The Top 500 Richest Americans Hold More Wealth Than The Bottom 150 Million Do, page 1

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 10:44 PM

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www.alternet.org...'s_wealth_--_what's_it_going_to_take_to_get_it_back www.globalresearch.ca... this is just really sad and wrong for so many people to have to work their only lives away for next to nothing. while the "beautiful" elite drag down more and more people into financial opression and mental depression and its only getting worse...in an old bureau in my grandmothers house i found a pay stub of my grandfathers from 1945, he made $2.50 an hour and he worked 40hrs,his gross was $100 even and after deductions he "brought home" $92 ! which means that then, his dollar had 92 cents of buying power!...now, if i gross $100, i "bring home" $65 ! so my dollar now has 65 cents of buying power! and this sad fact makes both parents have to work and their kids are raised by strangers and run wild in the streets...

edit on 17-8-2011 by blocula because: (no reason given)

beezzer

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 10:49 PM

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Originally posted by blocula
www.alternet.org...'s_wealth_--_what's_it_going_to_take_to_get_it_back

So you're trying to justify theft.
Niiiiiice.

Just another class-warfare thread.
*yawn*

EmVeeFF

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:00 PM

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Here's the elephant in the room, the problem with all these "Let's take the wealth back!" movements...

Fist off, this was the foundation of Karl Marx's Ideology

And secondly, all the people who had their "Money taken from them" (as taking the wealth back implies) VOLUNTARILY SUBMITTED to any impoverishing thing they were "subjected" to.

charles1952

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:14 PM

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reply to post by blocula

I'd like to understand your thinking a bit more clearly than I do now. Assume that you and I are identical in every economic respect; same income, bills, everything with one exception, I drink scotch and smoke cigars. Naturally, at the end of the month I have less money left than you do. (I spent mine on scotch and cigars.) This goes on for years until you eventually tell me you have $100,000 more than I do.

Is this state of affairs unfair? Have you done anything wrong to obtain your extra money? How is this situation hurting me? After all, I've had my fun while you were saving.

Maybe, after you've explained this to me we can discuss it more clearly. Thanks

CaDreamer

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:16 PM

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reply to post by blocula

so poor people are poor because the wealthy have all the money?
how does that work?

poor are poor primarily due to the fact that we live in a semi-feudal society, and they aren't in the right class. it really really sucks but its true.

i blame it all on two classes the bankers and the politicians. leach A and leach B.

Thunderheart

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:21 PM

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At one time, Bill Gates and a few of the other 500 were part of the 150 million. You too can be part of the top 500, just invent something that the world desperately needs and patent it.
Instead of hating them how about you learn how to become one of them?

blocula

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:22 PM

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www.mybudget360.com... ...what a decent new car costs now ,you could buy a nice house 40 years ago for the same price!.....somethings really wrong here and the end results not going to be nice

Observer99

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:26 PM

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Originally posted by EmVeeFF
Here's the elephant in the room, the problem with all these "Let's take the wealth back!" movements...

Fist off, this was the foundation of Karl Marx's Ideology

And secondly, all the people who had their "Money taken from them" (as taking the wealth back implies) VOLUNTARILY SUBMITTED to any impoverishing thing they were "subjected" to.

I voluntarily submitted to the Fed? Income tax? Trillions of dollars for criminal wars? Massive printing of money devaluing my wealth? An unsustainable budget deficit set to implode my monetary system?

No, I did not submit to those things.

Originally posted by Thunderheart
At one time, Bill Gates and a few of the other 500 were part of the 150 million. You too can be part of the top 500, just invent something that the world desperately needs and patent it.
Instead of hating them how about you learn how to become one of them?

That is The Lie. If only Joe Shmoe could invent cold fusion, or thorium power, or sentient cell phones, he wouldn't have to work at starbucks.

For one thing, most people could never invent those things. Are you advocating the massive disparity of wealth between motivated geniuses who get lucky, and the other 99.99% of the populace who are not and cannot be that person? Apparently you are.

