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View Poll Results: Which of these cities could be the capital of an American aristocracy?
Chicago 3 3.19%
Miami 1 1.06%
San Francisco 11 11.70%
New York City 51 54.26%
Washington, D.C. 17 18.09%
Boston 29 30.85%
Los Angeles 14 14.89%
Other city 10 10.64%
Multiple Choice Poll. Voters: 94. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 09-13-2012, 09:48 PM
 
Location: East Coast of the United States
27,274 posts, read 28,346,580 times
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Imagine that when the U.S. became a nation, instead of completely ridding itself of old European notions of aristocracy, the new nation helf onto some aspects of it.

Which city would be the effective capital of this aristocracy today?

Last edited by BigCityDreamer; 09-13-2012 at 09:58 PM..
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Old 09-13-2012, 11:26 PM
 
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
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If America had an aristocracy, we'd be due for another revolution. The sad thing is that we're headed that way already with the voter suppression laws and corporate personhood.
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Old 09-13-2012, 11:30 PM
 
Location: Minneapolis
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Manhattan is the Versailles of the American ruling class. And America has an aristorcracy, they just don't have the titles of nobility, but in functional terms they are the same thing.
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Old 09-13-2012, 11:40 PM
 
5,265 posts, read 16,539,770 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Drewcifer View Post
Manhattan is the Versailles of the American ruling class. And America has an aristorcracy, they just don't have the titles of nobility, but in functional terms they are the same thing.
Agreed....and though these "aristocrats" can be found all over the place...I think they are in highest concentrations in the NYC area, San Francisco/Silicon Valley, and Texas (think oil/energy execs in Houston and Dallas).
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Old 09-13-2012, 11:53 PM
 
9,961 posts, read 17,441,820 times
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If the US developed an aristocracy after the Revolution, at the time it would've been based in initially the rich old families of places like Virginia(old planter aristocracy), but then into New York through the 19th Century and to a lesser extent Philadelphia and Boston. The old money bastions have been based in the Upper East Side for some time, so that would really be the epicenter of it.

But today, the uber-wealthiest are really very spread out across the nation.


Rank Name Net Worth Age Residence Source
1 Bill Gates $59 B 55 Medina, Washington Microsoft
2 Warren Buffett $39 B 81 Omaha, Nebraska Berkshire Hathaway
3 Larry Ellison $33 B 67 Woodside, California Oracle
4 Charles Koch $25 B 75 Wichita, Kansas diversified
4 David Koch $25 B 71 New York, New York diversified
6 Christy Walton $24.5 B 56 Jackson, Wyoming Wal-Mart
7 George Soros $22 B 81 Katonah, New York hedge funds
8 Sheldon Adelson $21.5 B 78 Las Vegas, Nevada casinos
9 Jim Walton $21.1 B 63 Bentonville, Arkansas Wal-Mart
10 Alice Walton $20.9 B 61 Fort Worth, Texas Wal-Mart
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Old 09-14-2012, 12:35 AM
 
Location: Springfield, Ohio
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San Francisco...just ask a Republican.
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Old 09-14-2012, 12:09 PM
 
Location: Raleigh, NC
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Most of the American Aristocracy would have originally been in New York, Philly, and Boston. Today NYC would have the greatest concentration.
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Old 09-15-2012, 05:41 PM
 
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How about the Boston Brahmin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Old 09-15-2012, 06:11 PM
 
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No place in the West, it's too new. I don't know why, but I thought of Philadelphia with the Duponts and the movie "Trading Places." There's something somber about "old Philly money."
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Old 09-15-2012, 09:30 PM
 
Location: New Orleans
2,311 posts, read 4,925,403 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by soug View Post
This was the first thing I thought of. Are there any other bastions of old money in America that have their own sobriquet?
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