming the labor of others? In the vast majority of cases it is the latter.

[Bonobo]

3. Do you think that it is reasonable for a person to eat 2 portions while another starves?

That's about what it boils down to for me. Metaphorically speaking.

[Bicoastal]

12. Yes, it is reasonable--because this world will NEVER be without the poor and hungry.

The planet is too vast and the resources too limited. It's all well and good to recognize the injustice of this, but aside from living unselfishly and giving generously to charities and foundations, what else can even the richest of men do to halt the inevitable? Even in the unlikely scenario that they gave up their entire fortune to the poor, they would no longer to be in a position to continue giving...

I may be a liberal, but I'm also a realist. Poverty will NEVER go away.

[Sinti]

17. "Poverty will NEVER go away." Why?

I'm curious as to why you believe that sad statement, like it's not worth trying.

The human being uses its mind to overcome obstacles to survival, and as standard of living improves birthrates go down, often dramatically. I think we could put our minds together and search for sustainable practices for living that don't deplete the natural resources the way we've been doing.

Do you think that's even possible?

[barb162]

66. Take a look at some people who will have numerous children

without the means to support them. There are actually millions of people like this. Look at the birth rates in certain areas of thw world and in this country. There's always someone around who has more children than they can afford and the result is poverty ( and they were probably poor before having children).
As to "sustainable practices for living that don't deplete the natural resources" we have been looking for alternatives for decades. Wind power, smaller cars, solar power, tighter houses, etc., don't solve everything.

[Sinti]

74. Oddly enough, the demographics show that poverty causes

overpopulation. The more income security people have the fewer children they have, no matter how you slice the demos. When I was saying poverty, though, I was thinking of real grinding poverty, like in Africa, India, and similar areas. I don't personally believe that good thinking has really been done to stop poverty. The post-Colonial world is/was rife with Economic colonialism, and petty kings of the corporate state trying to suck more juice out of the poor world. The focus has been on coin collecting (or paper collecting), for all intents and purposes, not improving human life.

"someone around who has more children than they can afford and the result is poverty" - the numbers would say this statement is true, but backwards. "There's always poverty and the result is people having more children."

The presumed reasoning is that they want at least one of their children to survive and care for them in their old age. OF course, they also don't have good access to health care, education,and contraception - that would definitely increase their child production.

[Hannah Bell]

94. world fertility rate = 2.65 children per woman. us = at replacement rate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_territories_by_fertility_rate



countries below replacement rate:

124 New Caledonia (France) 2.23 2.08
125 Myanmar 2.25 2.07
126 Albania 2.25 2.06
127 United States 2.04 2.05
128 Iceland 1.99 2.05
129 Aruba (Netherlands) 2.12 2.04
130 Iran 2.12 2.04
131 Bahamas 2.11 2.02
132 New Zealand 1.96 1.99
133 Ireland 1.97 1.96
134 Chile 2.00 1.94
135 Tunisia 2.04 1.93
136 Martinique (France) 1.98 1.91
137 France 1.88 1.89
138 Sri Lanka 2.02 1.88
139 Mongolia 2.07 1.87
140 Mauritius 1.91 1.86
141 Netherlands Antilles (Netherlands) 2.06 1.85
142 North Korea 1.92 1.85
143 Thailand 1.83 1.85
144 Norway 1.80 1.85
145 Montenegro 1.83 1.83
146 Puerto Rico (US) 1.84 1.83
147 Finland 1.75 1.83
148 United Kingdom 1.70 1.82
149 Azerbaijan 1.67 1.82
150 Denmark 1.76 1.80
151 Sweden 1.67 1.80
152 Serbia 1.75 1.79
153 Australia 1.76 1.79
154 People's Republic of China (mainland only) 1.70 1.73
155 Netherlands 1.73 1.72
156 Luxembourg 1.67 1.66
157 Belgium 1.64 1.65
158 Trinidad and Tobago 1.61 1.64
159 Cyprus 1.63 1.61
160 Canada 1.52 1.53
161 Barbados 1.50 1.50
162 Cuba 1.63 1.49
163 Estonia 1.39 1.49
164 Portugal 1.45 1.46
165 Macedonia 1.56 1.43
166 Switzerland 1.42 1.42
167 Channel Islands ( Jersey and Guernsey) (UK) 1.41 1.42
168 Austria 1.38 1.42
169 Spain 1.29 1.41
170 Georgia 1.48 1.41
171 Moldova 1.50 1.40
172 Armenia 1.35 1.39
173 Italy 1.29 1.38
174 Malta 1.46 1.37
175 Germany 1.35 1.36
176 Croatia 1.35 1.35
177 Russia 1.30 1.34
178 Greece 1.28 1.33
179 Bulgaria 1.26 1.31
180 Romania 1.29 1.30
181 Latvia 1.25 1.29
182 Hungary 1.30 1.28
183 Slovenia 1.23 1.28
184 Japan 1.29 1.27
185 Lithuania 1.28 1.26
186 Singapore 1.35 1.26
187 Slovakia 1.22 1.25
188 Czech Republic 1.18 1.24
189 Bosnia and Herzegovina 1.28 1.23
190 Poland 1.25 1.23
191 Ukraine 1.15 1.22
192 South Korea 1.24 1.21
193 Belarus 1.24 1.20
194 Hong Kong (PRC) 0.94 0.97
195 Macau (PRC) 0.84 0.91

Source: United Nations World Population Prospects: 2006 revision – Table A.15


incidence of poverty has nothing to do with # of children. africa's not poor because people have more kids than americans do.

