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As the late great George Carlin once said, "They call it the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it."
Numerous studies have shown that it is better to be born rich than smart in America and that mobility between classes is far more limited than myth would have you believe.
Just to name one study done by Georgetown's Center on Education and the Workforce:
-The study found that children with low test scores from high-income families have a 71 percent chance of being affluent adults by the age of 25, compared to only a 31 percent chance for poor children with high test scores.
-Why? The safety nets that well-off students have that keep them on track and these are nets that poor kids lack. So when poor kids fall behind, they stay behind.
Are the so called "winners" of today so much better than the "winners" in past decades? I have a hard time believing CEO's in 2021 are actually 300 to 400 times better than the CEO's circa 1965 when the average multiple of CEO pay to the typical worker was only about 20 to 30 times. Today that ratio is about 300 to 400 times the typical worker pay.
Meritocracy is greatly exaggerated. It becomes a way to justify a professional credentialing game where certain categories of workers are able to carve out high rents for themselves.
Many people first make the false assumption that individual merit or individual talent and effort is the main factor in production, and often it is not. Most human economic activities depend far more importantly on the degree of cooperation that people are able to establish between themselves: cooperation within firms, cooperation between firms in a marketplace, and cooperation in a society at large in terms of having standards of trust, reasonable laws, and so on.
People make these false assumptions about a virtuous meritocracy precisely because the inequality exists and they are seeking a morally satisfying justification for the large gaps in income and wealth. Then, they make the further false assumption that the variation in human merit is actually THAT tremendous. That is truly astonishing. I have no problem with recognizing differences among people and in economic outcomes. But it’s completely false to think that those differences are great enough to explain the kind of variation that we see in the economy of the last few decades.
Intelligence is not an indication of wealth generation whatsoever. Meritocracy in the working ranks is very much alive and well, but working for another will not make you rich. This is the concept that even very smart people don't understand from time to time....or they do an decide life is better without the hassles of how one actually becomes rich. Good enough is perfectly acceptable.
Elon Musk made another stink in a public appearance recently by suggesting he actually hated being the CEO of Tesla. He would prefer to engineer products everyday. However, being the CEO of Tesla is the necessary evil to being rich. Being an engineer at Tesla will make you well off, but it won't make you rich. Being well off in America is absolutely wonderful...does adding those zeroes make it worthwhile? At the end of the day, if you made $10M more a year than you do now, what would you change? Would you be willing to work twice the hours and potentially jeopardize what your family has now in order to try for it? Would you be willing to live in high stress uncertainty for a decade while your labors come to fruition in a massive delayed gratification? Most of us would answer no.
Do you know who says yes? People with no other options. This is why so many small businesses come from our first generation of immigrants. Not because they are smarter but because they actually have fewer options and look harder and take longer odds to find something they can do that people will pay for on the regular. Those small businesses become the seeds for larger businesses and these otherwise average intelligence people will hire the smart people as they are growing to obtain the talent needed to grow.
Likewise, the game has changed from the 1960's. You no longer have your corner drugstores as much as you have a CVS or Walgreens....which may get swallowed up by an Amazon. These are companies that have much larger reach than the companies of the 60's....and they need brilliant people to run them....people with options and willingness to put in the type of smart work most would rather not have. Smart people live balanced lives. Ambitious people go for the money.
Intelligence is not an indication of wealth generation whatsoever. Meritocracy in the working ranks is very much alive and well, but working for another will not make you rich. This is the concept that even very smart people don't understand from time to time....or they do an decide life is better without the hassles of how one actually becomes rich. Good enough is perfectly acceptable.
Elon Musk made another stink in a public appearance recently by suggesting he actually hated being the CEO of Tesla. He would prefer to engineer products everyday. However, being the CEO of Tesla is the necessary evil to being rich. Being an engineer at Tesla will make you well off, but it won't make you rich. Being well off in America is absolutely wonderful...does adding those zeroes make it worthwhile? At the end of the day, if you made $10M more a year than you do now, what would you change? Would you be willing to work twice the hours and potentially jeopardize what your family has now in order to try for it? Would you be willing to live in high stress uncertainty for a decade while your labors come to fruition in a massive delayed gratification? Most of us would answer no.
Do you know who says yes? People with no other options. This is why so many small businesses come from our first generation of immigrants. Not because they are smarter but because they actually have fewer options and look harder and take longer odds to find something they can do that people will pay for on the regular. Those small businesses become the seeds for larger businesses and these otherwise average intelligence people will hire the smart people as they are growing to obtain the talent needed to grow.
