synch said:
The value of something is it's marginal market value
Some have thought so. I disagree to an extent--and I'm not alone in that.
synch said:
due to Globalization the management skills at the top are more useful than ever
This is a bare assertion. I don't believe it's correct, but if you've got some kind of argument for it, please state it.
synch said:
combined with free market policies executive pay are much higher than before, and the poor in rich countries are falling towards equilibrium, getting what they deserve on the world market.
What they
deserve? Who decides what someone deserves?
synch said:
Billionaires: Nature, Nurture or Innovation?
60% of America's billionaires are self made according to a report in 2001 by the Calgary Herald
In quasi-technical terms, you're attempting to pass a necessary condition as a sufficient condition. Someone who hadn't studied logic might be confused by the tactic.
Or in more simplistic terms, the purported conclusion of this article answers the question of what billionaires did to get their money. It does not address the critical issue, which is whether everyone doing those same things also becomes a billionaire. It seems pretty obvious that this is not the case.
Furthermore, the article itself doesn't seem to support the assertion that hard work, discipline, smarts, and innovation are the reason that rich people are rich.
synch said:
Of the self-made billionaires, some (such as Warren Buffett - a US investor) got on the list because they are astute investors. But the vast majority get there because they pioneered something new and useful, in other words, because they were innovators. Of the ten richest people, eight indisputably got there because of an innovation, a new product or service that met people's needs better then what went before. Three of these were "high tech" - Bill Gates and Paul Allen from Microsoft, and Larry Ellison from Oracle, but interestingly five were from retailing - four members of the Walton family whose wealth came from Wal-Mart, and two brothers who founded the Aldi discount store. The remaining two were Warren Buffet, whose wealth came from investing, and a Saudi Prince who inherited money. The innovators represent all sectors of the economy - and are certainly not just in the "high tech" area. Creative risk takers seem to be rewarded.
1) Doesn't really get to the heart of the matter. Warren Buffett definitely made a lot of money investing, but he came from an affluent family. His father was a stockbroker and U.S. congressman. People born into poverty tend to lack these kinds of connections. Buffet's first firm was financed by seven members of his family who together contributed a fairly substantial amount of money--poor people simply don't have that opportunity.
Bill Gates' family was wealthy and had connections that poor people wouldn't have.
The members of the Walton family are apparently listed by this author as "self-made," but if this is from the 2001 list, they can't mean Sam Walton (who wasn't four members of the Walton family anyway); ergo, they actually inherited their wealth. And so on for the others--all of whom were born with advantages that the poor do not have.
That's the whole point!
Calgary Herald said:
The distribution of billionaires around the world seems to reflect the underlying economic, social and cultural characteristics of different countries, rather than a random scattering of exceptional genes. Countries that have a relatively open social structure and that accept and reward enterprising behaviour seem to produce more rich people. So where you happen to be born plays a big part in determining success. Some billionaires recognise this in their more humble moments. Bill Gates was quoted recently as saying that he had been lucky, not in the sense of finding something, but in the sense of being born in a time and place that allowed him to exercise his talents to the full.
This seems to support my point, not yours.
synch said:
These unsubstantiated anecdotes serve no purpose and are both outlandish and worthless, you should try harder.
1) Are you calling me a liar? If so, on what grounds? Do you believe that the people I've described are impossible or something?
2) As to specific points--would you disagree with the statement that there are rich drug dealers? Would you disagree with the statement that there are rich people who use drugs?
3) They certainly do serve a purpose--they're the proverbial white crows that disprove PM's position.
synch said:
Virtue measured by their success in an free yet regulated (as in a sense that business contracts are enforced) market.
So to you, "virtue" is defined by how successful someone is? If so, how is the position you're defending not circular?
synch said:
I suggest you pick up a book on evolution, it's far more complex than your utterly misconstrued statement.
1) I happen to own (and have read) The Origin of Species, The Blind Watchmaker, and The Structure and Function of Evolutionary Theory. I've read, but do not own, a few others. I am reasonably conversant in evolutionary biology. Nothing I've ever read would contradict anything I said.
2) Who "utterly misconstrued" my statement? You? As the author of the statement, it couldn't have been me.
synch said:
The American Dream is about opportunity yes, but the actions you suggest we must take go directly against it.
