Socialized theft

[hensatri]

I do believe those on the very top in such companies are typically relativly safe and protected from any sort of repucussion of their responsibilities being ineptly carried out. It is those from the middle down that suffer when those at the top screw up.

There are no shortage of examples of those at the top of large companies severing ties and running with massive amounts of "clean" money months before major collapses, leaving all of their workers and the recently promoted mid-level execs hurting bad.

[Jack]

...how did anyone aquire wealth?

By exactly that method. Don't tell me you're unaware of the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts, the Morgans, the Fords or any of the other children of wealthy parents, most of whom inherited their wealth. They didn't sweat for it.

[hensatri]

I think you are missing an important point here. There is no problem with wealth, and certain people having it while other people don't. It is a problem with that wealth becomes institutionalized and the ability of that wealth to flow, and of people to enact economic mobility, starts to halt that you have a SERIOUS problem.

[hensatri]

....and that is why you are not a CEO.

I doubt your qualifications to make that statment.

[Trojan_Ripper]

I doubt your qualifications to make that statment.

I doubt your qualifications to make that statment.

[Trojan_Ripper]

By exactly that method. Don't tell me you're unaware of the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts, the Morgans, the Fords or any of the other children of wealthy parents, most of whom inherited their wealth. They didn't sweat for it.

So you are saying EVERY wealthy person aquired their wealth from their family?

Which came first...."the wealth" or the "given wealth"?

[Jack]

So you are saying EVERY wealthy person aquired their wealth from their family?

<sigh> Why was the qualifier "most" and specific examples ignored?

[Trojan_Ripper]

<sigh> Why was the qualifier "most" and specific examples ignored?

I don't know Jack....but again...Which came first...."the wealth" or the "given wealth"?

[Thanatos]

I don't know Jack....but again...Which came first...."the wealth" or the "given wealth"?

Logically, if a family has money then someone in that family worked hard or conquered effectively in the past.

I fail to see how that justifies much of anything in the present.

Personally, I just don't think anyone really needs or deserved a billion dollars. The lifestyle of someone with $2 billion is not much different from the lifestyle of someone with $1 billion; even if they hire people to help them squander it, they're probably set for life and so are their immediate descendents. Why let them keep it all? What possible benefit am I missing?

[finder]

Logically, if a family has money then someone in that family worked hard or conquered effectively in the past.

I fail to see how that justifies much of anything in the present.

Personally, I just don't think anyone really needs or deserved a billion dollars. The lifestyle of someone with $2 billion is not much different from the lifestyle of someone with $1 billion; even if they hire people to help them squander it, they're probably set for life and so are their immediate descendents. Why let them keep it all? What possible benefit am I missing?

I won't pretend to not see your point but whether you think it's too much money or they didn't deserve it in the first place because their parent earned it doesn't matter. It's not yours, mine or Uncle Sams. It's their money and that is why they should get to keep it.

Moreover, if the government did take it because WE wanted more of the lions share, what leads you to believe the average working stiff would see any of it?

[finder]

It seems a big part of the problem is that people have forgotten that we are supposed to be the government, you know, "of the people, by the people for the people"? We've surrendered control to our elected representatives and given up practicing any sort of oversight and now have come to believe that "the government" is some independent agency over which we have no control and for which we bare no responsibility. If it has become autonomous it's our fault. "The government" is supposed to be our collective mechanism for enacting laws and provisions that benefit our entire society. When it ceases performing that function we need to reform or replace it.

The Declaration of Independence states:

(Emphasis added)

I liked what you said. Just one problem. Your changes rely on an even bigger, more intrusive government where as we think smaller is the change we need. I'll ask you the same question I asked Barts. With this governments track record like with social security, why do you think they won't be corrupt all of a sudden if we give them (or they take) more of our money? How can you not be skeptical of them? A whole generation (baby boomers) paid into social security and it was supposed to be there when they retired. Pay out was to be according to contributions. So why is government using the excuse that "the boomers are retiring. We're in trouble now?" When it wasn't supposed to be used for nothing but their retirement in the first place? Smaller government will be easier for we the people to keep tabs on and correct when needed. The monstrosity we have now is hard enough to change, a bigger one will prove impossible.

[Muckraker]

I don't know Jack....but again...Which came first...."the wealth" or the "given wealth"?

