Are the Super Rich and there companies to blame for our Economic crisis and plunder?

[WilT]

Pope Francis

What can the Church do to reduce the growing inequality between the rich and the poor?

It’s proven that with the food that is left over we could feed the people who are hungry. When you see photographs of undernourished kids in different parts of the world, you take your head in your hand, it incomprehensible. I believe that we are in a world economic system that isn’t good. At the center of all economic systems must be man, man and woman, and everything else must be in service of this man. But we have put money at the center, the god of money. We have fallen into a sin of idolatry, the idolatry of money.

The economy is moved by the ambition of having more and, paradoxically, it feeds a throwaway culture. Young people are thrown away when their natality is limited. The elderly are also discarded because they don’t serve any use anymore, they don’t produce, this passive class… In throwing away the kids and elderly, the future of a people is thrown away because the young people are going to push forcefully forward and because the elderly give us wisdom. They have the memory of that people and they have to pass it on to the young people. And now also it is in style to throw the young people away with unemployment. The rate of unemployment is very worrisome to me, which in some countries is over 50%. Someone told me that 75 million young Europeans under 25 years of age are unemployed. That is an atrocity. But we are discarding an entire generation to maintain an economic system that can’t hold up anymore, a system that to survive must make war, as the great empires have always done. But as a Third World War can’t be done, they make zonal wars. What does this mean? That they produce and sell weapons, and with this the balance sheets of the idolatrous economies, the great world economies that sacrifice man at the feet of the idol of money, obviously they are sorted. This unique thought takes away the wealth of diversity of thought and therefore the wealth of a dialogue between peoples. Well understood globalization is a wealth. Poorly understood globalization is that which nullifies differences. It is like a sphere in which all points are equidistant from the center. A globalization that enriches is like a polyhedron, all united but each preserving its particularity, its wealth, its identity, and this isn’t given. And this does not happen.

catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-interview-with-la-vanguardia—full-text-45430/

Peace

Thank you for your link. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[tabycat]

But the question here isn’t luck. We all have varying degrees of talent, drive, intelligence etc. The question here is a fundamental moral question. Do I own myself and the wealth I produce or does someone else own me? Do I have a God given right to life and liberty or are these actually privileges conferred at the pleasure of others? If I own me I can give any amount of my property to whoever I want, whenever I want for any reason I want. That’s exactly what an inheritance tax is in principle. It’s the government saying that it actually owns me and my property and that it gets to decide how much of it I can dispose of myself.

 

[nmgauss]

http://static.businessinsider.com/image/501be81e69beddf725000016/image.jpg

And what happened to the 99%? Very little.

cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/business/p3.png

Do you have a point to make with these charts?

 

[nmgauss]

It’s probably not a choice between them sharing all the blame and them sharing no blame. Greed is always a temptation and leads to problems for many.

When I was 40 years old, I was flat broke. By the time I retired at age 65, I was worth several hundred thousand dollars. I was greedy, and it paid off. Too bad that many more people are not greedy.

 

[WilT]

Do you have a point to make with these charts?

Sure nmgauss, If those super rich have made these huge profits off the backs of the 99% ers. Either in this country or in others, then yes, it makes a great visible statement and makes for a clear point.

 

[nmgauss]

Sure nmgauss, If those super rich have made these huge profits off the backs of the 99% ers. Either in this country or in others, then yes, it makes a great visible statement and makes for a clear point.

Bill Gates made huge profits because of a great strategy. His products sold in the billions. People did not have to buy them, but they did. They were happy, Gates was happy and so were the owners of Microsoft Corporation. The products were not labor intensive. Why was this off the backs of the 99% ers?

Steve Jobs made huge profits for himself and Apple Corporation because of clever designs of new products. Again, people did not have to buy them, but they did, and the whole world benefited from them. Again, the products were not labor intensive. Are you going to begrudge the owners (shareholders) of Apple?

Now we have Facebook created by Mark Zuckerberg. Why is this off the backs of the 99% ers?

 

[nmgauss]

Our economic system, on both the national and global levels, is clearly misallocating the world’s wealth. This is not necessarily because the superwealthy have done something immoral in order to obtain their wealth (although this is always possible), but in any case the system is clearly severely flawed.

To become wealthy you endeavor to accumulate wealth. You make that goal the highest priority. Reduce your expenses to the bare minimum. Don’t have a large family. Cut out cell phones and cable TV, drive the cheapest car you can find, live in a small home, bypass vacations, cut out expensive food, and read as much as you can about managing money. I did that and have risen to the upper middle class.

My father did that, and my brother is doing that. In both cases, they were able to retire comfortably. My brother even managed to raise three daughters, all of whom are on the path to becoming financially comfortable.

How is this immoral? And how does this picture portray a severely flawed system?

 

[WilT]

To become wealthy you endeavor to accumulate wealth. You make that goal the highest priority. Reduce your expenses to the bare minimum. Don’t have a large family. Cut out cell phones and cable TV, drive the cheapest car you can find, live in a small home, bypass vacations, cut out expensive food, and read as much as you can about managing money. I did that and have risen to the upper middle class.

My father did that, and my brother is doing that. In both cases, they were able to retire comfortably. My brother even managed to raise three daughters, all of whom are on the path to becoming financially comfortable.

How is this immoral? And how does this picture portray a severely flawed system?

The thread speaks about the Super Rick not the middle class. Way different income brackets.

 

[nmgauss]

The thread speaks about the Super Rick not the middle class. Way different income brackets.