[SoCalDem]

91. Why?

because there is always "work" to be done.. necessary work, that is considered beneath someone else, and in order to get that work done, there has to be someone so desperate, that they will do it...or then there is slavery.. we have tried both

[Sinti]

108. If it's something they really didn't want to do, wouldn't you pay them more?

Paying them less actually defies the basic rules of Adam Smith capitalism, doesn't it? Aren't we all about the capitalism? Nah... maybe it's the corporate feudalism. n/t

[SoCalDem]

112. To the rich, it IS feudalism

to the masses, it's "called" capitalism, but does anyone really think that the cleaning lady who thinks up a better way to clean a toilet, will become rich?

It's always been amazing to me, what we pay people for truly important, but non-glamorous jobs.

trash removal comes to mind. the non-removal of trash leads to all sorts of nasties (the Plague was largely due to the filthy living conditions of the day), and except for a few places where unions have made it better for the workers, trash collectors are looked down on, and often paid low wages.

aides at nursing homes where our loved ones often spend their last days, have the dirtiest of jobs, and are often the lowest paid.

people still look for the "cheapest" babysitter, while proclaiming that their kids are their MOST precious "possessions".

we look for the cheapest auto repairs, while trusting the lives of our families to those metal (mostly) boxes on wheels.

we are always looking for ways to make education cheaper, and for ways to force "expensive" teachers out ..

when we look for the cheapest, that means that all down the line, people are being cheated on payment by someone (perhaps everyone)

[Sinti]

116. I know - educators and caregivers get particularly poor wages

especially for the schooling required for some of those jobs. It's obvious that we, as human beings, need to start looking at things quite differently. We need to assess what we value most and behave accordingly. The marketing is so powerful though. It's difficult for people to pull away from the abyss. Have you seen Century of the Self?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8953172273825999151#

[Quantess]

120. Oh, you can still get yourself some slaves.

I realize it's 2009, but, never say never. If you want some slave labor, you can still get it, champ.

[treestar]

18. Poverty could go away

At least to a point, with the right amount of organization.

There was a time people thought slavery would never go away.

-1 for hopelessness. Even if we don't see it in our lifetime, we see progress.

[Hannah Bell]

20. "this world will NEVER be without the poor and hungry" - so says the voice of privilege

down through the ages.

"The planet is too vast" - I can fly anywhere within a day; US corps are drilling oil in the smallest villages of the jungles of africa.

"resources too limited" - no, it's more that most of them are owned or controlled by a fraction of the world's population.

[Bicoastal]

28. I hear the justice in your answer and others, but I don't hear a solution.

Mankind has been trying to solve this problem since civilization began. Even as technology improves, even as wealth increases, I doubt we will ever fix it so there are no poor people on the planet.

Let's start with the most deserving of help, the most hungry, the most needy, and work our way up. Is that so cynical?

[retread]

58. " Mankind has been trying to solve this problem since civilization began." Quite the opposite.

[Hannah Bell]

78. The solution is obvious, & it's not "charity".

[barb162]

68. Maybe concentrate a bit more on over population n/t

[Hannah Bell]

dupe

[Hannah Bell]

88. sure, that explains why when the population was half what it was today, people

were still starving, or why western europe, with double, triple, quadruple the population density of africa, isn't starving.

[conscious evolution]

85. Artificial scarcity

There is plenty of resources.Problem is is that capitalism requires scarcity.You know,law of supply and demand.

[retread]

24. Is reasonable to ask that those limited resources you speak of be more equitably shared? Must we

continue to enshrine greed?

[Bicoastal]

29. Who will be the equalizer?

[Bonobo]

32. The fact that not EVERYTHING can be done to equalize things is not an argument to do nothing. nt

[Bicoastal]

34. Doing nothing was not my argument either.

You merely asked it it was reasonable for a person to have a lot and for another to have nothing.

Fair? No, absolutely not. But reasonable? Yes, because it will never not happen in a world this big.

[Bonobo]

40. The OP was phrased as "It is ok", so I assumed we were talking strictly in moral terms. nt

[retread]

54. From your evasive response I gather you think it is unreasonable? n/t

[Bicoastal]

57. I know WHY it should be done, and I can respect it. The question is HOW.

And by WHOM?

[kitkat65]

95. At least from the standpoint of starvation due to poverty, it's not the lack

of resources but lack of will. We have more than enough food to feed everyone in this country but people still go without. And when the middle class is struggling, the starving struggle even worse. Is this because the middle class is more apt to help those in need?

It's hard to see this polarity of "wealth" and not feel resentment towards those that make large fortunes for seemingly intangible reasons. When Goldman Sachs opens a soup kitchen, or turns down their unwarranted bonuses, maybe I'll look at it differently.

Exploitation is a huge problem and put simply, GREED is the cause of so much suffering.

Trickle-down economics, my ass. It's trickle-down GREED.

[Deja Q]

106. "Life is what we make of it"

[HughMoran]

36. It doesn't boil down to that for most people

It's possible that we all have enough to eat, but some work harder and expect some reward for their extra work - is that acceptable?

[Hansel]

56. Self Delete. nt

[HughBeaumont]

109. You're not really saying "poor people are poor because they don't work HARD enough", are you?

:shrug:

[HughMoran]

118. No, of course not

I'm saying exactly the opposite.

[quaker bill]

41. No, but we are not talking 2 portions here

it is more like whether it is reasonable for a person to have 100 billion portions while a billion starve.

