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tmoertel 25 days ago

> Not gp, but if the investment is made in either a non-productive asset, or in the secondary market toi buy share in a company that is downsizing/stabilizing their investments..., then the wealth does not benefit society in general but either inflate a bubble, or separate the owning class from the working class.

That if is doing a lot of lifting. What percentage of investments do you believe satisfy that if condition? If that percentage is p, then do you agree that it's generally beneficial for society, for approximately 100% − p percent of the time, when wealthy people decide to invest in the economy instead of spend on themselves?

(Further, even when companies downsize, don't they release their resources, such as people and equipment, back to the market? And doesn't the evidence of economic history suggest that, on the whole, the market tends to take up resources, including those released from downsizing companies, and use them produce goods and services that benefit both the owning class and the working class? For example, for most of history, even the wealthiest of the owning class lacked electricity, air conditioning, refrigeration, radio, television, electronic computers, the internet, cell phones, HDTVs, antibiotics, vaccines, generic drugs, medical imaging, DNA testing, video conferences with health care professionals, and so on. Today, don't even working people benefit from these things? So, even when your if condition holds, the claimed consequence, that such investments "either inflate a bubble, or separate the owning class from the working class" seems hard to believe.)

orwin 25 days ago | parent [-]

More than two third of all public investments are on the secondary market, and this do not benefit investments or the 'real' economy. It's this beneficial to society at best 33% of the time (I'm counting MIC in 'benefic for society' only for the sake of the argument to be clear).

While a worker is beneficial to society 100% of the time.