Current Events > Why do Americans worship rich people so much

(+) Yeah! (+)

Like they foam out of the mouth if you tell them that they got rich off of luck or they try and downplay the resources and opportunities they were born with.
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Because I wanna be like them.
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Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day and if you tell them the game is rigged so that they'll never escape their destitution they won't see a reason to live, it's why they buy lottery tickets.

It's wild that we live in a society where we so readily associate materia things with success. Buy a diamond ring worth three, six, twelve months salary to show your love. A cool car means you're a cool guy. An expensive suit means you're a good business man. A big house and a big SUV means you're well off. Ironically talking about your salary and frugality is shunned upon, but displays of material wealth that make you poor are lauded. We all hide our true selves behind a bubble of useless garbage.

I drive my 12 year old piece of shit car with pride.

Veggeta_MAX posted...

Because I wanna be like them.

Pretty much this. The rich represent what the classic American dream is about taken to tenfold. It's the penultimate of being an American: you work hard, do what's right, be smart with your money, and you have a chance at becoming rich.

Of course, this is just a nice fabrication. It's still entirely possible to own your business or make ends meet well enough but becoming rich requires much, much more than just playing by the rules and being smart with your money.
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clearaflagrantj posted...

Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day and if you tell them the game is rigged so that they'll never escape their destitution they won't see a reason to live, it's why they buy lottery tickets.

It's wild that we live in a society where we so readily associate materia things with success. Buy a diamond ring worth three, six, twelve months salary to show your love. A cool car means you're a cool guy. An expensive suit means you're a good business man. A big house and a big SUV means you're well off. Ironically talking about your salary and frugality is shunned upon, but displays of material wealth that make you poor are lauded. We all hide our true selves behind a bubble of useless garbage.

I drive my 12 year old piece of shit car with pride.

Sounds like youre some hermit Calvinist Protestant.....ewww
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EverDownward posted...

Veggeta_MAX posted...

Because I wanna be like them.

Pretty much this. The rich represent what the classic American dream is about taken to tenfold. It's the penultimate of being an American: you work hard, do what's right, be smart with your money, and you have a chance at becoming rich.

Of course, this is just a nice fabrication. It's still entirely possible to own your business or make ends meet well enough but becoming rich requires much, much more than just playing by the rules and being smart with your money.

Exactly, Ive just accepted the fact Im better off winning the lottery lol.
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Godnorgosh posted...

It's the ideology that being wealthy is about hard work, not circumstance or a willingness to exploit people. Take a look around in a nearby Barnes & Noble. Check out all the self-help books that try to sell you on the idea that you, too, can be rich if only you have the right mindset and discipline. Let's pretend scarcity isn't a thing.

Being well off mostly is about hard work, taking calculated risks, being aggressive in the right situations, and taking advantage of opportunities in front you. The foundation for being able to do all of this assumes you have a healthy family structure, you have a family that values education enough to make sure you get it, and that you avoid committing crime.
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The Admiral posted...

Godnorgosh posted...

It's the ideology that being wealthy is about hard work, not circumstance or a willingness to exploit people. Take a look around in a nearby Barnes & Noble. Check out all the self-help books that try to sell you on the idea that you, too, can be rich if only you have the right mindset and discipline. Let's pretend scarcity isn't a thing.

Being well off mostly is about hard work, taking calculated risks, being aggressive in the right situations, and taking advantage of opportunities in front you. The foundation for being able to do all of this assumes you have a healthy family structure, you have a family that values education enough to make sure you get it, and that you avoid committing crime.

But what about people who want to lay around playing video games and doing heroin? Don't they deserve to be rich too?
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The Admiral posted...

Godnorgosh posted...

It's the ideology that being wealthy is about hard work, not circumstance or a willingness to exploit people. Take a look around in a nearby Barnes & Noble. Check out all the self-help books that try to sell you on the idea that you, too, can be rich if only you have the right mindset and discipline. Let's pretend scarcity isn't a thing.

Being well off mostly is about hard work, taking calculated risks, being aggressive in the right situations, and taking advantage of opportunities in front you. The foundation for being able to do all of this assumes you have a healthy family structure, you have a family that values education enough to make sure you get it, and that you avoid committing crime.

So you have to be well off?
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REMercsChamp posted...

But what about people who want to lay around playing video games and doing heroin? Don't they deserve to be rich too?

According to some folks on CE, yes.

JBaLLEN66 posted...

So you have to be well off?

No, you just have to have that foundation I laid out in my last sentence.
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The Admiral posted...

REMercsChamp posted...

But what about people who want to lay around playing video games and doing heroin? Don't they deserve to be rich too?

According to some folks on CE, yes.

JBaLLEN66 posted...

So you have to be well off?

No, you just have to have that foundation I laid out in my last sentence.

Ya it pretty much defines upper middle class to rich Americans
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JBaLLEN66 posted...

Ya it pretty much defines upper middle class to rich Americans

It defines what poor immigrant families who came to the U.S. with not even a dollar in wealth did to help raise their children to a better living. Absolutely no excuse for families in the U.S. today not to do those things today.
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The Admiral posted...

