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mzhaase 6 days ago

The trickle down effect you mention here is simply not present in the data. Instead, wealth inequality keeps going up.

spwa4 6 days ago | parent [-]

Yes it is. What you're conveniently forgetting is that governments and banks (which are kind-of government, except profits go to private hands) think this is a very, very, very, VERY good thing indeed.

Why? Well, what is wealth inequality? It is people and companies (indirectly also people) not spending money. Just keeping it. "For the future". In bank accounts. On the stock market. In government bonds. Under their pillow. This also explains that a very large chunk of "the rich" is in practice people's pensions.

This means that governments can create almost unlimited new money, without taxing anything, and know it'll be hoovered up by the wealthy. What happens in practice? Wealthy people and companies will provide goods and services to hoover up that money, but they won't want (any new) goods and services in return. In other words: it is a way for governments to acquire almost unlimited goods and services in return for ... nothing at all. A few updates to a database "to be paid in the future".

And if you look at what governments spend money on, it's "everyone", the "public good", in other words: on the poor. In other words: this is a way for the poor to get more stuff now.

You want to kill this effect? Expect every government employee, every pensioner, every unemployment benefit receiver, every sick or disabled person and so on to scream bloody murder, because you'll have to seriously cut a LOT of benefits. Or, frankly, if recent history is any indication, to actually just kill you with a 3d printed gun.

Of course, because the government is still overspending, and debt servicing is becoming bigger and bigger. New debt is adding less and less spending power to government budgets. In some countries debt servicing is already bigger than the growth in debt (and not just Argentina and Pakistan). You can calculate: if Trump continues like this, the US will cross this critical threshold halfway through his term (assuming 5% interest rate). At that point the US government will lose the ability to trade government debt for goods and services. And last Trump term spending went up and up and up as his term progressed, and so far the same is happening this term. Had we elected a deceased possum instead of Trump, our country would have been fiscally better of than we are now.

So you'll see the maga republicans join the democrats in shouting and screaming how evil banks and "the rich" are, in 3 years or less. What's scary is that due to Trump this moment is coming towards us a LOT faster than it was under Biden, despite, of course, Trump getting elected on the promise that he would make the opposite happen. But, as said before, a dead possum would have far outperformed Trump on the fiscal front.

reactordev 6 days ago | parent [-]

>this is a way for the poor to get more stuff now.

Ummm, what? That’s not how inequality works.