[Bonobo]

47. Thanks. You are right. nt

[Posteritatis]

52. How about one portion? Is it morally acceptable for you to have had lunch today? (nt)

[Donald Ian Rankin]

77. Not merely reasonable, but absolutely vital to avoid everyone starving.

If it is not possible for some people to end up with more than others, nobody bothers to produce and everyone starves.

Just because the process has gone too far in modern day America does not mean that some degree of rewarding the ability to make money (not moral worth, or hard work, or talent, sadly - none of those works) is not absolutely vital for any moderately prosperous society.

[Hannah Bell]

89. evidence for your proposition that if some don't get more than others, nobody works & everyone

starves?

[Zoeisright]

4. What a ridiculous question.

Of course it's okay to be financially successful.

It's just not okay to be paid millions upon millions of dollars if you make those dollars off the suffering of others.

It's also not okay to whine about paying taxes and refuse to pay ANY more, especially if those (slightly) increased taxes will help others.

And it's also not okay to think that you made it all on your own, with no help from anyone, especially the government.

Sheesh. I can't believe I have to explain that.

[Tansy_Gold]

31. Absolutely. I would add that it's also not right to whine about

the "right" to pass on to one's chosen heirs everything one has earned. That is, in fact, the rightwing's way of justifying UNearned in heritances. They want the "right" to the wealth someone else has "earned."

Anyone who has "earned" a large estate and wants to leave it to their children or grandchildren ought to make arrangements to do so before they die. Either buy enough life insurance to pay the estate taxes or bring the heirs into the "family business" as partners so they really can earn it themselves.

Remember, no one is taxed after their death on the size of the estate that they leave to someone else. It's the HEIRS who get taxed on the UNEARNED wealth that they inherit. That's why it's called an estate tax and not, as the pukes would like us to believe, a "death" tax.



Tansy Gold, who also gets tired of explaining the same old shit over and over but considers it's just more evidence of a.) how effective the RW propaganda is and b.) how ignorant so many on "our" side still are

[ecstatic]

35. I don't think it's a ridiculous question because I think a lot of the division on DU

is due to fundamental differences in how we view wealth, corporations, etc. If you want all major corporations nationalized, then you're going to view things differently than someone who is OK with for profit organizations.

[Zoeisright]

50. There's a difference between 'profit' and 'obscene profit' and

a difference between making a profit and sucking up so much wealth that others suffer. There is NO need for anyone to make hundreds of millions of dollars and own eight homes, twenty cars, etc.

I have no problem with someone like Warren Buffet being wealthy because he's responsible about it. Then there are bloodsucking leeches like United Health Care CEO William McGuire, who earns $125 million a year off American's suffering and death.

It's not so much the profit or income as their attitude about it.

And the original question was an over-generalization and over-reaction, which made it a stupid question.

[ecstatic]

130. That sounds like a slippery slope

what is the cut off of too much profit, or how do we determine who has the right "attitude" and the wrong attitude? :shrug:

[raccoon]

126. Great post. nt

[blindpig]

128. Not just suffering, but the theft of labor.

Wage labor is theft.

[placton]

5. you ask a good question

the unreccing crew is out already!

[Quantess]

14. It is NOT a good question.

First, the "we" part is very patronizing. OP frames this, as though nobody thinks for themselves, or that there isn't a continuum of disagreement on this question. As though everyone on DU must be in consensus and be in tandem? How insulting.

Unrecommended.

[Zoeisright]

51. +1

[maddezmom]

6. to me it's not how much you have but what you do with what you have

People can be wealthy, rich, etc and not do good things but just as many could have less but be considered wealthy by others and do great things. It's all about perspective and actions in my book. Hope that makes sense to those reading my comments.

[Inspired]

8. There are many wealthy Democrats. It's how you care about those less fortunate that matters.

[AllentownJake]

9. Depends what you mean by being Financially succesful

I have no problem with people building their own careers or businesses and being reasonably rewarded for such hard work.

I do have a problem with someone being anointed the CEO of an already successful company, looting it for short term gains and than selling off the husk to someone else. I also have a problem with a society focused on finance. Finance makes nothing. It produces no wealth. Finance sucks wealth.

In America in 2009, you will see more of the looting than people who are rewarded for their hard work.

[pscot]

10. Sure

What gripes me is not success, but excess. Too much of modern, corporate capitalism is based on predatory and parasitic practices. There's a vast difference between doing well by doing good, and gaming the system and raping the environment to max out personal gain.

[LeftishBrit]

11. I don't have a problem with someone being rich..

But I prefer to use that term rather than 'financially successful', as the latter can have the implication that people who have been less fortunate with money are thereby 'failures'.

However, I think that people owe something to the rest of society, and those who have more, owe more than those who have less. I don't think that rich people should be dispossessed of all they have, but I think they should be taxed at an appropriately high rate.

[Orsino]

13. Rather than focusing on a particular amount of money...

...I'd prefer to think in human terms. Is there an honest way to earn any amount, no matter how big? How great a disconnect do we want to support between any two people? Does hereditary wealth create a class of people who will war on the rest of us? Is wealth actually dangerous in a system that equates it with political power?

Your OP, unfortunately, sounds an awful lot like the spin propagated by the wealthy shouters on TV. I'm sure that's the framework to which they'd like debate confined, without facing up to the parasitic nature of great wealth in American capitalism.

Personally, I'd like to see the very rich forced to live up to the myth they repeat about their being the ones who create prosperity. Tax the heck out of the highest incomes, on a progressive scale, and tax inheritances over some arbitrarily great amount heavily. They can stay relatively rich while doing the rest of us some good.

