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As a trained Economist, Michael Moore is a hypocrite. Moore does not pay for health insurance for his employees. Moore has not hired any African-American employees, along with living in a neighborhood that is over 97 percent white. Moore has a security detail with firearms, while he wants you to be unable to exercise your gun rights. The movie "Sicko" is a fraud. I know, I am on Nocturnal dialysis and most of my family is in Nursing. Most of my family is also in the hard sciences, Chemistry and Physics. In other words, Moore is a babbling fool who is clueless when he runs his mouth.
More money is concentrated at the top today than in any time in history.
As wealth becomes more and more concentrated at the top, we will continue to be beholden to the ruling (money) class.
It's considered class warfare when you criticize this extreme inequality of income at the top. However, it's not considered class warfare when those who are collecting government subsidies are also criticized.
Probably something to do with Nietzsche and Slave Morality. Weaker people must create a morality that elevates poverty, weakness, docility, populism and obedience to the rest of the herd - if they didnt they'd walk around depressed and wanting to kill themselves.
Seems pretty straightforward to me. I mean, one can ask serious questions about the dangers of large organizations, but the type of people who complain about corporations don't complain about JUST corporations. No, they have trouble acknowledging distinctions of ANY kind especially distinctions that label one behavior "better", "stronger" or "more successful" than others.
It's not respected by a pretty significant portion of the middle and lower classes either. I mean, you can't tell me that a culture based on decadence, self-indulgence and celebrity worship really values hard work, self-reliance and skill can you? Deep down I think most people want to be as decadent, as self-absorbed and as sexually reckless as the rich...they just don't want to put in the necessary work to get there.
At any rate, I don't think labor, or hard work, or a lifetime spent cultivating a skill(s) is highly valued anymore.
It's not respected by a pretty significant portion of the middle and lower classes either. I mean, you can't tell me that a culture based on decadence, self-indulgence and celebrity worship really values hard work, self-reliance and skill can you? Deep down I think most people want to be as decadent, as self-absorbed and as sexually reckless as the rich...they just don't want to put in the necessary work to get there.
At any rate, I don't think labor, or hard work, or a lifetime spent cultivating a skill(s) is highly valued anymore.
I agree that the culture does not value skills anymore, but I have found that companies value those skills more then ever now, and those are the people making better money then ever.
I agree that the culture does not value skills anymore, but I have found that companies value those skills more then ever now, and those are the people making better money then ever.
A strong argument can still be made that the value of labor is at one of its lowest points. Recent research that has come out shows that the top 1% of wage earners have obliterated the bottom 99% of wage earners in terms of net value over nearly a decade.
I think data like this continues to illustrate how little value Americans put on working class labor. And this isn't just from the top 1% either. Even those making less than six figures, heck $40k/yr, show little appreciation towards those who work for a living. My dad is a prime example of this. The guy makes less than $40k/year and still believes strongly in his pro-business/anti-labor principles. Though he still primarily blames the government for most of his problems, I think he has moments of clarity where he realizes that it's not all on the government. We've been sold out by both the government (who are bought by the top 1%) and the top 1% who continue to look out solely for their financial interests and growing their empires of wealth.
Many people dislike the wealthy and corporate America because they feed off of the people least adequately able to defend themselves.
There are very few people who understand how large the wealthy schism is in America. To the average guy making $50,000 a year, it is not even comprehensible.
And what is mostly distasteful about it is that much of the money which accrues to the wealthy and corporate America comes off the backs of the average guy. People have made extraordinary fortunes administering health care, or providing other 'services' to the government. They set up companies specifically designed to adhere to the exact standards which the Government defines. The definitions are provided by your Congressman and Senators, who are bribed (we have fancy names for it like campaign contributions or lobbying) by the wealthy who define these programs so they mostly benefit the wealthy administrators. The numbers sound good: Billions of Dollars have provided through Medicaid, while the people who administer these programs have also made Billions--just to set up a company and shuffle paperwork. The list of criminal/unethical behavior goes on and on> Look at Chris Dodd, the senator from Connecticut--he was 'regulating' Countrywide, while Angelo Mazillo (who founded Countrywide) was handing out favors to Dodd. We will never know how many millions of dollars of benefits passed to this one 'wealthy person'--compare that to the average guy who might (might) make $2 million dollars during his entire lifetime. ONE instance of fraud between a wealthy individual and a wealthy corporation eclipsed his ENTIRE lifetime of working wages.
And that is a tiny example. THAT is why people have a disdain for the wealthy. NOT that made money, but HOW they made it.
There are always going to be people who have more money than you or I do, so get over it. It is just a fact of life. Not only does it not bother me, I respect the fact that they have either found a way to make all that money or inherited it. If I had the opportunity to do either I would jump at the chance.
We take it that you mean books by the likes of Little Mikey Moore and other malcontents trying to pander to those who let emotion and jealousy overrule reason; who seek only power to redistribute other peoples' incomes rather than increase, or at least protect their own.
You are probably too inarticulate to put into words your apparent belief that the end justifies the means, but you will eagerly join what amounts to a lynch mob.
It has happened before, and always with the same result; responsible people blamed for losers' misfortune, and honest wealth, both large and small, squandered by the puppet-masters.
And there you go, spouting the typical lines about "responsible people blamed for losers' misfortune" blah blah blah. Do you have any original thoughts of your own, or are you going to just repeat what the talking heads on Fox News are talking about?
I'll give an attempt to explain my position, but I fear people of your ilk just simply lack ability to full comprehend any position that runs counter to yours.
So what do I mean by wealth distribution and equal access to opportunity? Well first of all we could easily just do without that and go with a full-blown winner takes all society. But we have already decided not to do that as a country. The concepts of wealth distribution and equal access to opportunity are POLICY DECISIONS embodied by things such as our progressive income tax structure. We realize there will be winners and "losers" as you put it, but as a society we have decided that we aren't going to just let the losers twist in the wind. That is why the rich pay a far heftier (in dollar terms) proportion of our taxes than the poor. People don't want to say "redistribution of wealth" because it is a loaded term, but frankly that's what our society provides for. We have decided this is a worthy policy objective if for no other reason than the rich have a better ability to pay more taxes and a true winner takes all pure capitalistic society would create social unrest and a variety of social ills.
So now that we have established that redistribution of wealth is a legit policy that we have undertaken, the question is degrees. And that is my objection. The rich are just hanging on to too much of the wealth. More so than at any time since the 1920s, according to a recent study. And that is thanks to the many policy decisions undertaken over the last 20-30 years that have favored the rich - mostly the tax code.
The tax code is THE MAIN instrument to promote redistribution of wealth. And over the last 20-30 years, it has favored the rich.
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