Capitalism is neither the devil, as believed by communists, nor a legitimate religion, as believed by fringe nutball conservatives. It is a machine. It can be used for good, or abused and perverted for evil. The constant in humanity is that unchecked power leads to evil. Look at the new slick of black sludge growing in the gulf right now and see that evil for yourself. CEOs and higher management simply cannot have the power that they have over so many people's lives. As long as they do, we will keep heading straight toward hell on earth. With corrupt corporations in control, I can guarantee you that one day, sooner than you think, we will not have an earth left. Not one that humans can safely live on, at least.

edit on 17-8-2011 by Observer99 because: addendum

confreak

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:31 PM

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reply to post by blocula

Before people were discriminated against based on their color, gender, or ethnicity, now you will be discriminated based on the amount of illusionary wealth you have.

If you got 1 dollars, and that's all the wealth you have, if you are killed, there is a high chance that they won't spend that much time looking for your killer. But if you are a million, there will be 20 investigators and couple of Police stations collectively working 24 hours a day looking for you.

If you own a dairy and someone robs your dairy, there is a high chance of the Police forgetting about the case, but if someone robs a bank, there will be a helicopter out, and Police will hunt the robber down, even kill him in the process.

Like the case where a homeless man who stole hundred dollars from a bank, handed himself in the next day, he got over a decade in prison. Another man who stole billions of dollars through ponzy schemes only got around 2 years.

Goes to show, the injustice still exists, but not based on race, ethnicity or religion, but based on the amount of illusionary wealth you have.

CaDreamer

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:33 PM

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how can anyone voluntarily submit to something that has been going on for nearly 100 years. the policies and raping of this country was established long ago. longer than most of ATS has been alive.

unrelated to the topic: so glad school has started...less kids on the web, crazy web drivers!

thetruthisclearnow

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:37 PM

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Originally posted by confreak
reply to post by blocula

Before people were discriminated against based on their color, gender, or ethnicity, now you will be discriminated based on the amount of illusionary wealth you have.

If you got 1 dollars, and that's all the wealth you have, if you are killed, there is a high chance that they won't spend that much time looking for your killer. But if you are a million, there will be 20 investigators and couple of Police stations collectively working 24 hours a day looking for you.

If you own a dairy and someone robs your dairy, there is a high chance of the Police forgetting about the case, but if someone robs a bank, there will be a helicopter out, and Police will hunt the robber down, even kill him in the process.

Like the case where a homeless man who stole hundred dollars from a bank, handed himself in the next day, he got over a decade in prison. Another man who stole billions of dollars through ponzy schemes only got around 2 years.

Goes to show, the injustice still exists, but not based on race, ethnicity or religion, but based on the amount of illusionary wealth you have.

I agree with you on everything
but *illusionary*

When lohan can spend thousands upon thousands
of dollars get umpteen DUI;s and not get any prison time...

Or paris hilton caught with COCAIN off pretty much scott free
that money is not *illusionary*

You can smell it, feel it, spend..

It really is unfair..

CaDreamer

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:37 PM

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reply to post by Observer99

with all the intellectual property agreements and non competition clauses etc that people have to sign just to remain employed these days less and less "little guys" are even getting the opportunity to climb that ladder to success.

Google's bid to purchase Motorola is a good example, they stated that Motorolas 17k plus patents is why they want it.
the big guys are gobbling up the little ones a handful at a time. glorious capitalism.

blocula

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:38 PM

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this is what the government expects and demands of the 150,000,000 people and 99% of their children when they grow up >>> "run the rat race till you die and your gonna pay for your coffin and grave as well and if you rock the boat and dont bow down to our iron will you will be left with three choices >>> homelessness,prison or death"........"you have to like yourself to be normal and being normal is expensive"

Timing

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:40 PM

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reply to post by CaDreamer

What is happening isn't capitalism.

What is happening is, for lack of a better word, corruptionism.

In capitalism it would all be equal playing field and the big money corporations would have to compete by the same rules as the smaller guys. The problems is the big money corporations pay politicians to rig the game in their favor. That's called corruption.

Thunderheart

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:45 PM

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Quit whining and go make more money for yourself!
You're jealous of the super rich? The internet moguls? The Hollywood starlets? Go and become one, otherwise stop lusting after their material goods. YOU have the power to become anything you want to be, it takes hard work and dedication, it's not going to happen whilst you sit on the computer whining and feeling sorry for yourselves.
Bunch of lazy babies.