Did I suggest any actions? I don't think I did.
synch said:
The gap in the poor and the rich does not suggest there are any less opportunities
It does not
necessarily suggest it, but I believe in this case it does.
synch said:
without substantial net migration society becomes less volatile as people of different intelligence and other capabilities find their equilibrium in society, The American Dream is about the brilliant "serf" being able to become successful in society, not the retarded "stable boy" who gets to live a comfortable life.
I agree to an extent with your point as stated, but you're hardly answering my argument. Two points:
1) The brilliant serf no longer has the opportunity to improve himself as he once did.
2) The retarded stable boy ought not to be kicked to the ground just because he's retarded. Why set up a system that denies him a comfortable life provided we have the resources to give everyone a comfortable life, and extra to boot for those who work hard?
synch said:
And that wealth must fund investments in order to maintain its value, creating more opportunties for society and for other people to get rich.
Correct to an extent, but also incomplete. The argument isn't about whether wealth should move through an economy, but rather about who has the right and opportunity to move it, and why.
synch said:
It is a combination of nature(genes) and nurture(including culture and environment). The redneck culture(commonly known as "black" culture today") plays a far more significant factor in determining the success of a child than economic factors, did you know poorer Asian students do better than richer black counterparts? In fact, they do better than richer whites in many areas.
I think you're arguing for my position.
synch said:
wealth has a very limited role in determine one's social status in American Society today.
Depends on what you mean by "social status." The way it's typically used, the term refers to how much wealth someone has. But if you're saying that, for instance, a particularly brilliant catholic priest who lives in poverty but writes books illuminating the relationship of God and Man has a type of high social status, then I'd agree.
synch said:
The poor need the rich far more than the rich need the poor
Not correct.
sycnh said:
if we were to separate the top 20% in society from the very beginning of humanity in terms of intelligence, etc, and the bottom 20%, and they lived in isolated areas, let's say the upper in North America and the bottom in Europe, who would benefit more if these two societies joined?
Read Jarred Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel." I would go so far as to say that he
proved that the lower 80% living in Europe would do vastly better. This is for a few very simple reasons:
1) The major axis of Eurasia is East West, whereas for all other continents except Australia it is north-south. This means that there are fewer climactic constraints to the free trade of ideas in Eurasia than there are in Africa or the Americas.
2) Eurasia, and Europe particularly, have the vast majority of all the domesticable species on earth, both plant and animal, and therefore develop agriculture with much greater ease.
3) Due to geological peculiarities, valuable minerals such as iron, copper, tin, mercury, and coal were more readily available to the inhabitants of Europe than to the inhabitants of Africa or the Americas. So therefore while the Native Americans had to make due with stone and wood weapons, the Europeans were able to develop superior steel weapons and armor.
Mr. Diamond would point out that there are known reference cases where your gedankenexperiment has been tried, and your implied outcome is completely incorrect. To wit:
1) The people who populated the South Pacific Islands circa 10,000 B.C. were technologically superior to their Near Eastern and European counterparts, but by 3,000 B.C. the people of both the Near East and Europe had surpassed them utterly.
2) The very early native Americans developed the very first writing system, predating those of Mesopotamia and Egypt by a couple thousand years, but when the inheritors of Near Eastern civilization came to America, they were easily able to overwhelm the Americans.
3) The Egyptians had vastly more technical knowledge than did the near eastern civilizations that eventually conquered them, but they were overwhelmed by the Assyrians, and then the Babylonians, due to the superior agricultural conditions in Mesopotamia.
And there are plenty of other examples.
sycnh said:
The poor have skills that are far less valuable than the rich, that's a fact, it's an issue of scarcity and Marginalism.
By your definition of value, this is obviously correct, but it's that definition that I challenge. The way you use it, this simply is the definition. It's not a new conclusion or anything, and if you're trying to say otherwise, you're begging the question.
synch said:
I'd like to see that report, and even if that's true, so what?
I'll see if I can find it.
synch said:
Why must society create a totalitarian system that specifically punishes sociopaths?
Wait a minute...did you just say...? It's usually considered evident that sociopaths are the ones who want to set up totalitarian systems.
sycnh said:
They've shown themselves to be far more useful to society than the everyday person
Only sociopaths think that.
synch said:
is that what we should be striving for? To be average?
Of course not. What does that have to do with anything?