JBaLLEN66 posted...

Ya it pretty much defines upper middle class to rich Americans

It defines what poor immigrant families who came to the U.S. with not even a dollar in wealth did to help raise their children to a better living. Absolutely no excuse for families in the U.S. today not to do those things today.

Oh joy the poor immigrant rag myth....sigh
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clearaflagrantj posted...

Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day

You always see this "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" rhetoric from the economic left but I almost never meet people like this.
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weapon_d00d816 posted...

clearaflagrantj posted...

Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day

You always see this "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" rhetoric from the economic left but I almost never meet people like this.

What are they?
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WhinyZach posted...

People want to be rich. Same reason they worship actors, athletes, singers, etc.

This isn't a hard question, and if you can't figure it out yourself you may need some higher education.

I want to be rich too. Oh nooo, youre silly post derailed within seconds.
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They represent the American Dream.
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Godnorgosh posted...

WhinyZach posted...

People want to be rich. Same reason they worship actors, athletes, singers, etc.

This isn't a hard question, and if you can't figure it out yourself you may need some higher education.

Higher education will teach you that scarcity is a thing and hard work won't cut it for most people.

There is no good reason to glorify a degree of wealth that comes at the cost of others' well-being. You should aim to make a living, not a killing.

Hes a troll lol
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The hell are you on that you think Americans worship rich people? Nothing but "eat the rich" as the current mood, don't confuse that with people still wanting to be rich themselves.
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clearaflagrantj posted...

Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day and if you tell them the game is rigged so that they'll never escape their destitution they won't see a reason to live, it's why they buy lottery tickets.

It's wild that we live in a society where we so readily associate materia things with success. Buy a diamond ring worth three, six, twelve months salary to show your love. A cool car means you're a cool guy. An expensive suit means you're a good business man. A big house and a big SUV means you're well off. Ironically talking about your salary and frugality is shunned upon, but displays of material wealth that make you poor are lauded. We all hide our true selves behind a bubble of useless garbage.

I drive my 12 year old piece of shit car with pride.

Agreed wholeheartedly. Society is sick
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The Admiral posted...

It defines what poor immigrant families who came to the U.S. with not even a dollar in wealth did to help raise their children to a better living.

tell me what the typical class mobility of poor immigrant families is today compared to then

tell me if something changed

tell me what changed

be specific
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weapon_d00d816 posted...

clearaflagrantj posted...

Because everyone thinks they'll be a millionaire one day

You always see this "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" rhetoric from the economic left but I almost never meet people like this.

You should get out more, every conservative I know is like this because they think hard work is actually rewarded.

Godnorgosh posted...

WhinyZach posted...

People want to be rich. Same reason they worship actors, athletes, singers, etc.

This isn't a hard question, and if you can't figure it out yourself you may need some higher education.

Higher education will teach you that scarcity is a thing and hard work won't cut it for most people.

There is no good reason to glorify a degree of wealth that comes at the cost of others' well-being. You should aim to make a living, not a killing.

Higher education will also teach you that wealth is not a zero sum game and that "making a killing" doesn't come at the cost of others' well-being.

Since you talk about higher education but clearly didn't attend, this will explain it to you-

https://www.forbes.com/sites/objectivist/2011/06/14/when-it-comes-to-wealth-creation-there-is-no-pie/#66526a8d7a2c
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as always, the elephant chart tells us what we need to understand about wealth in post-industrial nations.

http://harvardpress.typepad.com/hup_publicity/2016/06/branko-milanovic-elephant-chart-brexit.html

as the developing world has become 'developed' since the early 1980s, a massive new source of labor became available. that labor allowed corporations to continue increasing productivity without an associated cost increase from paying higher wages to their workers. prior to then, labor was able to enjoy a significant portion of the gains from increased productivity. but the new labor source basically destroyed unionized labor, and the jobs that weren't shipped overseas were given to those who would work without union protection, who saw no gains in their salary. the increase in women working also influenced this, albeit less.

this has resulted in the creation of upper middle class jobs, management, development, etc which generally stayed in the west and are unlikely to depart it. for those of us in those positions, some of the gains of the richest were shared with us. we didn't see our lot improve as much as that of the rich, or of the international poor, but we got more than enough.

for those who didn't/couldn't get the education for those jobs, income stagnated. they are area B.

i tend to think the rise of right-wing nativism is in part a reaction to the very real "DEY TOOK ARR JERBS" effect that the poor in the developing world had on the employment of the former middle class, now lower class, of the west.

it's interesting: prior to 1980, we had a very large, developed middle class. now, about half of it shifted into the upper middle class, while the other half--hit hard by the real cost increases to education/healthcare/housing--can buy less of the essentials than they could 40 years ago, although they also can afford some new technology that was an extreme luxury years prior.
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Godnorgosh posted...

The album example is also hilarious. He didn't create wealth by selling an album. You can argue that he earned the wealth from those who bought it, but it came from people who already owned it, not out of thin air.

