What percentage of the wealthy would it take?

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by bricklayer, Jul 8, 2018.

  1. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    We've all read about the 1%ers. The wealthiest of the wealthy.

    What percentage of the worlds wealthiest would we need to plunder to achieve social justice?
    Would the top 1% do the trick? the top 10%?

    If you could eliminate some percentage of the worlds wealthiest and redistribute their wealth, what percentage would it take to achieve social justice?
     
  2. Texan

    Texan Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    May 7, 2014
    Messages:
    9,126
    Likes Received:
    4,696
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Someone will always be the top 1%, even after you rob a bunch of people.
     
  3. nra37922

    nra37922 Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Nov 27, 2013
    Messages:
    13,118
    Likes Received:
    8,506
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    What percentage of the wealthy would it take?

    ALL of it...
     
  4. 61falcon

    61falcon Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Apr 27, 2018
    Messages:
    21,436
    Likes Received:
    12,227
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Just the top 1% of income earners would raise the bottom 50% considerably!
     
  5. modernpaladin

    modernpaladin Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Apr 23, 2017
    Messages:
    27,704
    Likes Received:
    21,104
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    100%

    Thats the problem.

    Collectivists arent happy until everyone is equally miserable.
     
    Bridget, Bondo, navigator2 and 5 others like this.
  6. roorooroo

    roorooroo Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    May 14, 2017
    Messages:
    2,814
    Likes Received:
    3,091
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    But not for very long. Within 14 months, we'd be right back where we started. Consumers gonna consume, the rich are gonna get rich, and the financially illiterate will have wasted everything that was given to them.
     
    Bondo, webrockk, jack4freedom and 4 others like this.
  7. nra37922

    nra37922 Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Nov 27, 2013
    Messages:
    13,118
    Likes Received:
    8,506
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    But those spinners sure do look nice. Nothing says I had it like grillwork on the teeth..
     
    navigator2 likes this.
  8. RodB

    RodB Well-Known Member Donor

    Joined:
    Apr 29, 2015
    Messages:
    22,361
    Likes Received:
    11,141
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    What do you mean by "social justice?" Economic equality? Everyone with the same income and wealth? I haven't done it but the math should be pretty straight forward. You could start with all having the same income and wealth, and it would pretty much stay equal as income and wealth slowly fell across the board (which it will absolutely do). Or is it cultural equivalence? Everyone belonging to equal golf clubs? No... wait... strike that... no golf clubs ...... everyone attending the same equivalent city parks? Equal access to NFL stadiums? No.... wait again..... no more NFL ....... everyone attending the same equivalent high school football game? What???
     
  9. Spooky

    Spooky Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Nov 29, 2013
    Messages:
    31,814
    Likes Received:
    13,377
    Trophy Points:
    113
    They want everyone to earn the exact same amount, if you go over that your money will be taken from you and giving to others.

    Basically there is no reason to work hard anymore or improve yourself. Find the most menial job you can and you would earn as much as the CEO of a mutli-billion dollar corporation.
     
  10. MolonLabe2009

    MolonLabe2009 Banned

    Joined:
    Dec 10, 2009
    Messages:
    33,092
    Likes Received:
    15,284
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Why do some people think they are entitled to other people's money?

    And giving people money doesn't teach them the value of money. They will just blow it and then want more.
     
    Last edited: Jul 9, 2018
    Bridget likes this.
  11. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Your post illustrates quite well the distinction, even when there's no difference, between equality and uniformity.
     
  12. opion8d

    opion8d Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 6, 2018
    Messages:
    5,864
    Likes Received:
    4,631
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Income disparity and concentration of wealth in a privileged few has been increasing for decades. People know it. That and growing elitism account for the rise of populism in the world. It's an explosive mix.
     
    jack4freedom likes this.
  13. Sanskrit

    Sanskrit Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Feb 12, 2014
    Messages:
    17,082
    Likes Received:
    6,711
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Trying to raid the assets of the 1% or even the 10% in the U.S. would do nothing but plunge the world into the greatest depression it has ever known. Leftists are near universally ignorant of finance, specifically that huge portions of "wealth" are abstract, intangible, not truly liquid, and that exist SOLELY due to market multiples that depend on stability of property rights over time. The U.S. has the world's most stable (and very high) market multiples because it is the least likely to attempt to nationalize wealth. Any such attempt, or even significantly higher taxes on the wealthy, would not only evaporate the "wealth" instantly, but would prevent the benefits of stable markets (that benefit all U.S. citizens, top to bottom) for generations.

    That there is a static "wealth pie" that is "split up" inequitably such that someone got "your piece" and that can be taken away and redistributed back to "the people" is perhaps the biggest lie the left tells its ignorant voting blocs.

    Another huge leftist/statist lie takes place in falsely calculating what constitutes "wealth." Residential real estate, proliferation of cheap innovations, and tangible personal property are "mysteriously" left out of all such calculations I've seen purposefully to create their lie narratives on wealth inequality. That a small X% of "the rich" hold a high Y% of "the wealth" is perhaps the second biggest financial lie the left tells its ignorant blocs.
     
    Last edited: Jul 13, 2018
    RodB, navigator2 and bricklayer like this.
  14. ButterBalls

    ButterBalls Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 2, 2016
    Messages:
    51,205
    Likes Received:
    37,549
    Trophy Points:
    113
    And that's the bottom line, THREAD KILLER :)
     
  15. Brewskier

    Brewskier Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Aug 20, 2011
    Messages:
    48,910
    Likes Received:
    9,641
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    Back in the 50s the wealthy paid much higher taxes to pay off the war debt that was accumulated. I think if we had a homogenous nation full of our own people again, the richer people might be more willing to sacrifice for the good of the nation and their future children, so that they would not have to be burdened with crippling amounts of debt. Of course, the future population will look, sound, and act nothing like the people doing the sacrificing, so I don’t blame them for not wanting to do anything for those people.
     