[ThoughtCriminal]

15. It's something conservatives believe about liberals

They think that being even slightly left of Milton Friedman means that you are a full Marxist Socialist who believes that all wealth should be distributed equally. They think that if you suggest that if there is any flaw in pure, free market capitalism, one must take a vow of poverty or be a hypocrite.

[RadicalGeek]

16. To Answer Your Questions

I have no objection to anyone succeeding, I'm with those who say it's what you do with that success.

I don't think all who are wealthy have cheated, but a lot of them have somehow--IMO.

As for, "too much", I don't know.

[treestar]

19. To a point

There's a point where one has enough and can stop and let others do the work.

There's that greedy point of just grabbing as much as possible when one already has plenty, just for the sake of grabbing and upping the "score."

The rich, even those who earned it, were the beneficiaries of a certain amount of luck. So I don't have a problem with taxing then.

[Sinti]

21. I want everyone to have plenty - those who have more often give

quite a bit - Gates and Buffett have given nearly everything, of course some of what the Gates Foundation is doing I don't agree with, but I don't think he means "evil". I want there to be enough that generosity is the norm, and hoarding is seen as unusual.

[Bonobo]

22. Gates has given nearly everything? Really?

[Sinti]

33. Basically all of his money will eventually be redistributed through the Gates Foundation

That is his plan, everything except what it takes to give his kids a good education. But, he's says he's trying to make sure it goes to the right place, for the right thing. They're now working with small, independent farmers (mostly women) in Africa to support them, and to find and encourage the most sustainable and profitable methods for those farmers to operate (profit in terms of profit for human life).

I feel he's misguided in his love of chemicals and genetically manipulated crops. I think there are other ways, and hybrids done the old fashioned way are more likely to do no harm, but I don't think he's evil. Anyone is free to disagree with this opinion, but I've done some work for the Gates Foundation, and they do mean well - otherwise what kind of insane conspiracy would they be involved in :)

[Bonobo]

37. Why wait then?

Last time I checked there were lots of starving people.

Why not give it all away now?

There's probably enough money in his couch cushions to pay for his kids' education a hundred times over.

[Bicoastal]

42. Give it all away now, so there's none left for the starving children yet to be born?

Your idealism is admirable but totally incompatible with the reality of the situation.

[Bonobo]

46. Oh, I see. So he's just holding onto it for the starving kids that are yet to be born.

Makes perfect sense!

[Sinti]

44. I think he feels that if you give a man a fish he'll eat for a day...

If you look at it, there are a few major problems that fall into the grinding poverty of the poor world, sanitation/water, malnutrition, disease (which is greatly exacerbated by the former two), and education. These problems are usually caused by corruption, and it's very hard to work around corrupt governments and officials. So, if he bought bags of rice or vaccines and sent them all out, less than half would get to their destination and when that was gone people would be starving again, or children would be left un-vaccinated.

It's actually better to build up the people from the ground. Let them grow what's best for them. Let them build their own water and sanitation solutions, with the help of experts and funding where it's needed, of course. When the belly is full, and you're not sick, education is the next step to creating a healthy society. The corruption would fall if the people were empowered. You need a holistic approach.

There are horribly hard problems out there, I have to let myself believe someone is genuinely trying to get to the root, rather than keeping themselves in a job by treating the symptoms. So, I hold on to this POV :)

[ctaylors6]

60. he has said in interviews that he doesn't want to give it away to wasteful

or just any organization. He resigned not too many years ago to run the foundation basically full-time. Warren Buffett has said he'll give away 85% of his wealth. As silly as it may sound, I think it takes more time than one may think to give away tens of billions of dollars and make sure it's used in a productive way. There have also been stretches of years when they both made money extremely fast because of the way the market was going up.

[Hannah Bell]

25. "Gates and Buffett have given nearly everything" - lol. You notice they're still

at the top of the "world's richest person" lists.

Hint: the rich never give away "everything". generally speaking, they don't give away anything unless they get more in return.

[ipaint]

59. Gates gives 5% of the worth of his foundation every year so he doesn't have to pay taxes.

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-gatesx07jan07,0,2533850.story

[Sinti]

82. Crap - but thanks, actually, for opening my eyes. The 5% is not the worst part of it

I so want to believe they mean well - I guess it hurts my conscience too, I occasionally have done work for them. I want a better world. I know I'm not the only one, you know.

[Hannah Bell]

90. is that supposed to be evidence he's "given everything"?

[hfojvt]

132. 5% is an interesting number

because you only need a 5.1% return on your investments. Start with $10 billion, make .51 billion from investments and then give away .5 billion and finish the year with 10.01 billion. If you get larger returns on your investments, then your wealth increases even faster, all while you are supposedly giving it away.

"Giving it away" can be profitable too, as I have read stories where the Gates Foundation gave away a bunch of computers. Well, since all of those computers are using operating systems from Microsoft, that kinda comes back to line his pocket, doesn't it? It's like the Amazon Foundation giving away a bunch of books, books that they purchase from Amazon, and then they avoid paying taxes on the profits from that sale by putting the profits into the Amazon foundation, which they manage as directors.

[Bluenorthwest]

26. Most of the people I know are very wealthy and many are

also famous. They are all good Democrats. They would never play passive aggressive word games, such as asking if 'we' are alright with something. They are also not the sort of people to confuse the term 'earn' with the word 'steal' and my feeling is that you think they are the same thing.

[OHdem10]

27. I am happy for people to become rich.. However, I only have problems

when we have more and more getting rich at the expense of others.