The same principle applies. If the super rich did not inherit their wealth, they worked hard to accumulate it. How did Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Warren Buffett do it?

 

[WilT]

The same principle applies. If the super rich did not inherit their wealth, they worked hard to accumulate it. How did Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Warren Buffett do it?

I’m not sure where you going with it are you saying that those people you mentioned work harder than those below them. The common blue collar worker? If you look at the charts up earlier you get a good glance of the extreme disproportion of wealth. And since your a secular humanist, I don’t expect you to fully understand the concept of Sin. Good talking to you.

 

[Jeanne_S]

The Holy Family was visited by rich (wise) men who brought lavish gifts. When Christ began his ministry had had nothing. He and his disciples depended on wealthy home owners to provide shelter. Christ even had to depend on a rich man for his tomb.

Sure us rich Christians have to work harder for salvation…that’s what makes us very good Christians.

Nice!

 

[nmgauss]

I’m not sure where you going with it are you saying that those people you mentioned work harder than those below them. The common blue collar worker? If you look at the charts up earlier you get a good glance of the extreme disproportion of wealth. And since your a secular humanist, I don’t expect you to fully understand the concept of Sin. Good talking to you.

How hard you work has little to do with accumulating wealth. Mining coal by hand is hard work, but these days coal miners in industrialized countries use machines to dig out the coal. If you mine coal by hand, you will be paid very little per hour. But if you mine coal with a machine, you will be paid much more. That is because your efficiency per hour of work is greatly enhanced with a machine.

The people I mentioned may not have worked harder than their associates, but they worked smarter.

 

[nmgauss]

How hard you work has little to do with accumulating wealth. Mining coal by hand is hard work, but these days coal miners in industrialized countries use machines to dig out the coal. If you mine coal by hand, you will be paid very little per hour. But if you mine coal with a machine, you will be paid much more. That is because your efficiency per hour of work is greatly enhanced with a machine.

The people I mentioned may not have worked harder than their associates, but they worked smarter.

There is also the element of risk. If a farm worker decides to continue in the family tradition and be a farm worker, even though the wages may be low, he is following in a familiar low-risk pattern and can expect to earn the same low wages. But if he decides to take a riskier path, move to the city, and learn a trade that he might not be successful at, he is stepping into unfamiliar territory. He might fail, become unhappy and move back to the farm with his family. But if he is successful, he reaps the rewards.

The adventurous ones have a higher probability of succeeding compared to the fearful ones who stay in the status quo.

This is where the church comes in. Parishioners are taught to follow the straight and narrow. Don’t entertain thoughts that might put you at odds with your parishioners. Then you will be different, and being different is threatening to the community’s tradition.

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

Sure nmgauss, If those super rich have made these huge profits off the backs of the 99% ers. Either in this country or in others, then yes, it makes a great visible statement and makes for a clear point.

I am sure the charts are accurate but they have no bearing on the question on this thread.

What is NOT shown in the charts is the ever changing dynamics of our economic brackets.

Everyday, rich people take economic losses that sends them to the middle class or even the ranks of the poor. Middle class people lose a job and drop into a lower bracket or they work their way up into a higher bracket. Poor people also work their way up. This is ever changing. Incomes are not static…they change both ways.

As you said there seems to be more millionaires and billionaires today. Where do you think these people came from? If you say from the poor and middle class…go to the head of the class.

 

[Seraphim73]

As you said there seems to be more millionaires and billionaires today. Where do you think these people came from? If you say from the poor and middle class…go to the head of the class.

Bravo my friend! And the freer the market the more likely it is the lower classes can work their way up. I’ve never quite understood the mindset of people who are dead set on confiscating the wealth of the rich. Why do you care how much money they have? Isn’t envy one of the seven deadly sins?

 

[Zoltan_Cobalt]

Bravo my friend! And the freer the market the more likely it is the lower classes can work their way up. I’ve never quite understood the mindset of people who are dead set on confiscating the wealth of the rich. Why do you care how much money they have? Isn’t envy one of the seven deadly sins?

Forgive them. They know not what they do.*

*Class envy…the only logical conclusion.

 

[stinkcat_14]

Forgive them. They know not what they do.*

*Class envy…the only logical conclusion.

Perhaps you need to take a class in logic. For example, I am concerned about the income distribution when people’s incomes are higher because of rent seeking and corporate welfare? Does that mean that class envy is the only logical explanation for such a concern? Of course, not.

If occupational licensing means that physicians make more money and nurse practitioners make less due to scope of practice limitations put in place due to lobbying of the AMA, then the income distribution will be unjustly skewed. And Christians have a right to be concerned about economic justice.

 

[stinkcat_14]

Bravo my friend! And the freer the market the more likely it is the lower classes can work their way up. I’ve never quite understood the mindset of people who are dead set on confiscating the wealth of the rich. Why do you care how much money they have? Isn’t envy one of the seven deadly sins?

On the other hand, in the US, almost everyone has no problem confiscating the wealth of future generations. I mean think of the wars we started in the past decade and we put the entire bill on future generations, talk about taxation without representation! And I have yet to see one person on either side of the aisle offer to pay more so that the future taxpayers can pay less.

 

[ralfyman]

Part of the crisis involves fallout from financial speculation and large amounts of credit created. Other parts of the crisis involve the effects of peak oil and environmental damage coupled with global warming.

 

[stinkcat_14]

Part of the crisis involves fallout from financial speculation and large amounts of credit created. Other parts of the crisis involve the effects of peak oil and environmental damage coupled with global warming.

I think debtors prison would go a long way to limit excessive risk taking by corporate executives.