Global wealth distribution

Or that it's a real issue. 

I grew up in a very affluent area, and was not affluent myself.  Most of my friends started 10 steps ahead of me, and are now 50 steps a head of me.  I had to work harder, pay more, and sacrifice more just because of who I was born to.   Some of these kids are lazy f*cks that don't even know the meaning of work.

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If it's all the same to everybody, I'll just work and save for what I have and not worry about what anyone else has.  I was taught that life is not fair, and to get over it.....it has served me well.

Wait a minute......if that's the case, then why is all I hear about is that the wealthy are the problem?

And you are probably a much better person for it.  I don't see how it is a problem.  So their parents or their parents parents were successful and they should now be punished for it.  I sort of like you have some experience with that.  I went to an affluent school but am from a non affluent family.  Some of the people I am friends with are from or married into families and do not ever have to work but can live pretty amazing lives.  Some work really hard and others not so much.  But I also know people who came from nothing and have done extremely well for themselves.  They work hard to build a legacy for themselves also.  Some people both rich and poor are going to work hard and do great things.  Some people from both groups are going to sit around and do nothing. 

I had a similar experience where I went to affluent schools, but I was the outcast trailer park poor kid who was ignored and cast aside.  I was extremely jealous of all the wealth people took for granted and it motivated the crap out of me to do well.  It's hard to explain but had I grown up affluent I know that I wouldn't have the motivation levels that I do today.  Similar to what you're saying where many of them are lazy.

The good news is these things have a way of working themselves out over time.  Many extremely wealthy families lose all their money in the 2nd or 3rd generation because of this very reason.

As for global or even national wealth inequality I think it's a lot more complex than many people like to acknowledge.  The government has gotten involved more and more to "fix the equality" the past 20 years and they've only made it worse.  The economy has changed in many ways with the services we consume.  You used to have to hire hundreds of thousands of people and have billions of dollars in infrastructure to have a company worth billions of dollars.  These companies were so huge that there were hundreds of owners or they were publicly owned so the "wealth" was distributed widely even amongst the top and across hundreds of thousands of employees.
Today you can have a kid in college that builds a website and suddenly becomes a billionaire.  There are hundreds if not thousands of people who have very small companies (employee wise) that are worth billions.  Things like this simply can't be "regulated away" because it's a fundamental shift in goods and services we consume.  With an airplane factory you have to manufacture planes, but with a website you simply have to create content and it doesn't take anywhere near as many people.

Technology automation has effected many jobs as well.  There used to be thousands of people getting paid a lot of money to assemble cars in detroit, but many/most of their jobs have been replaced by robots because they work around the clock and are a ton cheaper.  The top makes more money and there are less jobs on the bottom.  I don't think you can regulate away innovation and efficiency like this either.

I don't know the answer, but I do know it's not as simple as "redistributing money" because that's a short term fix to a longer term problem.  Even in the "perfect" wealth equality system of the old Russian socialism there was a huge income gap between the rich and the poor.  There were the elites who had money and everybody else who didn't.  The down side of that system was that there was no way for you to change your status.  At least in America every one of us has the opportunity to change our status in life.  Many chose to sulk in the world they were born into and try to take other peoples money, but I chose not to because stealing is wrong, no matter what means you use to take somebody else's money.  If you stick a gun in my face and take my money or stick a government in my face and take my money you're still stealing it.

I agree with you a lot here tuwood.  I am against "redistribution" in the classic sense.  I don't know what the answers are, but I do agree with you that we do have great opportunities in America, and that a lot of people don't take advantage of those opportunities.  My partner is a case manager for FSET in Wisconsin.  Boy does he have some stories to tell me. 

I know for me I make a ok living.  I will make a better living once my debt is paid off.  Which I am working side jobs to accelerate it.  (It really is amazing what an extra $30-$40 a month does to student loans, been doing that for about 5 years).  I also choose to be where I am because I enjoy the lifestyle of working in academics. 

I do think it's becoming harder and harder to succeed in this country.  We need to fix our education system, tax policies and pretty much everything our government does. 

Maybe we should all get together, have a few beers and solve all of the worlds problems? 

PCOJ can fix a lot of things.  

I don't know what all the answer are either because it's easy to say "get the government out of everything" but that's bad too because people take advantage of other people without any regulation.  On the flip side, when you have too many regulations it makes it more and more difficult for good people to succeed in their businesses.

One of my Facebook friends just posted this video and I thought it was really interesting in the context of world poverty and wealth.

Immigration, World Poverty and Gumballs

I didn't verify the numbers, but I didn't get any feeling that they were out of line. It does put a lot of the immigration stuff into a whole new perspective, and more importantly it makes me think of how do we better address world poverty as a nation.

I am not a fan of interventionist diplomacy, so if countries are run by oppressive people I truly don't know what we are supposed to do.  We found out the hard way with Iraq and Afghanistan that Democracy isn't necessarily a good thing for people who have been generationally oppressed by religion and dictators.

I think that's the rub.   What do we teach?   Who says that America's idea is the 'best' idea.  When we try and TEACH someone, we assume the person does not know.   The (late) great comedian Sam Kinison said it best in a routine..."Do you know what this is??  IT"S SAND!  NOTHING GROWS HERE!  MOVE TO WHERE THE FOOD GROWS!"  lol

I tend to agree.  We saw that in Iraq where we tried exporting our form of Democracy and then sat back dumfounded as to why it didn't work.

Even in the US where we tend to think things are going pretty well, it has taken us hundreds of years to get to this point with generations of people changing gradually.  If you have generations of people who have lived under an oppressive dictatorship, I suspect it takes many generations of gradual change to move away from it.

I'm not an expert on global logistics, but I'd say in todays day in age if all countries of the world were peaceful and functioning well it really doesn't matter what their agricultural situation is.  They would simply import food from elsewhere and be just fine.  Think Las Vegas in the US.  I don't think they grow much for crops there or have cattle grazing out in the sand.

Perhaps I'm over simplifying things.  lol

Sand = crushing socio/political/environmental factor

I 'think' it's a metaphor.  Kinison was a pretty sharp guy.   (except for the uncontrolled, binge behavior and poor driving) 

So......when you leaving? 

So......when you leaving?