Three things history teaches us

That's probably true, but that may or may not have much to do with their economic situation. Maybe some people are bad at managing money. Who knows?

 

I'm sure there are examples of that, but it doesn't begin to explain the overall reality.

 

Assuming that the claim is true, I don't know why a portion of Americans don't have enough money saved up. It implies that there is a problem without detailing alternatives to said "problem."

Perhaps people would prefer to use credit. Perhaps the low interest rate environment dis-incentivizes savings. All of these are possible factors.

 

I find it surprising & sometimes shocking, how clueless those with money can be about how a lack of it affects people's lives. People with small incomes have to make careful choices about where they use the little money they have at their disposal. For many, what they have isn't enough to cover basic living expenses, & they have absolutely nothing extra for emergencies or entertainment. I've know many people who lived like this. These people are so strapped the very idea of having a "savings" account is sheer fantasy. Those with money seem incapable of imagining life under such limited conditions, & often resort to blaming those facing such predicaments as lazy or stupid or both. That's easier than broadening their own awareness to include the unpleasant, painful realities truly poor people live with daily.

 

Explain to me how you are worse off, because somebody else has a billion dollars?

 

At no point in our history, or the world for that matter, has any society enjoyed the amenities, luxuries, and resources as the American people.

The overwhelming majority of adult Americans are bot earning minimum wage, andnmost households have 2 cars, 4 cell phones, cable TV and internet, and air conditioning.

This doom and gloom theory that the majority of Americans are struggling, and that struggle is the result of outside influences working against them is a made up narrative to attempt to validate the non-existent theory of zero sum economics. This fallacy assume that one person being rich requires another to be poor.

This is the argument of the liberal left, based upon non-truths and outlier statistics, to validate their true desire which is social justice through wealth redistribution.

Unfortunately, the entire arguement is based on theories and statistics that don exist.

 

The GNP is a finite number, & it has to provide for the lives of everyone in the country. Over the past 30 years, the disparity between the wealthy & the worker classes has been growing more extreme, with the wealthy families shrinking in number but increasing in wealth. That simply translates into less wealth available out there to support the workers, who have actually gone 30 years without an increase in real income. Because of technology, almost everyone in America has a better standard of living than compared to 30 years ago, but the relative wealth for the working classes has remained stagnant or shrunk. I have no objection to anyone getting rich, but I do have objections to the wealthy owning & controlling everything & even the law itself, & using it to pass codes that help enrich themselves further at the expense of those less wealthy around them--which has been happening for generations. When the wealthy own all the businesses, & have 98% of all available wealth, & can buy the services of the politicians who pass the laws to make those laws in favor of processes that result in preserving or increasing their own personal wealth without addressing the needs of the workers who make all that wealth possible, then the system has failed & needs massive repairs or replacement.

 

Your response was not very good. If we go with the dictionary definition of pure socialism - there are none - sans if you find some tribal community that operates under generalized reciprocity.

What people most often mean when they use the term socialism is "wealth redistribution" This is a form of socialism lite where the state has partial ownership of all means of resources and means of production via taxation.

 

Your dictionary is too old. Language, like everything else, changes over time. Today, socialism isn't state ownership of business, but does include state directives for how some of the wealth created by that business will be used to benefit all in society.

 

I did not give a dictionary definition - and further I stated what modern socialism is "wealth redistribution".

 

False. The GNP is in a near constant state of growth.

Wealth is literally generated everyday that didnt previously exist. That could be from natural raw resources, technology, innovations and inventions...

We do not live in an economic system in which there is a finite amount of wealth, we never have. This is not a game of monopoly in which the available funds are limited.

The idea that anybody is poor because somebody else is wealthy is patently false, and the failure of the liberal progressive zero sum argument.

That simply isn't how the economy works.

 

However the economy is working, it's working for the wealthy classes only, not the working classes, & I find that completely contradictory to the American ideal.

 

That's also completely false.

Historically, the large majority of people in this country are better off than at any time in our history.

The problem is, you want to measure our success or failure looking only at the top and bottom 1% of earners. When you look at the middle 98%, and consider the middle 98% at all time in our history, they are better off.

 

As I've already stated, the reason you & most feel the middle class is better off today than in years past is mostly due to the availability of technology. But if you look at the real income & it's power to buy comfort in the daily lives of those involved, our current economy fails miserably, & has for the past 3 decades. What I'm saying isn't completely false. America has become increasingly an aristocratic nation, where the established economy serves only those who have the wealth to own it, while the workers who make that wealth possible with their labors, get shoved aside & kept trapped in an environment with costs constantly rising but wages & incomes frozen. I repeat, today's American economy is NOT a successful one. It serves only the wealthy. And, Trump is wealthy, & serves only the wealthy, as a core member of that proverbial swamp.