  16. Daggdag

    Daggdag Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2010
    Messages:
    15,668
    Likes Received:
    1,957
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    We wouldn't have to take any of of it. We just need to get rid of all the loopholes that let them get out of paying the taxes they already owe....

    No more moving wealth overseas, no more hiding their income as stock options and other benefits. No more undeserved, unneeded tax breaks and subsidies....

    And prison sentences for billionaires and CEOs who don't pay their taxes,
     
    jack4freedom likes this.
  17. Steady Pie

    Steady Pie Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Oct 15, 2012
    Messages:
    24,506
    Likes Received:
    7,247
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male
    If you earn over $32,000 per year you're in the world 1%.

    When, in several decades, we have a Federal international government, the global 1% will absolutely be facing similar measures now aimed at the 1% within wealthy nations.

    Enjoy your reparations. I myself plan on getting wealthy before then and burying a whole lot of gold 30ft under the Great Sandy Desert.
     
    jack4freedom likes this.
  18. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Well put. Well written. Hear here!
     
  19. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Billions of people alive today, perhaps a majority, are in the top 1% of all people who ever lived.
    Poverty is no longer defined by how little some have; it is now defined by how much more others have. That's not poverty; that's envy.
     
    Last edited: Jul 14, 2018
    cyndibru and spiritgide like this.
  20. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Why money? Aren't there many more things that are more important than money?
    Why try to solve poverty by taxing the wealthy? Why not tackle a real problem?
    Why not try to solve world hunger by harvesting the obese? Just the top 1% of course.

    They've obviously had more then their fair share. It's obviously not good for them or others. Others are obviously hungry because the obese consumed other's fair share.

    Why just money? Why not kidneys? Millions of people need kidneys. Why not take those kidneys from the top 1% healthiest, those who need that second kidney the least?
     
    Last edited: Jul 14, 2018
    RodB and Sanskrit like this.
  21. DarkSkies

    DarkSkies Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 15, 2014
    Messages:
    4,522
    Likes Received:
    583
    Trophy Points:
    113
    The question is biased in that it is framed as if many of the wealthiest didn't participate in anything criminal to gain their wealth to begin with. If you traced back certain wealth in certain sectors for example, you would find cutthroat practices, unfairly knocked out competition, and most important a major transfer of working class wealth to the uber wealthy class. So with that, about 90 to maybe 95% of that 1% needs to go back to the common taxpayer.
     
  22. spiritgide

    spiritgide Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Mar 25, 2016
    Messages:
    20,133
    Likes Received:
    16,080
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male

    First- theft of anyone's property hardly qualifies as social justice. Just the opposite, it's criminal greed.

    Second, if you took all the wealth of those who produce the most, once that is squandered (which is what most people would do and why most people are not wealthy) you will no longer have a source to take wealth from. Somewhat like cooking the golden goose for dinner.

    Third.... Reminds me of an old story.
    The first guy says, we should gather up all the money, and divide it equally among all the people!
    The second guy says- but in a few months, it would all be back where it was before.
    The first guy says- No, man! I mean we do it every friday night!

    Wealth is not something infinite, nor something only the privileged can obtain. Wealth is the results of your productivity, your ability to produce things of value. It is a product of how the person thinks and how they are motivated. If you punish those who are motivated to produce, you will indeed kill the golden goose- because those people are also the examples of what is possible, what others can aspire to and achieve for themselves. They are the proof that you can become rich, as well as the people who are already paying the vast majority of the nations expenses..... for which you are obviously ungrateful.
     
    bricklayer likes this.
  23. spiritgide

    spiritgide Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Mar 25, 2016
    Messages:
    20,133
    Likes Received:
    16,080
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Gender:
    Male

    True, true!
     
  24. opion8d

    opion8d Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 6, 2018
    Messages:
    5,864
    Likes Received:
    4,631
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Progressive taxation, like that practiced by G-7 (wealthy) nations isn't about money. It never has been. It is because hard experience has shown that concentration of wealth in only a few eventually leads to economic collapse. Today, G-7 nations practice progressive taxation for one simple reason - it works. Unfortunately, because of unwise tax breaks and favoritism, the system is off kilter again.

    Now we have increasing instability in much of the Western World. Income disparity and the rising elitism of the mega rich and highly educated has given rise to Popularism in places like Italy, UK, and the United States. Trump is merely the inevitable manifestation of this movement. Handled deftly, Popularism can be good but handle it badly and things will rapidly spin out of control.

    Trump supporters have bought into Popularism in a big way. Democrats are outsiders looking in and wondering who locked the doors. Popularism has one inherent weakness, it isn't global. In fact, it's anti global in a global world and this feels dangerous. Neither party in America has a clue to what's happening or what to do about it. The dems, with a hard turn to reality might be able to offer alternatives. Trump & Company don't want to.

    With their elitist, globalist, and pro-immigration beliefs Dems fall neatly into the Populist hate basket. The only thing keeping Dems alive is their best friend, Donald Trump and his breathtaking incompetence. The Dems were, some time ago, populist in their beliefs but abandoned them for an intellectual, elitist death wish. What Dems need to do is figure how to adopt their historic popularism to a global reality. That's a challenge the old guard is simply not up to.
     
    Last edited: Jul 14, 2018
  25. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

    Joined:
    Jan 12, 2011
    Messages:
    8,898
    Likes Received:
    2,751
    Trophy Points:
    113
    A far greater percentage of poor people are poor because of bad character than wealthy people are wealthy because of bad character. The failure to understand the above is one of the main things that keep poor people poor.
     

Share This Page