Timing

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:54 PM

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Originally posted by Thunderheart
Quit whining and go make more money for yourself!
You're jealous of the super rich? The internet moguls? The Hollywood starlets? Go and become one, otherwise stop lusting after their material goods. YOU have the power to become anything you want to be, it takes hard work and dedication, it's not going to happen whilst you sit on the computer whining and feeling sorry for yourselves.
Bunch of lazy babies.

I don't understand what your position on the matter at hand is.

People are pointing out exactly what I have pointed out, corruption at it's finest. I also don't see where anyone is said they are aspiring to be anything of the things that you have mentioned. Unless you agree that rich people should have to live by different rules than people that are just "trying to make it".

Why don't you tell us how you feel on the subject instead of lobbing false allegations and assumptions at people in this thread. It would be much more constructive.

blocula

posted on Aug, 17 2011 @ 11:55 PM

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Originally posted by blocula
www.alternet.org...'s_wealth_--_what's_it_going_to_take_to_get_it_back www.globalresearch.ca... this is just really sad and wrong for so many people to have to work their only lives away for next to nothing. while the "beautiful" elite drag down more and more people into financial opression and mental depression and its only getting worse...in an old bureau in my grandmothers house i found a pay stub of my grandfathers from 1945, he made $2.50 an hour and he worked 40hrs,his gross was $100 even and after deductions he "brought home" $92 ! which means that then, his dollar had 92 cents of buying power!...now, if i gross $100, i "bring home" $65 ! so my dollar now has 65 cents of buying power! and this sad fact makes both parents have to work and their kids are raised by strangers and run wild in the streets...
edit on 17-8-2011 by blocula because: (no reason given)

www.good.is...

charles1952

posted on Aug, 18 2011 @ 12:18 AM

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"Why don't you tell us how you feel on the subject ..." written by one of the posters, started me thinking. Can someone please tell me what "the subject" is? Is it that it's not fair that someone has more money than someone else? Or, that people with more money are treated differently? Or, business doesn't want people to get money? Or that government doesn't want people to get money? Or that people with money stole it?

It's often fair and, indeed, inevitable that some people will have more than others, so? People with money get treated differently. So do beautiful young ladies, diplomats, professors, poliburo members, the severely handicapped, etc. This is also inevitable, rail against it all you want. Of course, businesses want people to have money, to whom will they sell their products and stock if everyone is poor? If citizens' money was illegally taken, I can assure you that lawyers smelling a class action law suit will swarm over you.

I am willing to entertain the thought that the government doesn't want people to have money, that would give "Power to the People," and some politicans (most?) don't want that.

So, again, what is the subject?

defcon5

posted on Aug, 18 2011 @ 12:28 AM

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The following is my opinion as a member participating in this discussion.

Originally posted by EmVeeFF
Fist off, this was the foundation of Karl Marx's Ideology

While I understand that redistribution of wealth is considered a form of Communism, lets just go ahead and get over the idea that we live in a true Capitalism right now.

What we actually live in is a form of Feudalism where the elite control everything, and the rest of us peasants live to serve them. True Capitalism in the US died pre-1900’s when your powerful elites started setting up shop in this country. These guys have so much money that they crush anyone who tries to live out the Capitalist dream and make it into their elitist circles. Very few make it into those circles in today’s world as the elite will use any means possible to ensure that anything that generates a large amount of money comes into their control.

These same elite burden the countries social services system by being cheap and unfair with their employees forcing them seek out government assistance to survive in a world where these same corporations constantly surge forward with the cost of services outside the reach of many Americans. All the while they take even more from these workers by using our tax system, and trickle down economics, to their advantage with the ever shrinking middle class footing the tax bill for their expanding profits while the majority of them pay little to nothing into that system.

While everyone is picking on the President over the unemployment rate, who is it that is in fact not hiring people? Is it the president, or is it these greedy corporations who have cut back staff, and increased unemployment in a bid to drive down the costs of the remaining labor through threat of losing their jobs if they do not agree to work harder for less money and benefits? All the while taking tax breaks on the back side so they can “trickle” it back into the economy?

