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Only 1% of World's Population Grabbed 82% of all 2017 Wealth

posted by martyb on Saturday January 27 2018, @12:43PM   Printer-friendly
from the I-got-mine!-And-Yours.-And-Yours.-Annnnnd-yours,-too. dept.

canopic jug writes:

The 1% grabbed 82% of all wealth created in 2017

More than $8 of every $10 of wealth created last year went to the richest 1%.

That's according to a new report from Oxfam International, which estimates that the bottom 50% of the world's population saw no increase in wealth.

Oxfam says the trend shows that the global economy is skewed in favor of the rich, rewarding wealth instead of work.

"The billionaire boom is not a sign of a thriving economy but a symptom of a failing economic system," said Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International.

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  • (Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Sunday January 28 2018, @08:58PM (1 child)

    by fyngyrz (6567) on Sunday January 28 2018, @08:58PM (#629569) Journal

    How did we get from

    Read the thread, think about the points I made, and then you'll know. Presumably. You'd have looked less silly if you had done that first, but hey, it's your party. :)

    So why disrespect those people?

    I am one of "those people." I'm not disrespecting them, or myself. I'm talking about the reality of starting a commercial enterprise without any financial assistance, a circumstance I am intimately familiar with.

    The point I was making, counterpoint to my respondent above, was precisely that it's not as simple as earn, save, implement.

    Now, you're saying that the wealthy person merely needs to be lucky

    That is not in any way a coherent summary of the points I made. Welcome to the "I built a better strawman" contest.

    So as to what I was actually saying: Yes, luck plays a part in how well each attempt at success turns out, no matter how well funded you might be. For the wealthy, so does managing your undertakings so that one attempt doesn't preclude a further one in the case of your attempt not working out. So does marketing, which is often very expensive. So do the caprices of the intended audience / user base. Sometimes the quality of the idea, by which I mean, its actual (or relative, when there is competition) utility, plays a part, but sometimes it does not.

    Given these facts — and they are facts — the wealthy are far more enabled to pursue such a path than those that aren't, because if they do manage these attempts so the current one doesn't blow them out, they can try again, whereas a person with just enough resources to make one attempt cannot do that. Now, if you'd like to try to argue these interrelated points, which, again, serve to delineate what I was actually saying, by all means — have at it.

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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 29 2018, @02:42AM

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 29 2018, @02:42AM (#629675) Journal

    You're still ignoring how the world actually works. You're still ignoring what the follow-on consequences bring to the not-wealthy for that one try they (might) get by scrimping and saving when it doesn't work out, as is most likely, statistically speaking.

    I disagree that the follow-on consequences are that serious. They're in a better position to start a second business than they were the first.

    Yes, luck plays a part in how well each attempt at success turns out, no matter how well funded you might be.

    It's not luck that casinos don't lose money on gambling in the long run. At a certain level of certainty, it goes from getting lucky to not getting really bad luck (and even that can be tolerated).

    The point I was making, counterpoint to my respondent above, was precisely that it's not as simple as earn, save, implement.

    Actually, it is that simple. "Implement" covers all the concerns you mentioned. No one was claiming business creation was easy (else why bother defending business creation?), but high level business planning is not that hard to describe.

    There's very little fairness in the world. Idiots and cheats like Paltrow who produce nothing of value succeed, while people with very good products and ideas fail. That's the actual reality in which your "earn, save and create" model has to operate. The truth is, many times it fails, and catastrophically so.

    So what? Even Paltrow's shifty business is subject to these difficulties.