Frogm4n: Do you really think that having 10 percent of americans holding 80-90 percent of the wealth creates a healthy society?
Most of that wealth - probably 99% of it - is in the form of a capital. And capital is only valuable if it produces value - goods and services - for the non-owners of the capital, the consumers like me.
In the free(ish) market the consumer is the souvereign who determines what is produced and at what prices by choosing or abstaining from purchase.
And if it's me who determines what the factory produces, I could not care less who holds the title to it - except if it is the government bureacrat in a socialist state who could not care less about me.
The disparity of wealth you hear about is bogus. The capital the rich "own" is working for our benefit. The profits they receive (after paying disproportionately high taxes) are mostly reinvested back into the productive capital so that we could get better and less expensive goods in the future.
So it's not income disparity but consumption disparity that really matters. Which is also much distorted by lying socialists.
The tiny fraction of profits that the "rich" actually consume does not buy them nearly as much more consumption as the monetary difference suggests.
My suit may cost several times less than theirs but it is almost the same real value.
The house ten times as expensive does not provide ten times better value.
The car ten times more expensive does not give one a ten times better transportation, etc.
The food you can buy from the supermarket does not differ by caloric intake or nutritional values from the food that costs rich people many times more.
And of course most or all of the price the rich overpay for their consumption goes towards the salaries of the people.
If you take a person from 16th century (or a socialist country like Soviet Union) and show them the life of Bill Gates, what would they be most impressed?
They would be most impressed that Bill and Malinda have a warm house in the winter and cool air in the summer, clean hot and cold water available any time, indoor plumbing, ability to travel other than by foot, warm convenient quality clothes, little fear of dying in childbirth or from some desease, ample nutritious food, affordable education, etc. etc.
But all those things are what any american - rich and poor enjoys, all courtecy of the free market.
miko