 

It's worse than that.

• Current and former spies are floored by President Donald Trump's fervent defense of Russia at this year's G7 summit in Biarritz, France.
• "It's hard to see the bar anymore since it's been pushed so far down the last few years, but President Trump's behavior over the weekend was a new low," one FBI agent who works in counterintelligence told Insider.
• At the summit, Trump aggressively lobbied for Russia to be readmitted into the G7, refused to hold it accountable for violating international law, blamed former President Barack Obama for Russia's annexation of Crimea, and expressed sympathy for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
• One former senior Justice Department official, who worked closely with the former special counsel Robert Mueller when he was the FBI director, told Insider Trump's behavior was "directly out of the Putin playbook. We have a Russian asset sitting in the Oval Office."
• A former CIA operative told Insider the evidence is "overwhelming" that Trump is a Russian asset, but another CIA and NSA veteran said it was more likely Trump was currying favor with Putin for future business deals.
• Meanwhile, a recently retired FBI special agent told Insider that Trump's freewheeling and often unfounded statements make it more likely that he's a "useful idiot" for the Russians. But "it would not surprise me in the least if the Russians had at least one asset in Trump's inner circle."

https://amp.businessinsider.com/spies-react-trump-g7-summit-russian-asset-2019-8

Business Insider is a Republican soapbox.

 

The Nazis were socialists.

 

You voted for Trump. I can always tell.

 

Yes I did and will again. I'm hoping the Trump boys are warming up in the bullpen, I would love to see a Trump dynasty.

 

Where we disagree is the stagnation of wages being caused by others being wealthy. I don't believe that is the case.

 

Nor do I. But the results speak for themselves. Our economy is rigged to serve only the wealthy. Our laws funnel that wealth into the bank accounts of the wealthy instead of allowing it to become distributed within the working classes to improve their lives. The wealthy are responsible for those laws, & by that connection, mostly responsible for the economic disparity we feel ourselves trapped in today. I don't care if the wealthy get wealthier. I DO care that the working classes aren't.

 

So do you favor forced wealth redistribution? Capitalism is what makes America, America and the yes the wealth of the nation is lopsided but you cannot blame that on the wealthy alone. Wages may be suppressed but on the other hand you have a government that enslaves people with entitlements so both do not improve lives. Still work offers a way out for those who are willing. It has never been easy for the worker but it has over time created a better life for successive generations, where welfare has not. We cannot end poverty without work being part of the equation. While many of the wealthy do give back via philanthropic acts that is voluntary not mandatory. Beyond that the reality is that they are never going tip the scales any further than that and any redistribution would come from an already squeezed middle class. This is pretty much how it's always been with the exception of many failed socialist pipe dreams and absolute disastrous dystopian communist experiments.

 

What laws specifically are funneling money to the wealthy?

 

1. I favor passing laws that mandate more of America's wealth going directly to the working classes, & less to the already rich. There are several good examples of such systems in place, & working successfully in countries of W Europe. There's no reason it can't work here.
2. Capitalism is fine, but it needs to be refined in ways that make it less selfish for the rich & more responsive toward the workers. Our current lopsided wealth distribution has been caused by influence from the wealthy class, thru their massive campaign contributions for politicians willing to do their bidding once elected. The existing laws created the system that has gradually become more & more subservient to that wealthy class, & more unresponsive toward the workers whose labors make that wealth possible in the first place.
3. Wages are suppressed by owners & corporate executives who are all members of the wealthiest classes. Workers have little to no say. Entitlements are necessary BECAUSE of the systems proclivity toward enriching the already rich at the expense of everyone else. If we change the system to force more wealth down the pipeline to the workers & their families, then entitlements would be needed less.
4. The number off individuals unwilling to work to support themselves or their families, is a very small minority overall, & shouldn't be used an an excuse to disregard the needs & lives of most workers. Of course, work should be part of the equation, but wages for that work MUST be equal to the living needs of that worker--not some small fraction of that need.
5. Yes, there are still philanthropists out there, like Bill Gates & others. There are also extremely wealthy individuals & families who never consider philanthropy--like D. Trump & his family. The vast majority of Americans who are not wealthy, cannot depend on the good nature of a few compassionate billionaires to provide for all their needs beyond their own means. The capitalist system must be amended to do that.
6. That can't happen, & must not happen. The necessary changes must come from the wealthiest class. Any other answer would simply be a continuation of the status quo, & doomed to failure.
7. There are examples of failed pipe dreams within capitalism & socialism & communism, all. But both Capitalism & Socialism have examples of profound successes--even ones involving both working together.
8. Only Communism has been an abject failure in every sense, & by every measure.