If our businesses paid living wages, I would celebrate the more
people working themselves up the socio-economic ladder.

When the rules and regulations begin to favor the rich, by encouraging
the loss of Middle Class Jobs, I have problems. We are in the
process of losing our Middle Class because of bad policies and
poor mgmt especially of Trade Policy.

Being Rich can be a good thing. What concerns me more is how
our leaders manage our country and look out for the good of all
citizens.

[CJCRANE]

30. I'm okay with the financially successful

as long as they don't create a $10,000,000,000,000 financial black hole through sheer greed that nearly destroys the global economy.

[rucky]

38. It's not the "how much?" it's the "how?"

Is it possible to get obscenely rich without victimizing folks along the way? If so, that's fine with me.

[TicketyBoo]

39. Sure, I'm okay with it.

The two richest men, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, are using their vast wealth to benefit mankind.

Does it matter if they've worked their way from nothing? Or is it that you have an issue with those living off of trust funds? If that's the case, should it no longer be legal for a person to leave to their children all the money that they've earned?

You can bet that if I were well-to-do, I would want to leave my money to my children. Wouldn't most people? I mean, at least enough to make sure they never lived in want.

do you assume that everyone who is wealthy has cheated somehow?

Heck, no. But way too many have.

How much is too much?

I think that does depend on whether or not they did that cheating you were talking about. If they did, then anything is "too much."

A million dollars isn't what it used to be, if you think about it. A somewhat modest house in parts of California (and other places, too) will cost that these days.

In my opinion, for people with a heart and a conscience and a philanthropic spirit, there's no such thing as "too much."

Think Andrew Carnegie. He may have been a scoundrel in his day, but he gave most of it away (setting up public libraries all across the country, for one thing).

[aquart]

43. Why are you here?

I'd like to understand.

[AlienGirl]

48. The problem's not success, it's distribution of resources

What I'm not OK with is the huge gap between the very top and everyone else. It's the steepness of the wealth distribution curve, along with the downward slide of the middle class, that is the problem. Eventually steeply unequal distribution ends with chaos.

Tucker

[tosh]

53. Best response. nt.

[anonymous171]

75. +1. nt

[anonymous171]

76. dupe

[Thickasabrick]

49. We love Grayson - he's worth about 32.1 million. nt

[kestrel91316]

55. Did they EARN the money through their own efforts sustained over time?

Or did they make a pot of money by exploiting and cheating others? Or did they perhaps just come by the money by accident of birth, inheriting from parents who inherited it, or stole it, or whatever?

I'll judge each individual case by its own merits. And if somebody has a whole lot of money and doesn't give much of it away to decent charities to help the less fortunate, or to undo environmental damage caused by their moneymaking, then I will also look askance.

Accumulation of vast wealth for its own sake, or to achieve power over others, is not a virtue AFAIAC.

[lumberjack_jeff]

61. What a moronic question.

a) who is this "we" whom you are asking, particularly given that you clearly disagree with the strawman you've constructed.
b) "financially successful" is okay. Your apprarent definition of success suggests that you don't recognize the destabilizing effect of wealth concentration.

Doug Henwood begins the issue by placing our current extreme inequality in historical context. We now live, he writes, in a second Gilded Age. Today, as in the robber baron era a century ago, the gap between those at the top and the rest of us is simply staggering. The richest 1 percent of Americans currently hold wealth worth $16.8 trillion, nearly $2 trillion more than the bottom 90 percent. A worker making $10 an hour would have to labor for more than 10,000 years to earn what one of the 400 richest Americans pocketed in 2005.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080630/cavanagh_collins

The social result of allowing the already successful to define what's good for the rest of us is feudalism.

I think financial independence is a great goal. Society has created enough wealth that everyone *could* be guaranteed adequate nutrition, adequate education, adequate healthcare and a fulfilling standard of living. Unfortunately, that wealth is concentrated in about 100,000 hands.

[haele]

62. A financially successful small business, or independent professional, is different than someone

on the Board of Directors of some Multi-National Monopoly.

The issue is that a small businessman or independent professional, like a doctor, or educator/writer, research engineer, etc, - heck, even an athlete or celebrity actor or musician - actually has to work to produce their wealth. That isn't "cheating". I fully support a hard-working, intelligent and dedicated professional receiving his or her due.
That being written...
The "good ol' boy's club" of finance and executives that give themselves outrageous bonuses and call themselves "Captains of Industry" for gambling with virtual money and running companies into the ground in the name of "profits" are working no harder than a salesman taking his or her commission to Vegas and betting it all on "Black". If they learned anything from their high priced, legacy baby educations, they've forgotten everything but "How to Win and Influence Friends and Fellow-Travelers". Most of them have become Peter-Principled, getting to the point that they go to the next level of executive positions by social network rather than any particular talent or hard work.
You can tell the ones who actually work. They're usually in positions that are lower-paying; governmental/regulatory, non-profits, or advisory positions. The ones who work longer hours in the office interacting with others in the company trying to build business rather than those who do most of their work at board meetings, golf courses, "leadership seminars" and events.
And since there are only so many management or influence positions in the corporate world, the meeting-mongers tend to belong to a very exclusive clique. People who actually work are just not as important in their world as those "who make the decisions".
In my opinion, not a one of them really understands leadership or responsibility, even though they mouth it constantly to their drones and sycophants.
My experiences have lead me to believe it's because those "Power Brokers" believe in a limited view of Corporate Personhood, where the Corporation's responsibility is only to the "shareholders" rather than stakeholders - stakeholders including the work force, customer base, and anyone else who is affected by a Corporation's activities.