I did the following research just to determine how many of the world's current richest people came "up from the ghetto." Some of these billionaires obviously created their wealth themselves but I want to point out that only three of the top thirty had no head-start.

The underlined names are the people that appear to truly have roots that did not provide much opportunity.

By my count it appears that 15 of the 30 directly inherited a company.


Let's look at the current list of billionaires. (Quotes from Wikis)
The World's Billionaires List - Forbes

1. Carlos Slim Helu (Richest man in the world)
In 1911, Julián established a dry goods store, La Estrella del Oriente (The Star of the Orient). By 1921, he had purchased real estate in the flourishing commercial district of Mexico City. These enterprises became the source of considerable wealth.

2. Bill Gates
His father was a prominent lawyer, and his mother served on the board of directors for First Interstate BancSystem and the United Way. Gates's maternal grandfather was J. W. Maxwell, a national bank president. At 13 he enrolled in the Lakeside School, an exclusive preparatory school.

3. Warren Buffett
In 1942, his father was elected to the first of four terms in the United States Congress, and after moving with his family to Washington, D.C.

4. Bernard Arnault
His father Jean Leon Arnault was a manufacturer, owner of a civil engineering company, Ferret-Savinel.

5. Amancio Ortega
his father, a railway worker

6. Larry Ellison
his adoptive father, was a modest government employee who had made a small fortune in Chicago real estate

7. Eike Batista
children of businessman Eliezer Batista da Silva,[10] who was Minister of Mines and Energy

8. Stefan Persson
Hennes & Mauritz (H&M), which was founded by his father Erling Persson.

9. Li Ka-shing
forced to leave school before the age of 15 and found a job in a plastics trading company where he labored 16 hours a day.

10. Karl Albrecht
After the war, the brothers took over their mother's business. Aldi's operations were divided between the brothers, with Karl taking control of the more profitable Aldi Süd

11. Christy Walton
Wal-Mart -- enough said. Also see 16, 17, 18

12. Charles Koch
attended the Deerfield Academy prep school in Massachusetts

13. David Koch
See above. What a coincidence.

14. Sheldon Adelson
son of Ukrainian Jewish immigrants. Adelson’s father, a Lithuanian immigrant, drove a cab in Boston while his mother operated a knitting shop from home.

15. Liliane Bettencourt
the only child of Eugène Schueller, the founder of L'Oréal, one of the world's largest cosmetics and beauty companies.

16. Jim Walton

17. Alice Walton

18. S. Robson Walton

19. Mukesh Ambani
Dhirubhai Ambani then purchased a 14-floor apartment block called 'Sea Wind' in Colaba

20. Michael Bloomberg
raised in a middle class home in Medford, Massachusetts

21. Lakshmi Mittal
born into a Hindu Indian Marwari business family

22. George Soros
His early life admittedly sucked but at one point "His uncle paid his living expenses while he attended the London School of Economics"

23. Michele Ferrero
Piera and Pietro, Michele’s parents, transformed a pastry shop into a factory.
These first and decisive steps forward were thanks to the products “invented” by Pietro Ferrero

24. Sergey Brin
Michael Brin and Eugenia Brin, both graduates of Moscow State University.[6] His father is a mathematics professor at the University of Maryland, and his mother is a research scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

25. Larry Page
His father, Carl Page, earned a Ph.D. in computer science in 1965 when the field was in its infancy, and is considered a "pioneer in computer science and artificial intelligence." Both he and Page's mother were computer science professors at Michigan State University

26. Jeff Bezos
His maternal ancestors were settlers who lived in Texas, and over the generations acquired a 25,000 acre (101 km2 or 39 miles2) ranch in Cotulla. Bezos' maternal grandfather was a regional director of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission in Albuquerque.

27. Thomas and Raymond Kwok
sons of Kwok Tak Seng, the founder of SHK Properties

28. Alisher Usmanov
His father was a state prosecutor in the Soviet republic's capital, Tashkent

29. Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal
born to Talal bin Abdul-Aziz ( the son of the founding King of Saudi Arabia, Abdul Aziz Al Saud ) and Princess Mona El-Solh, daughter of Riad as-Solh, Lebanon's first Prime Minister.

30. Georgina Rinehart
worked for her father, gaining an extensive knowledge of the Pilbara iron-ore industry. legal fight with her stepmother, Rose Porteous, in 1992 over the circumstances of her father's death and control of the Hancock assets.

If anyone else wants to continue down the list please feel free.