[nathan_compton]

I'm pretty sure that wealth accumulated by the very rich at the expense of the poor is bad for total economic development because we drastically under-estimate the value of properly developing human beings.

We see enormous flourishing in society whenever labor is given more power for whatever reason (usually mass deaths) because this increases the amount of resources which flow towards raising children, who then become productive members of society. In times of weak labor power, average people are squeezed tight and less resources flow to children, which fucks shit up.

I think we are seeing that right now in the U.S. - education is nickle and dimed to shit, wages aren't enough to support children, let alone let them flourish, and the general "vibe" is so bad that people don't even want to have kids.

Meanwhile rich people are richer than ever.

[mytailorisrich]

I think a problem is to think that people become rich at the expense of the poor. This is not a zero-sum game.

This leads to the erroneous assumption that making the rich less rich will make the poor less poor. That's obviously not the case.

[nathan_compton]

It isn't a zero sum game, but people still get rich at the expense of the poor, sometimes. There are different ways to accumulate wealth and some are better for society than others.

I object to the observation "wealth isn't zero sum" being used to sop up every possible objection to the way the system currently works.

[throw0101d]

> This leads to the erroneous assumption that making the rich less rich will make the poor less poor. That's obviously not the case.

Taking more money from the poor makes them more poor.

Taking more from the rich 'harms' them less because of the margin utility of money: taking $1k from someone making $160k is qualitatively different from someone making $60k. Taking 20% from someone making $160k ($32k) is qualitatively different than taking 20% from someone making $60k ($12k).

So if you want to have X revenues for funding government, you can take it from those who have more marginal need of it, or those who have less.

[mytailorisrich]

You'll note you've not rebuked what you've quoted from my previous comment, you've argued something different altogether, and used tautologies and fallacies, too.

It not even related to the original comment I replied to about becoming rich the exoense of the poor...

[throw0101d]

I've argued that, given the need to fund government, the point of marginal tax rates is to not to make the rick less rich, but to not make the poor any more poor, but rather to take the money from those who can better afford to have it taken from.

I.e., to take money from those who have (more) money.