I've got nothing against profits; I do draw the line at profiteering.

Haele

[southernyankeebelle]

63. The wording the republicans use is a death tax - they don't dare call it

an inherits tax. They think saying death tax makes everyone think they will get it to. But its not so.

[asdjrocky]

64. You really don't get it do you?

Do you think when I say rich I'm talking about the doctor that has done well, or a guy in my town that's made a few million in real estate?

Do you really think that's what any of us who write threads about what the rich are doing to us are talking about? You want a number? How about 1%. Here's another number Forbes 400.

I'm not talking about anyone reading this right now. If you think I'm talking about you than you are only doing their bidding and you are an idiot.

Do you really need this explained to you?

[Writer]

65. Well, I suppose when you read this thread, you had a choice as to how you would respond.

And this is the result of your choice.

[asdjrocky]

70. I read your op.

I don't respond in accordance with how others respond. I based my words on the words you wrote in your op. Now you've just made two really silly statements.

[Writer]

71. It seems that you've made yet another choice. Good luck on your next one. n/t

[CJCRANE]

80. +1. Good reply. nt

[HughMoran]

92. -1 Idiotic reply

Let's get this straight - you're the one personalizing this.

[asdjrocky]

98. You are so silly.

Don't you just crack yourself up?

[HughMoran]

100. uh-huh

:silly:

[ipaint]

67. Most very wealthy people have been subsidized by taxpayers.

The list is endless on the breaks the wealthy get as a result of buying the government. All of it on the backs of working americans.



"BILL MOYERS: But some of your critics have said you've gone beyond investigative reporting in this book to become a crusader against the rich. do you object to people getting rich?

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: Oh, no. I-- good grief. I have no objection to that whatsoever. But get rich by working hard, working smarter, coming up with a better mousetrap. Don't get rich by getting the government to pass a law that sticks the government's hand into my pocket, takes money out of it, and gives it to you. That's not right. That's not a fair playing field. And Adam Smith, you know, warned again and again that it is the nature and tendency of business people to want to put their thumb on the scale, and even better, to get the government to put the thumb on the scale for their benefit. And that's what we've seen going on now in our society for some time.

BILL MOYERS: Yeah, the theme of the book as I read it is that not that the rich are getting richer but that they've got the government rigging the rules to help them do it.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: That's exactly right. And they're doing it in a way that I think is very crucial for people to understand. They're doing it by taking from those with less to give to those with more. So the other moral authority I cite in the book is the Bible, both the Old Testament and the new. And all the way through those two books you can read condemnation after condemnation of taking from the poor to benefit the rich. You will come to ruin, it says in the Old Testament, if you give to the rich and yet that's what we're doing. We gave $100 million dollars to Warren Buffett's company last year, a gift from the taxpayers. We make gifts all over the place to rich people. And yet the way the news media write about it, people are often very unaware of this because we use complicated terms and meaningless language to the average reader so they don't understand what's happened.

BILL MOYERS: You mentioned Warren Buffet. I was impressed in the book that you do name names. And so let me mention some of the names that you talk about in the book. Warren Buffet. Everyone respects him as the world's greatest investor. Yet he's in your book on free lunches.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: In Several places.

BILL MOYERS: Several places.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: He got a $665 million interest-free loan for the utility he has in the Midwest. Now--

BILL MOYERS: From? He got the loan from?

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: From the taxpayers. Now, imagine for a moment that the house you live in today, you bought it 24 years ago and you agreed to pay the price then. And now you've got to pay back with no interest half the price in the dollars you agreed to in 1924. You could be rich just from that alone?

BILL MOYERS: But those are the rules. Buffet was doing something legal.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: That's right. And that's always the biggest scandal is what is legal. Steve Jobs. Well, Steve Jobs got $70 million of stock options at a meeting of the board of Apple company directors that never took place.

BILL MOYERS: In fact, you say Steve Jobs arranged to have his fraudulently-issued options exchanged for restricted stock worth hundreds of millions. And the government has yet to take any action.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: Well, not against him.

BILL MOYERS: But not against him.

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON: They prosecuted two people under him, one of whom said, "I warned Mr. Jobs about this." Mr. Jobs says, "You know I really didn't understand the rules."

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/01182008/transcript.html


The deck is stacked so good for the rare entrepreneur that works for their riches. The majority make it on taxpayer handouts.

[HughBeaumont]

111. People need to read both of DCJ's books.

Perfectly Legal and Free Lunch are both exercises in infuriation. Anyone who still think the deck isn't stacked in favor of the wealthy needs to get a nice big fat wake-up call in these two books.

[Initech]

69. I dont care. The people I do have a problem with are people like Ken Lay, Dennis Koczwalski, etc.

[Dreamer Tatum]

72. I'm fine with the earned wealth of anyone whatsoever

So long as it's earned. And as far as I'm concerned, income from investments is earned. Interest earned on interest is also earned. Principal or interest from illegal activity, however, is not earned.

[bluestateguy]

73. Sure, as long as the Professional Victim crowd gets to decide what constitutes permissible success

And my experience here has been that that means anyone with a job, health insurance and an income in excess of $75,000 is "rich".

I'm not in that income category BTW.

[SallyMander]

79. I would like this lady to hit the Mega-Millions

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6805250

:(

[JVS]

81. I seek the absolute annihilation of the bourgeoisie, so not really

Because that is what is necessary for the liberation of my class, and thus myself.

[nomorenomore08]

134. So how much money does one have to make to be "annihilated"?

;)

J/K

[Blue_In_AK]

83. If a person can't live on $500,000 a year

they need to examine their lifestyle.

