Ha Ha....no more Goodreads.com for quotes!....but the "Tytler cycle" has some merit points. When 62 individuals own as much wealth as 3.5 billion, there is something out of balance. Part of it is the consolidation of power though wealth, ie our current plutocracy. The aggregators of wealth inject that into the political process to further consolidate. It becomes self serving. They in turn rob people of opportunity, which I see as the greatest loss in society right now. You see it everywhere in the world, and automation is just around the corner, displacing even more opportunity.
Consolidation is the enemy of opportunity.
I see some talk about a basic wage, a stipend given by government to every citizen and It may come to that some day. People should dread that. It really is the ultimate loss of opportunity.
I couldn't agree more about consolidation and I am very wary of a national wage. Such ideas have the ring of real desperation to them, and despite what we hear from the politicians, I don't think we're that far up S**t Creek yet.
I think sufficient opportunity to take a national wage off the table can be created through correcting consolidation, ending plutocracy, and investing in society through things like infrastructure repair and creation, new energy sources, addiction treatment, education (which is a whole other topic I won't uncork here), etc. It's not the final answer or guaranteed to be awesome, but I believe it should be tried before we dismiss government spending as a tonic entirely simply because of its potential to negatively affect opportunity. We've seen how deregulation, multinationals, and neoliberalism affect opportunity and they're no sure thing either.
Ha Ha....no more Goodreads.com for quotes!....but the "Tytler cycle" has some merit points. When 62 individuals own as much wealth as 3.5 billion, there is something out of balance. Part of it is the consolidation of power though wealth, ie our current plutocracy. The aggregators of wealth inject that into the political process to further consolidate. It becomes self serving. They in turn rob people of opportunity, which I see as the greatest loss in society right now. You see it everywhere in the world, and automation is just around the corner, displacing even more opportunity.
Consolidation is the enemy of opportunity.
I see some talk about a basic wage, a stipend given by government to every citizen and It may come to that some day. People should dread that. It really is the ultimate loss of opportunity.
I couldn't agree more about consolidation and I am very wary of a national wage. Such ideas have the ring of real desperation to them, and despite what we hear from the politicians, I don't think we're that far up S**t Creek yet.
I think sufficient opportunity to take a national wage off the table can be created through correcting consolidation, ending plutocracy, and investing in society through things like infrastructure repair and creation, new energy sources, addiction treatment, education (which is a whole other topic I won't uncork here), etc. It's not the final answer or guaranteed to be awesome, but I believe it should be tried before we dismiss government spending as a tonic entirely simply because of its potential to negatively affect opportunity. We've seen how deregulation, multinationals, and neoliberalism affect opportunity and they're no sure thing either.