Likewise, the game has changed from the 1960's. You no longer have your corner drugstores as much as you have a CVS or Walgreens....which may get swallowed up by an Amazon. These are companies that have much larger reach than the companies of the 60's....and they need brilliant people to run them....people with options and willingness to put in the type of smart work most would rather not have. Smart people live balanced lives. Ambitious people go for the money.
I agree with most of that, but I think we frame it differently. I admit the biased framing, but all I see is "the system rewards exploiters, who view humans as little more than tools and put themselves in advantageous positions by whatever ethical means over intelligent productive people who's labor is critical and necessary to the success of the business, and this preferential rewards manifests itself as at least 100-fold if not much, much more".
If pointing that out makes me communism, then I'm Karl flippin' Marx.
Risk should be rewarded to an extent, but it shouldn't be the defining moral sentiment of our whole economic system, that's ludicrous. And to those with infinite-sized wallets, their only "risk" is rejoining the working class, how ironic! A much different risk, I'd say, than putting my house, wife, and kids on the gambling table, no?
As the late great George Carlin once said, "They call it the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it."
Numerous studies have shown that it is better to be born rich than smart in America and that mobility between classes is far more limited than myth would have you believe........
George Carlin grew up poor in New York and died with a net worth of $10M
So whatever cynical remarks he has made about the death of the American Dream are just for entertainment.
I think we may find common ground if we say, "People who are born dumb and rich find a way to become poor."
I am rich. I have everything I want and need, and certainly have more than 90% of the people in the world. I doubt that I would show up on one of your "numerous studies", but that doesn't mean I don't exist. Although I expect it is true that poor children often become poor adults, it is also true that a great many poor people migrate to America looking for a way forward. This is one of the only countries in the world where that way forward can be found.
The American Dream is alive and well. George Carlin is neither.
George Carlin grew up poor in New York and died with a net worth of $10M
So whatever cynical remarks he has made about the death of the American Dream are just for entertainment.
I think we may find common ground if we say, "People who are born dumb and rich find a way to become poor."
I am rich. I have everything I want and need, and certainly have more than 90% of the people in the world. I doubt that I would show up on one of your "numerous studies", but that doesn't mean I don't exist. Although I expect it is true that poor children often become poor adults, it is also true that a great many poor people migrate to America looking for a way forward. This is one of the only countries in the world where that way forward can be found.
The American Dream is alive and well. George Carlin is neither.
George Carlin acquired his wealth via a different path taken by most U.S. citizens.
America idolizes those who entertain us, whether they be comedians, actors, sports figures, "real" housewives or Kardashians. Such people receive rewards insanely incommensurate with the rewards generally bestowed upon those who work hard in less celebrated occupations.
I don't think that George Carlin had any illusions about his own wealth status, nor do I think that he had any illusions about the situation of most U.S. citizens.
I'm happy that you are rich and have everything you want and need. I imagine you worked hard to achieve your American dream. I am not rich, but I believe that I have everything I want and need and I, too, worked hard to achieve my American dream (which, in my case, was retirement with a nice pension so that I can do what I want).
Not everyone in America winds up in the same place as either you or me, regardless of how hard they work. I wonder even how many people in this thread will have a pension, or even sufficient savings, upon retirement? I wonder how many will have to continue to work past their retirement years, in order to make ends meet?
George Carlin grew up poor in New York and died with a net worth of $10M
So whatever cynical remarks he has made about the death of the American Dream are just for entertainment.
I think we may find common ground if we say, "People who are born dumb and rich find a way to become poor."
I am rich. I have everything I want and need, and certainly have more than 90% of the people in the world. I doubt that I would show up on one of your "numerous studies", but that doesn't mean I don't exist. Although I expect it is true that poor children often become poor adults, it is also true that a great many poor people migrate to America looking for a way forward. This is one of the only countries in the world where that way forward can be found.
The American Dream is alive and well. George Carlin is neither.
Yes, Carlin's comment was designed for social satire/entertainment. As such, as a stand-alone comment without any additional context it paints too stark a picture. There are far more gray areas in real life than a comedy sketch would call for.
Still, that doesn't mean there isn't a kernel of truth in his observation. Additionally, as Rachel noted, Mr. Carlin surely wouldn't also make the mistake of applying his singular life experience to all of American society.
Finally, they aren't "my studies" and there is no reason to believe those studies somehow missed you or people like you.
I think we may find common ground if we say,
"People who are born dumb and rich find a way to become poor."
And that group (1/10 of 1%?) is likely about as large as the other exceptional group and their outcomes.
(even if this is because of the safety nets and help they'll find available to help -- getting back to astral's point)
How about limiting the anecdotes to what the bottom 90%+ will find reality to be.