[eShirl]

84. as long as they recognize they have a responsibility to pay their fair share in taxes

like Warren Buffett

It's assholes trying to rip everybody off and get away with sneaky shit that I have a problem with.

[Juche]

86. Alan Grayson is worth $31 million

He is independently wealthy and paid for his own house race in 2008. Ned Lamont is another wealthy liberal worth over $200 million. George Soros, Tim Gill, most hollywood celebrities, many people who got wealthy in technology,

A group called 'democracy alliance' is made up of millionaires and billionaires who lean liberal who are donating tons of money to promoting liberal values and agendas. They played a big role in turning Colorado from a red state into a purple state.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/16/AR2006071600882_pf.html

An alliance of nearly a hundred of the nation's wealthiest donors is roiling Democratic political circles, directing more than $50 million in the past nine months to liberal think tanks and advocacy groups in what organizers say is the first installment of a long-term campaign to compete more aggressively against conservatives.

A year after its founding, Democracy Alliance has followed up on its pledge to become a major power in the liberal movement. It has lavished millions on groups that have been willing to submit to its extensive screening process and its demands for secrecy.

Point is, not all wealthy people are bad. There is a Ned Lamont for every Mitt Romney out there.

http://www.newsmeat.com/billionaire_political_donations/


Here is my view and explanation:

In the last 30 years almost all the benefits of economic growth have gone to the top 5%, and especially the top 1%. The problem with this is that there is only so much wealth to go around. We have important things to fund like education, healthcare, the military, science, etc. If all the money goes to the bank accounts of wealthy people, we can't keep going.

Plus as money is congregated in a handful, those handful can just buy media outlets and politicians to trick poor people into supporting agendas that are good for them. That is why we now have a nation full of wingnuts who believe in supply side economics and who oppose labor unions and minimum wage laws. Wealthy people just bought politicians and media outlets to make the country serve their interests. And it has worked. That is what happens when a small number of people become too powerful.

I do not support 100% tax rates on the wealthy. However a more progressive tax system that eventually tops off at 60% or so of income would be fine by me.

I don't think everyone who is rich has cheated. But I would support higher progressive taxes.

I do think there are many wealthy people who are wealthy because they contributed to our economy. And I think there are tons of wealthy liberals just like there are wealthy conservatives. But our nation is going broke, almost all the economic growth has gone to wealthy people and they control too much of our economy.

[Joe Fields]

87. I have no problem with capitalism.

As long as the rules are fair.

[Deja Q]

105. +1

[Fire1]

93. First of all, DEFINE financially successful? n/t

[earth mom]

96. Anyone who EXPLOITS people or the earth or the stock market for their riches is a complete asshole.

Otherwise, I'm fine with rich people like Michael Moore, Al Gore, Oprah, Rosie O'Donnell-especially if they do good things/works with their money.

[REP]

117. Gore, O'Donnell, Winfrey, probably even Moore invest in the stock market

Unless they're receiving very bad advice and making very bad investments, they've made money in the market. I personally do not begrudge any of them their wealth (Winfrey's huge diamonds make me smile for her; she worked hard to get where she is and I'm glad she was able to buy herself what she likes, instead of being something for another to use to display his wealth and power), and these are smart people who undoubtedly invested in something. More money means more to spread around.

[GliderGuider]

97. It doesn't matter if we're OK with it or not. It's inevitable in this system.

Any system that includes hierarchy as its core organizing principle will have the eventual results we see around us today.

The Guardian Institutions of Hierarchy

One aspect of human culture that seems irresistible to the ancient status-seeking part of our brain is the development of hierarchies. The encoding of personal status and power into social structures is evident in the tribes and troops of all the great apes, but human beings have gone much further. We built an entire globe-spanning civilization on the foundation of hierarchy.

One inevitable effect of social hierarchies (in fact the effect that made our global civilization possible) is the consolidation of power. As new power comes into a hierarchic social system it flows preferentially to the top. As the system develops, even the small amount of power available to those at the bottom of the social pyramid is removed and ends up concentrated at the top in a power elite. This becomes a positive feedback loop: the more power is consolidated at the top, the easier the consolidation becomes.

This consolidation of power is seen in all social hierarchies. As you would expect, our most hierarchic societies, from ancient Egypt to Stalinist Russia to the USA, exhibit it most profoundly.

You can think of this effect as a form of social reverse osmosis, in which power is pumped through a semi-permeable membrane up a gradient from social regions of low power concentration to regions of high concentration, with class boundaries forming the membrane between them.

Physical reverse osmosis requires both a semi-permeable membrane and a pump, so it's logical to look for similar mechanisms in this social metaphor. What drives social power from low to high concentrations? And what keeps the semi-permeable membrane of social class boundaries intact so that the whole system can function?

In our metaphor of reverse osmosis, these mechanisms are provided by what I call the Guardian Institutions. These are the corporate, economic, financial, political, legal, religious, educational and communications institutions that form the structural skeleton of our civilization.

Whether you or I or any other progressive or prole think this outcome is fair or desirable is inconsequential. Our culture, as currently manifested, is essentially a machine. It operates according to its design assumptions and its own inner logic so long as there is fuel available to keep it running. It doesn't much matter what those who style themselves as being "outside" the machine think. In the first place, there is really no "outside", because the machine is really the totality of modern global industrial civilization. In the second place, the machine might only be stopped from the inside, and as soon as an outsider with big ideas gets inside, they are either neutralized or co-opted. The machine's design has been enormously successful -- it has been running now for over two hundred years, and its design principles were laid down hundreds of years before that.