 

Trump's close ties with Netanyahu while unilaterally proclaiming Jerusalem the capital of Israel has removed the U.S. from Middle East talks because the Arab republics do not trust him. Neither do Great Britain or France because Trump is unpredictable and unreliable. The U.S. has been replaced by Russia.

Trump removed the U.S. from the Paris Accord to which there are 197 signatories. Under Trump, the U.S. joins with the major emitters led by Russia.

Because it was signed during the Obama administration, Trump removed the U.S. from the JCPOA which permanently barred Iran from making a nuke. He has been urging the Iranian leaders to agree to talks for a new agreement that permanently bars Iran from making a nuke. In the meantime, Iran has followed Trump's example and is in violation of the JCPOA. Our allies are trying desperately to save the agreement. Trump is opposing our allies' intentions.

Trump has removed the U.S. from lucrative trade agreements, TPP, NAFTA, and has not signed one major trade agreement in 2 1/2 years.

Much to Putin's delight, Trump has weakened NATO with his constant jabs at our NATO partners. The recent G-7 conference went nearly as bad as last year's G-7 conference and there was no common statement of cooperation.

Trump has threaten the vibrant American economy. Because of his trade war with China, even he is concerned about a possible recession as consumer confidence is dropping along with the manufacturing index. Trump's harsh tariffs cause inflation, and inflation causes recession. To illustrate all of this, the stock market has been treading water since January 2018. On Jan. 29, 2018, the Dow stood at 26,439. Right now the Dow is at 26,817. It has been below Jan. 2018 figure for most of August due to Trump's tweets.

 

Back in the early 1990s, the North American Free Trade Agreement was one of the hottest political issues in the country. When he was running for president in 1992, Bill Clinton promised that NAFTA would result in an increase in the number of high quality jobs for Americans that it would reduce illegal immigration. Ross Perot warned that just the opposite would happen. He warned that if NAFTA was implemented there would be a "giant sucking sound" as thousands of businesses and millions of jobs left this country. Most Americans chose to believe Bill Clinton. Well, it is 26 years later and it turns out that Perot was right and Clinton was dead wrong.

On the matter of of the TPP, Americans didn't even realize what was happening. Barack Obama had been negotiating a secret trade treaty like “NAFTA on steroids” and if Congress adopted it we would have lost millions more good paying jobs.It amazes me how the American people can fall for the same lies over and over again. The lies that serial liar Barack Obama told about "free trade" and the globalization of the economy are the same lies that Bill Clinton was telling back in the early 1990s.
“Clinton and his collaborators promised that the deal would bring “good-paying American jobs,” a rising trade surplus with Mexico, and a dramatic reduction in illegal immigration.

Considering that thousands of illegals are pouring over the border as we speak, well, how’d that work out for us?

More than 845,000 American workers have been officially certified for Trade Adjustment Assistance because they lost their jobs due to imports from Mexico or Canada or because their factories were relocated to those nations.

Overall, it is estimated that NAFTA has cost us well over a million jobs.

The number of illegal immigrants living in the United States has more than doubled since the implementation of NAFTA.

It has been estimated that the U.S. economy loses approximately 9,000 jobs for every 1 billion dollars of goods that are imported from overseas.

One professor has estimated that cutting the total U.S. trade deficit in half would create 5 million more jobs in the United States.

Since the auto industry bailout, approximately 70 percent of all GM vehicles have been built outside the United States. In fact, many of them are now being built in Mexico.

NAFTA hasn't worked out very well for Mexico either. Since 1994, the average yearly rate of economic growth in Mexico has been less than one percent.

The exporting of massive amounts of government-subsidized U.S. corn down into Mexico has destroyed more than a million Mexican jobs and has helped fuel the continual rise in the number of illegal immigrants coming north.

Someone making minimum wage in Mexico today can buy 38 percent fewer consumer goods than the day before NAFTA went into effect.

Overall, the United States has lost a total of more than 56,000 manufacturing facilities since 2001.

Back in the 1980s, more than 20 percent of the jobs in the United States were manufacturing jobs. Today, only about 9 percent of the jobs in the United States are manufacturing jobs but thanks to Donald Trump that is changing.

As evidenced by the post WWII years America’s industry is what made us an economic giant. NAFTA pretty much gutted American industry and the TPP would have been the death blow and Obama would have presided over remaking America according to his own perverse vision.

Consider this, both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders came out against the TPP. Just politics?