As to the bottom of the bottom 90% ... the real questions are about why their numbers got so large.
Last edited by MrRational; 11-01-2021 at 10:51 AM..
And that group (1/10 of 1%?) is likely about as large as the other exceptional group and their outcomes.
How about limiting the anecdotes to what to the 90%+ find reality to be.
OK, how's this? The best indicator of how wealthy an American child is likely to become, is how wealthy his family is. Doesn't sound like the "American Dream" to me.
..........
As to the bottom of the bottom 90% ... the real questions are about why their numbers got so large.
The bottom 90% is self defined. So it cannot have "gotten so large". It is always the bottom 90%, no matter what the population is.
Poor people in America today are better off than they have even been in any country at any time in history. That's why millions of people trek thousands of miles to get here.
Being born to a wealthy family has generally had a positive impact in terms of options available to the child. They can be educated in what they want, they have the means to start an enterprise of their choosing, the associate with the people that can potentially allow them still further options. It is ridiculous to think that this only occurs in capitalistic societies. If anything, capitalism....in her wanton lust for exploiting the top talent....will see said exploiters trip over themselves for the very best of talent...sometimes even overpaying for it. In a free market, the advantaged may be able to pay more for talent than others, but they still must pay enough as to not let it go away. The same cannot be said in authoritarian regimes, where talent truly has no other source of exploitation and must meekly submit to whatever is offered and hope my particular set of talents and interest are put to good use.
Beyond which, families must continue to generate new wealth or risk tremendous decline. How powerful were the Vanderbilts 100 years ago vs today?
If there are 2 cashiers, one can work at 7-11 and the other at Google...if Google can pay more than 7-11, it stands to reason that it may get the better of the two. It can pay more because it brings greater value with its products, so much so that overpaying for a cashier slightly is of no consideration to ensuring the most careful yet still efficient cashier is the one that is quickly getting workers whatever it is that they need. As far as CEOs are concerned....how many could conceive of and create Google? How many of us could run an organization consisting of tens of thousands of stores?
The cruel reality is that capitalism is more fair to workers, not in the wages is pays for a job that most anyone can do, but in the competition to let anyone be an employer or study into becoming something else. It can "overshoot'" if you will. 100 years ago, what percentage of the country knew how to sew? Capitalism drove prices so low, nobody bothered to learn it...except now decent sewing craftmanship is rare. My wife's little alterations store now does very well.
Hell, one can even make decent money waxing bottoms. It might not be prestigious...but how many others can make $60/hour?
The closer a country comes to giving everyone the freedoms once reserved for the rich to pursue endeavors (as opposed to guarantee their success) the better off we all are.
Being born to a wealthy family has generally had a positive impact in terms of options available to the child. They can be educated in what they want, they have the means to start an enterprise of their choosing, the associate with the people that can potentially allow them still further options. It is ridiculous to think that this only occurs in capitalistic societies. If anything, capitalism....in her wanton lust for exploiting the top talent....will see said exploiters trip over themselves for the very best of talent...sometimes even overpaying for it. In a free market, the advantaged may be able to pay more for talent than others, but they still must pay enough as to not let it go away. The same cannot be said in authoritarian regimes, where talent truly has no other source of exploitation and must meekly submit to whatever is offered and hope my particular set of talents and interest are put to good use.
I am not sure anyone in this thread claimed only capitalistic societies create advantages for wealthy families. But based on your posts...you presumably think this is not something to be concerned about so why get defensive about it now? Just let the capitalists create wealth and let the cards fall where they may.....
While free markets are an unparalleled source of prosperity and innovation, markets do not police themselves. They must be balanced by transparent, capable and democratically accountable governments. There is a need for public goods and dealing with various externalities.
Quote:
Originally Posted by artillery77
Beyond which, families must continue to generate new wealth or risk tremendous decline. How powerful were the Vanderbilts 100 years ago vs today?.
The example of the Vanderbilt family only undermines the line of argument you seem to be pushing in this entire thread: That era was dominated by men such as Vanderbilt in railroads, Carnegie in steel, and the oil titan John D. Rockefeller in oil.
Rockefeller felt very strongly that competition was a very wasteful and inefficient process. Rockefeller was a figure of infinite cunning and stealth. He would have gladly made himself king if there was no government to counterbalance his monopolistic power.
That is why in 1890, the US Congress passed the Sherman Anti-Trust Act to curb their monopoly power. This was followed by numerous other public policies to rein in the excesses of that era including the federal income tax and estate tax in 1916 to tax families like the Vanderbilts.
Last edited by Astral_Weeks; 11-02-2021 at 01:57 AM..
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