Thanks for wasting my time with more libertarian nonsense. I didn't have enough of it in my life as it was.

Aaaaand you don't understand the difference between wealth and money.

For somebody who preaches the benefits of higher education, you don't seem to have passed middle school economics.
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Capitalism.
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We don't, we worship money in general
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Darkman124 posted...

The Admiral posted...

It defines what poor immigrant families who came to the U.S. with not even a dollar in wealth did to help raise their children to a better living.

tell me what the typical class mobility of poor immigrant families is today compared to then

tell me if something changed

tell me what changed

be specific

The mobility is better. What's changed is an abolition of overtly racist policies that used to hold immigrants back like the Chinese Exclusion Act and "Irish Need Not Apply." It's never been easier for poor immigrants to succeed in the U.S. Natural born U.S. citizens have even less of an excuse to escape poverty, and this reality is an enormous source of tension and embarrassment for many people.
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not all Americans worship the rich, in fact, a lot of Americans demonize the rich.

this is a very bad generalization.
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Americans worship celebrities. Not that many people actually worship money by itself, some do, but there's a reason why Leonardo DiCaprio is way more famous than say Ray Dalio or Ken Griffin.
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The Admiral posted...

The mobility is better.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/07/social-mobility-america/491240/

according to this source, it's objectively not. granted that was the first result when i googled "class mobility over the decades" and i haven't read every other result, but that's pretty clear that what you claim isn't true.
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Social mobility is getting worse in the US, that I agree with, but I think it's due to a broken political situation. This country could easily afford free public universities plus an extensive job training program so help fill all the unfilled jobs across the US, jobs that require skills of some sort.

It wouldn't require a radical change of our system at all to fix these issues. It would just be a reallocation of less than 2% of GDP, that's it.
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Godnorgosh posted...

Let me put it this way.

How does the fact that wealth grows entail that it's not zero-sum? Even if I grant you that wealth can be created, wealth as we know it is finite, and severe income inequality leads to an inability of many people to increase their own share. If you're living each month strapped by rent and other necessary expenses, you're not going to be the next Richard Branson (even the writers at the Ayn Rand Center admit that Branson needed money to implement his ideas). You're probably not going to be investing enough for even your own retirement. Wealth creation and investment are possible only for those who already possess it.

Please explain how Richard Branson being worth five billion dollars means you have less. Does Beardy Branson sneak into your house at night and steal money from your wallet?

I see nobody could understand the middle school level vocabulary used in the last link I posted, so I looked for something simpler-

http://capitalismmagazine.com/2017/11/wealth-creation-is-not-a-zero-sum-game/

Because wealth creation is not a zero-sum game. Those producing and trading goods and services for profit are not taking anything away from othersthe producers and traders are creating material values that would not exist without their productivity.

If I build a wooden bench and sell it to you for $50, you now have a bench worth $50 and I have $50. Wealth has been created. The size of the pie has been increased. That person has $50 less in money, but gains $50 in material goods. This is back to what I said about the difference between wealth and money. Am I getting through? I'm sorry, I'm having to reach back to 8th grade economics terminology to try and explain this to you guys.
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r4X0r posted...

Godnorgosh posted...

Let me put it this way.

How does the fact that wealth grows entail that it's not zero-sum? Even if I grant you that wealth can be created, wealth as we know it is finite, and severe income inequality leads to an inability of many people to increase their own share. If you're living each month strapped by rent and other necessary expenses, you're not going to be the next Richard Branson (even the writers at the Ayn Rand Center admit that Branson needed money to implement his ideas). You're probably not going to be investing enough for even your own retirement. Wealth creation and investment are possible only for those who already possess it.

Please explain how Richard Branson being worth five billion dollars means you have less. Does Beardy Branson sneak into your house at night and steal money from your wallet?

I see nobody could understand the middle school level vocabulary used in the last link I posted, so I looked for something simpler-

http://capitalismmagazine.com/2017/11/wealth-creation-is-not-a-zero-sum-game/

Because wealth creation is not a zero-sum game. Those producing and trading goods and services for profit are not taking anything away from othersthe producers and traders are creating material values that would not exist without their productivity.

If I build a wooden bench and sell it to you for $50, you now have a bench worth $50 and I have $50. Wealth has been created. The size of the pie has been increased. That person has $50 less in money, but gains $50 in material goods. This is back to what I said about the difference between wealth and money. Am I getting through? I'm sorry, I'm having to reach back to 8th grade economics terminology to try and explain this to you guys.

This is a horrible explanation
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The economy is anything but a zero sum game. Simply put, imagine the economy as a giant pizza, a pizza that represents the sum of actual goods and services that people can buy. Economic growth is increasing the size of the pizza, increasing the total amount of goods and services available that someone could theoretically buy. The Industrial Revolution was like the pizza growing rapidly larger, like the number of clothing articles available for example shot way up.

So the economy is not a zero sum game because the pizza changes in size with economic growth. The pizza can also shrink if economic growth is negative.
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