[shreyansh_k]

It seems that we tend to treat wealth inequality as some sort of judgement of fairness and unfairness. That is: the lower wealth inequality, the more fair.

I think projecting the quality of fairness is a false hope.

The Dutch are the tallest people in the world and Asians tend to be the smallest. Remember that oxygen and food are also resources in the world. Consequently, the Dutch inherently use more food and oxygen to maintain their bigger bodies compared to the Asians.

As such, it is unfair to an Asian person that their Dutch friend use so much more, if we were to judge them based on fairness.

Now, just to mess with the reader's mind, I'll flip my own case by saying that since there are many more Asians than the Dutch, it's unfair to the Dutch that Asians consume so much of food and oxygen.

I hope that the reader gets my point that projection of any sort of fairness is an exercise in vain.

I think that if we want to grow up, we need to grow beyond fairness and unfairness. We need to looks for things beyond these realms of false projection.

Personally, I have accepted the idea that some people have more wealth than others and some less. I neither despise those people nor I love them. I feel content with whatever life has given me. Now, that is not to say that I don't desire to be richer. I do and I continue to act in my own favour. It's just that I do not feel sad that I have less than others or hate someone if they are richer.

[cycomanic]

I don't know what your argument about tallness is supposed to mean. Fairness has nothing to do with people being equal in physical attributes, however it does have to do with being equal in front of the law and how to influence law and the ability to improve one's economic situation (or the chance to loose it).

That is what is being eroded by the wealth inequality. The wealthy are significantly insulated from the law, are shaping laws that further reduce their chance of loosing wealth, increasing their wealth in the process and reducing everyone else's economic opportunity.

For a society this creates an unstable situation, if all economic (and political) power sits in the hands of only a few that creates unrest often leading to a violent overturn of the situation (or trying to counteract via totalitarian measures).

As a side note, you say you're content with not being wealthy, but how far would this content stretch, would you be content if you are so poor that you'd struggle to feed your kids?

[MrJohz]

It's also a poor analogy in that the average Dutch person is around 15% taller than the average person in Timor-Leste, which Google informs me has the smallest height difference. If the disparity in wealth were on the order of 15%, I don't think there'd be nearly as much complaint.

Instead, in many countries, it's not uncommon for some people to be sitting on a hundred, a thousand, even a million times as much money as others. The disparity is so great that it's difficult to fully visualise - hence why you get videos of people like Tom Scott driving around trying to demonstrate just how different these sorts of numbers are.

More importantly, wealth scales in a strange way. Becoming a billionaire didn't just entitle you to more exotic holidays or vehicles or mansions than your millionaire peers, it brings incredible ability to influence politics and the world, with next to no accountability from the people whose lives you are affecting. You can buy media companies on a whim. You can demand meetings with politicians. You can make economic threats in order to get your own way. And, unlike politicians, there is no democratic process to elect you or remove you.

The analogy is, therefore, absurd. The premise is that, if you have an issue with wealth inequality, you have an issue with inequality universally, at all scales. But it misses the point that the issue with wealth inequality isn't that the numbers aren't an identical, it's that extreme wealth actively causes problems.

[shreyansh_k]

I hear your comments and agree with your data about the 15% difference (personally, this number doesn't even matter, what matters is just the fact that there is some form of observable difference) even though I haven't verified it.

I'd like to give you a thought exercise, if you be so kind to me. I'd like for you to take that Dutch argument and replace Dutch with "human adult" and Asian with "human baby" (assume it's a booming population where babies outnumber adults) and see if your reasoning serve you well.

[cycomanic]

Seriously what sort of weird equivalence are you trying to create. Apart from the fact that it doesn't even make sense, it doesn't match in terms of scales (sure a baby is 10 times smaller, whatever that means), we are talking about the richest having 5 million times as much as the average (in the US). So your next thought experiment is "ah let's compare an adult with an individual cell"?

[shreyansh_k]

You talk about wealth (and inequality) so much yet you fail to see that food and oxygen is also a form of wealth. We, the humans, in fact, had barter system, food and oxygen before we invented money.

It's difficult to take you seriously.

[MrJohz]

I don't think that analogy works well either, given that humans often put a lot of effort into caring for human babies in order that they are able to make it to adulthood (thus achieving "equality" as per your analogy).

I think it might be easier for you to explain your point if you didn't describe it in analogy, and instead described it directly. The criticism is that large (i.e. several orders of magnitude) wealth gaps are bad for society, and that they cause tremendous power imbalances in what would otherwise be a democratic society.

Purely in terms of wealth inequality, and not through analogy, why do you disagree with this criticism?

[shreyansh_k]

I hear your thoughts on equality before the law and everything. I think it is coming with a good motivation, cute even, but, dare I say, not everybody deserves to be treated equally, if we were even willing to tussle for the sake of equality (and by extension, fairness, see my previous comment).

