[rmunn]

> ... human trafficking exists because some people are rich and others are poor ...

No, it doesn't. This is an absurd claim, and nobody intelligent should take it seriously. Human trafficking exists because some people choose to do evil things. There are plenty of relatively-rich people who are actively trying to stop the evil of human trafficking.

Furthermore, just being wealthy has not, historically, made you immune to being made a slave. For just one example, look at the story of Joseph in the Bible. He was his father's favorite son, the heir presumptive to fantastic wealth for his time (that "coat of many colors" his father gave him cost the equivalent of what a sports car would today), and yet his brothers who hated him sold him into slavery while his father wasn't around to protect him. Throughout history, cross-border slave raiding has been a thing, too: it didn't matter how much gold you had tucked under your bed if the Vikings (or whoever) caught you alone, or outnumbered and overpowered your hired guards: once they hauled you away and slapped chains on you, you no longer had access to your wealth, and your life depended on making your captors happy with your work.

To think that slavery, ancient or modern, is caused by relative wealth differentials reveals an abysmal ignorance of both history and human nature.

[customguy]

> To think that slavery, ancient or modern, is caused by relative wealth differentials reveals an abysmal ignorance of both history and human nature.

I claimed no such thing, you read way too much into your missing the point.

> if the Vikings (or whoever) caught you alone, or outnumbered and overpowered your hired guards

Wait, I thought it was just because "some people do evil things", nothing to do with relative power?

[rmunn]

I'm deliberately giving an illustration that shows that relative power throughout most of history had to do with physical strength and weapons, rather than money.

And if you didn't mean that slavery is caused by relative wealth differentials, then saying "... the people who treat them like slaves have even more. It's all about the relative difference between people who are alive today ..." was a very poor way of making your point. So what was your point that I missed, then?

[customguy]

That in this context, it's about the wealth that leads to "having economic power over the people around you". That is zero sum, and the general rise in absolute living standards is as relevant to that as a comment about apples is in a discussion about Apple.

[rmunn]

Ah. When that one commenter said "Wealth is having economic power over the people around you", I ignored him, because that's a ridiculous definition, not to be taken seriously. Any argument that arises out of that definition is inherently flawed, since one of its premises is false; it would be like saying "Since the moon is made of green cheese, therefore X". The definition of wealth that nearly everyone agrees with is, well, I'll just cite the opening line of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth because it's a pretty good summary: "Wealth is the abundance of valuable financial assets or physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for transactions." Or, to put it in simpler terms, wealth is the stuff you have that you can use to satisfy your desires. Anyone trying to make it about economic power over people is trying to redefine the standard definition for his own purposes... and that's usually a big red flag warning you of a bad argument.

[customguy]

it is simply one meaning of the word, and you talking about something else instead a waste of time.