[mentalgear]

One of the engines of collapse of Rome was the corrupt financial elite extending to the government that designed rules to extract maximum wealth for the elites, ignoring the long-term health of the economy. By the end, the government was essentially squeezing a dry sponge. Seems like civilisation has learned nothing.

[diordiderot]

You'd think that an army full of oppressed Roman citizens would've overthrown them right.

[mentalgear]

Yes, you'd think that. There are historical precedents of high-civilisation collapse (in South America) and Europe (French Revolution). Sometimes people rise up and something better arises from it. Sometimes they don't, but the tainted civilisation will still collapse one way or another under it's own corruption.

[bamboozled]

The elites have, and that’s what they’re doing in the USA. As for the plebs. It’s expensive bread and UFC on the Whitehouse lawn.

[skybrian]

In ancient times, wealth was based on controlling farmland and extracting food from peasants. Modern economies don’t work like that, so what you can learn from historical analogies is limited.

[chadgpt3]

They're still based on controlling shares and extracting profits from workers. Very similar.

[skybrian]

Oddly, for some companies, the money comes from advertisers. When this started becoming a thing, I figured it would be a bubble and eventually businesses would wise up, but they've kept on paying for decades now.