There are capitalists in this world. There are communists in this world. There are Christians in this world. There are Muslims in this world.

I'm not taking any sides. I'm just saying that it is impossible for all of them to be right... Because they are mutually exclusive ideologies/religions. Someone is bound to be wrong. Therefore, someone deserves to be treated poorly by the law. Infact, dare I say, all these 4 groups are being a bit childish. Also, "totalitarian" is also another such group. Anyway, personally, for the current situation of the world, I think that the world needs at least one adult leader at the helm. In other words, dare I say, a single leader. No, definitely not someone who believes in totalitarianism.

Finally, personally, I think that if I fail to feed my children properly, then, it's either a failure on the part of society to educate me properly or to manage the resources. I am, afterall, a product my society.

[cycomanic]

Sure moral relativity everything is equivalent, there is no morality. I assume you're OK with someone stealing all your things, because it's OK in their moral framework.

Also you might want to actually watch the movie. The whole point about growing inequality is that society is failing to provide economic opportunity because inequality is going through the roof. Education will not help you because of the economic realities.

[shreyansh_k]

Please don't put words into my mouth.

If someone culture is to be honest and not steal, they don't. But having an ideology is not a invitation to force ones own values on to other people. I'd like to live in a honest world and that's the part of the world I limit myself to. I do not force my views onto others or claim to speak for other cultures.

Secondly, in response to your second paragraph, I'd like to quote another sibling comment of mine already in this thread.

Here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39414190

[thomassmith65]

  I think that if we want to grow up, we need to grow beyond fairness and unfairness.

Fair or unfair... it's nice to live in a region where one can leave their house without stepping over homeless people, without having one's car stolen or vandalized, without one worrying about being mugged, and where one's surroundings are vibrant and picturesque. That is not life in a country with high wealth inequality.

[shreyansh_k]

I'm going to tell you a story. A story, I'm afraid, that might leave you even more confused. But, I hope it serve us well.

Sometime in the 1960s (don't quote me on the year), there was plenty of scientific research coming out that cholesterol is bad for your heart's health. Doctors were recommending to completely avoid cholesterol. Governments were in the process of banning it.

It got so bad that for decades people were avoiding food with cholesterol like plague. Companies were actively seeking to substitute it with other things or artificially remove it from their products.

Then, I think in the 2000s (again, don't quote), to everyone's surprise, research started coming out that there seem to be even stronger links of those heart disease with trans fat.

So much so that trans fat actually got banned across countries in the world by many governments by 2010s. Even higher that cholesterol.

Anyway, upon reviewing the old research about cholesterol, researchers learnt that food with high trans fats also tends to be high in cholesterol. I mean, it makes sense, they are both fats... And most food have a complex combination of many fats (among other things). But really, the cause was not cholesterol, it was trans fat.

So, in the cross fire between reasoning (and heart disease) and evidence (caused by trans fat), cholesterol got shot, for no good reason.

[pydry]

Using nihilism to defend wealth inequality is certainly a new one.

[shreyansh_k]

No. Not nihilism. Neither do I participate in nor promote nihilism.

[pydry]

That is literally all you were just promoting.

[shreyansh_k]

I assure you, it's not.

It's one of those things, that is, if you know, you know. If you don't, then you don't. Unfortunately for us, I don't feel good about revealing too much about it (or myself). Sorry.

[pydry]

Nihilism is a family of views within philosophy which rejects generally accepted or fundamental aspects of human existence, such as knowledge, morality, or meaning.

Or fairness. Exhibited by this quote of yours:

>I think that if we want to grow up, we need to grow beyond fairness and unfairness.

You might not be a nihilist, but nihilism is 100% what you are preaching here in defense of wealth inequality.

If you're not, it's somehow even worse. And, it reminds me of this rather brilliant scene in the big lebowski:

    Walter Sobchak: No, without a hostage, there is no ransom. That's what ransom is. Those are the fucking rules.

    Nihilist #2: His girlfriend gave up her toe!

    Nihilist #3: She though we'd be getting million dollars!

    Nihilist #2: Iss not fair!

    Walter Sobchak: Fair! WHO'S THE FUCKING NIHILIST HERE! WHAT ARE YOU, A BUNCH OF FUCKING CRYBABIES?

[shreyansh_k]

I'm fully aware of nihilism. I think it's childish.

I think we don't know if there a meaning to life and we might never have an answer. If such a meaning exists, I think that humans simply are not equipped to reason about the meaning of their own existence.

[EchoChamberMan]

Dark Enlightenment but you're too afraid to say it?

[drekipus]

This is actually a pretty good take when it comes down to it.

I'm reminded of the "businessman and the fisherman" parable.

Wealth and GDP isn't everything. And they definitely aren't moral judgements. People don't just deserve to have more because they have little to start with.

I'm trying to pull my sister and her family out of poverty; the partner doesn't want to work any more than mowing lawns, and they go to the beach on Sundays. That's all they want out of life