Tinkering with this law or that will not stop it, or even appreciably slow it down. Aside from the fact that the system would object strenuously to the passing of, say, a non-inheritance law or the removal of corporate personhood, the system has a powerful incentive to find alternative means to the same ends. And since the system owns virtually all the world's resources (including its people) it will find a way to do it faster than you can say "qui tam".

[DIKB]

99. Provided they pay their taxes and help to insure the

Societal infrastructures that led to that success.

Granted I think we need a much higher marginal tax-rate and there should be a heavy inheritance/estate tax.

The system that allows for them to accrue such a fortune should be maintained for others to do so as well. Inheritance taxes should be in place to prevent aristocracy and to encourage the next generation to emulate their predecessors and not merely live off the wealth passed on to them.

One only needs so much wealth, so every dollar over 300,000 (say 5 times a comfortable living) should be taxed at a marginal rate of 75-95%. If you cannot live on a personal income of $300,000, your tastes are OBSCENE.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

101. Hell yes make as much money as you can.

Start a company that employees people at a living wage, provides them great health insurance and provides customers a quality product at a fair price. Do all that and I'm fine with you making a trillion dollars.

[leftstreet]

102. I want Skinner to become wealthy so it will TrickleDown™ on DU

We could all use a few bucks.

[hughee99]

104. It all depends on a person's politics...

The Bush family are old money and must have been taking food out of the mouths of the poor for decades to create such a fortune. Fuck them. The Kennedy's are great.

Wall Street CEO's are evil greedy SOB's who have been robbing the public and producing no real benefit to society for generations... but former Goldman Sachs CEO John Corzine, the Democratic Governor of NJ, is okay.

Warren Buffett is one of the wealthiest people in the world, and the fortune he's amassed is proof of, oh wait a minute, he's supporting Obama? He's okay too, then, at least for now.

[havocmom]

107. Problem is the system is so corrupt, few can do it without exploiting others or environment

I have no problem with people who are economically successful, IF they managed it without harming/exploiting others or the earth.

Economic system has degraded to point that it is hard to reach economic success without doing some bad shit.

[Laelth]

110. Drive-by attack DU post. Happy to k&u. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth

[DireStrike]

113. Personally, I think taxes should continually increase asymptotically to 100%

There is only one reason to have wealth, beyond a certain point - to amass political power. We should not allow any individual to have more political power than any other individual. This is impossible, but we should reduce the differences as much as we can.

After a certain point, you are only buying status symbols. It doesn't matter what they cost. If the most money anybody had was a million dollars, they would still be able to buy much of the same crap they have. The prices are only that high because people like them can afford to pay.

It should be very difficult to stay wealthy. Only continual success should be so rewarded, not simply the amassing of capital. If we used all that excess wealth to increase the standard of living, more people would be able to compete, and more good ideas would get worked out faster. Failing in a business venture would not be a huge problem, with an enormous pool of public largesse to fall back on. Anyone who was determined to try their hand at something like a business could do so, and only the best would rise to the top, but nobody would be ruined by failure or ill luck - nor could someone stay on top simply by virtue of luck and/or having started off wealthy.

[LWolf]

115. Who is "we?"

Don't you know if YOU are ok with "ANYONE" being financially successful?

As for me, first there has to be a commonly agreed upon definition of "financially successful."

I think that EVERYONE should be able to afford a home, transportation, healthy food, clothing, a retirement plan, and recreation on the money that they get for a reasonable amount of work. I think that health care and education should be 100% public and free.

I think that ALL of the above should be provided to ANYONE who cannot work.

I think it's okay to close the economic class gap enough to ensure those things.

[HamdenRice]

122. "Anyone with a few thousand dollars in the bank is a parasite"

I asked a question like this during the financial crisis of last year, but was much more modest in my criteria of success. I had to keep lowering the criteria, until I got to a community college teacher with a few thousand dollars saved.

According to a significant clique of DUers, such a person is a parasite and class enemy.

You're not dealing with anything approaching normal reality with a significant number of people here on DU.

[eridani]

123. If they got that way by adding value

And they don't mind being taxed appropriately for the infrastructure that helped them get where they are.

Banksters and shitstains that kill and bankrupt people for profit are right out of it from the beginning, obviously.

[mmonk]

124. The question is do we as a society have any problem with

the growing income disparities and growing opportunity disparities that Reaganomics has brought us. So your question is backwards from a societal standpoint and the answer here at DU will vary according to that growing disparity and its subsequent results personally.

[Nye Bevan]

125. I HATE that the top 1% in this country are wealthier than 99% of Americans

and my resentment will *seethe* until this situation is ended.

[la_chupa]

129. royalty is un-American

I'm fine with leaving some money to your kids, but the notion of someone being born already wealthy enough that their kids will never have to work is ridiculous.

[harun]

131. I think you are asking all the wrong questions.

The questions themselves paint the "we" as against everyone who has more than them.

I want everyone to be financially successful but to give a portion to charity. Charity as in giving it to poor people. Portion as in a portion of their wealth, not portion of their income.

Debate of income, capital gains, portions of tax burdens etc. would be a different discussion. At the core of the issue that is where I stand though.

Republicans always like to paint Liberals as hating everyone with money and wanting to tax it all out of them until they are poor. I don't support oppression of the rich any more than I support oppression of the poor. I don't support seizing the assets and homes of the super-rich just to punish them, etc. You simply allocate a portion of their wealth every year to be donated to charity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zakat