Who is it that cut employees during the recession?
Who is it that eliminated health insurance, or make their employees now pay for it?
Who is it that increased the cost of insurances using Obamcare as an excuse?
Who is it that is sending our work overseas?
Who is it that keeps increasing the cost of their services?
Who is it that eliminated pensions for stock market based 401K’S?
Who is it that manipulated those markets, and crashed many of those 401K’s for profit?
Who is it that refuses to give salary increases?
Who got bailout tax money from us tax payers?
Who is it who by and large does not pay its fair share of taxes?
…And who is it that is taking additional tax breaks because they are supposed to be trickling it into growing our economy?

You want to know where the real economic bubble came from? It came from them having all the money on one side of the bucket, eventually it spilled over into our now recession. All caused by the elitists, with us footing the bill for their greed generated mess.

The attitude of the elitists is to let the middle class bear the burden for the unemployed (caused by them), the disabled, and the retired. If those people starve the elitists could really care less, as long as they don’t do it in front of their country club.
After all, its us serfs jobs to…

Buy their services.
Work for them at slave wages.
Pay for our fellow disabled/elderly surfs way.
Give them additional money whenever they want through our taxes.
Eat, breath, drink whatever toxic crap they throw into our environment.
Not interfere with their lifestyles, or try and enter their elite class.
Die.

No one is saying to unfairly redistribute wealth, but its time to start holding these greedy criminals to the same ethical standards that the rest of us are held to, to make them play fair with their employees, make them stop taking from the pot that we are paying into while they contribute little to nothing, stop them from interfering with other less powerful entrepreneurs, and force them to start contributing back into the country that made them wealthy to begin with.

They had the chance to play fair, and didn’t, now its time to force them too…
The first step IMHO is the removal of all lobbying and campaign contributions that give both the rich and their corporations unfair influence over our political leaders. Without that step we will never see politicians vote the conscience of their constituents, only what their corporate masters tell them to vote.

As an ATS Staff Member, I will not moderate in threads such as this where I have participated as a member.

Timing

posted on Aug, 18 2011 @ 12:36 AM

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Originally posted by charles1952
"Why don't you tell us how you feel on the subject ..." written by one of the posters, started me thinking. Can someone please tell me what "the subject" is? Is it that it's not fair that someone has more money than someone else? Or, that people with more money are treated differently? Or, business doesn't want people to get money? Or that government doesn't want people to get money? Or that people with money stole it?

It's often fair and, indeed, inevitable that some people will have more than others, so? People with money get treated differently. So do beautiful young ladies, diplomats, professors, poliburo members, the severely handicapped, etc. This is also inevitable, rail against it all you want. Of course, businesses want people to have money, to whom will they sell their products and stock if everyone is poor? If citizens' money was illegally taken, I can assure you that lawyers smelling a class action law suit will swarm over you.

I am willing to entertain the thought that the government doesn't want people to have money, that would give "Power to the People," and some politicans (most?) don't want that.

So, again, what is the subject?

Well the subject is the fact that the richest 500 American's hold more wealth than the bottom 150 million Americans. As the title says.

And if you look back over the span of the years of the wealth holders then you would notice that there were more than 500 people with all the wealth and over the course of decades and bad governmental policy that number has shrunk to 500 and will keep shrinking as the polices that created the mess keep getting worse.

Some will use this as a means to keep stoking the class welfare and some will even use this as a means to blow it off as "this is a good thing" and justify it in their minds as "this is just the way it is".

Of course we know people want money, and the more rational people understand that there will be poor people and there will be rich people. There will be homeless people and extremely rich people. Then the majority of us will be middle class and should have a comfortable living. Although this article points out the extremes it is a well known fact that the middle class is shrinking also.

In this case this article points out the extremes of the problem, but the over all problem is that bad governmental policy is destroying our economy.

I have no problems with rich people, as I want to be rich one day myself. What I have problems with is when those rich people get together and start to throw their weight around to rig the game in their favor. And just like not everyone can be rich and not everyone can be pretty, not everyone can so eloquently describe the true nature of the problem at hand without getting emotional. As when you start playing with peoples lives and well being people get emotional, as they should.

edit on 18-8-2011 by Timing because: spelling