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Very few elites over a huge underclass has a 6000 year track record of "success". The dominant middle class has about 100 years and is already breaking down.
Just saying...
I hear what you're sayin, but every now and then you see some backlash. France - 1790's, Russia - 1917, and Cuba - 1959 for example. Maybe US - 201? will be the next backlash the world sees.
Americans are very sheepish, I don't see major revolts happening; enough of the working class has been brainwashed to identify with the upper class they don't belong to but that they believe colloquially to be capable of reaching as a simple function of time (mainly this is your lower class to lower middle class republican voters). As such, the working class lacks the galvanizing required to bring the pitch forks to the street. It would be akin to the rebels in Lybia, everybody applauds them, but the majority in Libya are still in their homes "waiting it out". You can't win a revolution without a buy-in from the dispossessed in question. Can't be three cats with stones and everybody playing the numbers at home.
Americans are very sheepish, I don't see major revolts happening; enough of the working class has been brainwashed to identify with the upper class they don't belong to but that they believe colloquially to be capable of reaching as a simple function of time (mainly this is your lower class to lower middle class republican voters). As such, the working class lacks the galvanizing required to bring the pitch forks to the street. It would be akin to the rebels in Lybia, everybody applauds them, but the majority in Libya are still in their homes "waiting it out". You can't win a revolution without a buy-in from thedispossessed in question. Can't be three cats with stones and everybody playing the numbers at home.
I don't see major revolts happening here either, but perhaps for slightly different reasons. There are lots of aspects to the whole question of revolts and revolutions. First, I would point out that having a successful revolution is certainly no guarantee of things getting better for what you call the "dispossessed". Historically the record indicates a good chance of things getting worse or at least no better: Just two cases among many would be the French in 1789 (leading to the reign of terror) and the Russians in 1917 (leading to the horrible yoke of Soviet-style communism). The emotional satisfaction of executing (or jailing, or tar-and-feathering) a few of the biggest fat cats does not ipso facto create a more just system.
Second, I would argue that most people in this country are not dispossessed. Sure there is a lot of pain right now; but if unemployment is running at, say, 10%, that means 90% of people have jobs. Yes, I know, not all of those 90% have very good jobs. But any revolution of the dispossessed here would be (at the present time) a revolution of a minority, even with total buy-in, which as you point out is unlikely.
Those posters on CD who rant about revolution are giving vent to their anger and frustration, but are not providing a rational or logical plan for anything to get better. They remind me a children having a tantrum.
No one can know the answer because there is no answer.
Someone like Bill Gates, a man who has improved the lives of almost everyone on Earth, is a gift from the Gods. As are Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos. As were Cornelius Vanderbilt, Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller. Can we even imagine a world without the contributions of these giants ?
Some countries don't have and never have had comparable talents, comparable geniuses. One need only look at them to see how the lack of such exemplars leads to want, hunger, and lack.
We should be thankful that our country has had the great fortune to birth such talents, and pray that posterity will be as fortunate as history was.
What is sustainable depends upon 1) people's needs vs. productive capacity, and 2) people's expectations of fairness vs. elite coercive ability.
1) Our productive capacity keeps increasing, and now most famines are caused not by natural disaster but by political mismanagement. Amartya Sen wrote a book about this: Poverty and FaminesAn Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation - Oxford Scholarship. So from a subsistence angle, many more people are sustainable than we have now given the slack in the system introduced by high levels of consumption by the middle classes in developed countries.
2) During the middle ages, most people in society lived subsistence existences where surplus wealth was taken by the lord. During the classical age, a significant minority of the population were slaves, who had no right to own property and were compelled to work.
What is socially acceptable is a function of coercive ability and to a lesser extent belief systems. Belief systems such as the divine right of kings legitimize coercive systems such as feudalism, but cannot sustain those systems for long if the coercive ability is removed.
As can be seen with the election of an all-Republican government at a time of record wealth inequality, the USA can sustain quite high levels of class disparity.
I think this problem will get worse as technology amplifies the coercive power of the upper class. Historically the biggest limit on coercion has been funding an army and police force, the costs of which rise as repression becomes more brutal. If the wealthy of the world ever develop effective robotic armies and police forces, that's the end of freedom for most people.
I have no way to tell you what a sustainable class ratio is under the status quo, but we are approaching the limits given the level of social discord. However if the elites develop a robotic economy and security apparatus, the ratio of super rich to everyone else will be 100:0 (and that doesn't mean everyone will become super rich ).
How so? That makes no sense at all. Your statement assumes that there is a finite and fixed amount of wealth. If that were true, every bit of population growth would result in the impoverishment of society, on average.
Wealth is actually created by innovations and new technologies. Example: the advent of the automobile. Workers were hired (gradually, over time) and were paid, and their pay was used to buy goods and services from others, some of whom bought automobiles, and so on in an ever-expanding process. Sure, Henry Ford got rich, but his enterprise stimulated America and contributed to its prosperity.
There are corrections and retrenchments over time too; they are called recessions and depressions. But overall, over even longer periods of time, there is growth, and a growth of wealth.
I'd disagree. Wealth is created by an influx of capital and lending due to fractional reserve banking (defined as money supply). That capital is what finances innovations and new technologies.
The inverse of the reserve rate 1/r defines the money multiplier M. Given $100, if x bank is required to only hold 20% in it's reserve and can lend out the rest, then it can lend $80 to the next bank, and so on. Effectively "generating" money of a total of $180 (in the case of 2 banks) when in reality, it started with $100.
There is no "sustainable" (what force of nature would sustain that) ratio just continuous squabbles. A faint promise of a greater degree of parasitism (just like big boys) can keep people more docile (e.g. USA) but it can also collapse societies and reshuffle folks closest to the trough.
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Let's talk revolution.
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