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On Inequality of Wealth & How smart barzillia is
tallcharlie
Member Posts: 673 ✭✭✭✭
Liberals make a great fuss over the unequal distribution of wealth common to capitalist society. Let me pose this question: is Inequality of wealth necessarily bad and why?
Comments
Society would be exemplified by the British and the Indian Brahman class systems which limit individual opportunity on the bases of family, religion, or race.
Government and laws include taxes, regulations, politics, and war.
Individual character is demonstrated by the adage, "The poor will always be with us."
Tidy world you have there.
Ecclesiastes 9:11
Your pomposity is showing, as usual.
Tidy world you have there.
Ecclesiastes 9:11
Well, perhaps you think that because you do not understand problem-solving methods.
There are four basic steps in solving a problem:
1. Defining the problem.
2. Generating alternatives.
3. Evaluating and selecting alternatives.
4. Implementing solutions.
My previous post was step 1.
However, you did bring up a fourth category, chance or luck, although I doubt that was your intention, more of a fortunate but unintended consequence.
Yet it is a valid point. If one has bad luck, say being struck by lightning, that person's wealth would surely diminish. Conversely, good luck, say winning the power ball lottery, would surely increase wealth, at least temporarily.
So, Barzillia, despite your apparent intentions, you have luckily made a valuable contribution to the discussion.
quote:Originally posted by tallcharlie
quote:Originally posted by Barzillia
Tidy world you have there.
Ecclesiastes 9:11
Well, perhaps you think that because you do not understand problem-solving methods.
There are four basic steps in solving a problem:
1. Defining the problem.
2. Generating alternatives.
3. Evaluating and selecting alternatives.
4. Implementing solutions.
My previous post was step 1.
However, you did bring up a fourth category, chance or luck, although I doubt that was your intention, more of a fortunate but unintended consequence.
Yet it is a valid point. If one has bad luck, say being struck by lightning, that person's wealth would surely diminish. Conversely, good luck, say winning the power ball lottery, would surely increase wealth, at least temporarily.
So, Barzillia, despite your apparent intentions, you have luckily made a valuable contribution to the discussion.
The verse has virtually nothing to do with "luck", being struck by lightening, or winning the powerball.
It has to do with the situations and conditions people may find themselves involved with, and which they did not cause, but into which God has placed them.Gee, Barz, that sounds exactly like what chance is.
Chance, the occurrence and development of events in the absence of any obvious design.
synonyms: accident, coincidence, serendipity, fate, destiny, fortuity, providence, happenstance, i.e., luck.quote:
Since you are unable to reach anything more than an erroneous and quite superficial conclusion based upon the text, try a decent commentary.
The verse YOU cited ends with these words:
"It is all decided by chance, by being in the right place at the right time." New Living Translation
"..., but time and chance happen to them all." New International Version
"..., but time and chance happeneth to them all." King James Version
"But time and unpredictable events overtake all of them." God's Word Translation
..."for time and chance overtake them all." New American Standard 1977
The full American King James Version is, "I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but time and chance happens to them all."
Now, Barzillia, you conveniently took my words out of context, which is typical of you, and selected only the one you could attack with any chance of being believed.
The truth is, I wrote, "...a fourth category, chance or luck..."
You elected to delete the word chance and base your deceitful, lying, and duplicitous argument on the word luck.
Unfortunately for your argument, every one of the translations of that verse contains the word chance, so of course you couldn't let it stand because it would make you look like more of a fool to argue that chance is not chance, or whatever the hell you're trying to prove.
And you still don't know crap about problem-solving methods.
Nothing left but name calling when you have no argument, eh ?
Posted by Barzillia - 02/14/2016 : 10:36:06 AM
It depends.
Posted right now by bpost
Ditto..............
Try a Hebrew interlinear and a commentary.
You are a yard wide and a quarter inch deep in this matter.
No thinking person would term the providential will of God "luck".
And that would be the beginning of honest problem solving.
Barzillia, I am not going to let you screw-up another discussion with your pompous BS. As far as I am concerned you are a disruption and a waste of time.
You can take your commentaries and your obnoxious self-importance and stick them up the source of your bull.
I think this can be easily supported by looking a how the distribution of wealth has changed in the last half-century. As tax laws and regulations have changed, become more oppressive, more unequally applied for political reasons, wealth has moved farther and farther to the right, into the hands of the already wealthy.
Can it not be said then that government is the major cause of wealth inequality?
After 50 years of the war on poverty we have the same % below the poverty line as when it started except of a much larger population. The war has been lost. But was it ever intended to be won?
I like the contrast presented by environmentalist (liberals) in that you can be arrested for feeding the bears in a national park, because the bears will lose their ability to hunt or be self sufficient, grow dependant on an easy source of food. They are right.......it works.
Evidencing, of course, that you have no rational response.
If you can't muster an adequate response, then fine. It was you who introduced scripture to the discussion.
Thanks for your time.
No he did not, you did.
The word "religion" is not scripture.
In your normal pious manner YOU posted scripture. Your troll response of "it depends" was as useless as teats on a boar when it came to even hinting at answering the OP questions or adding to the discussion.
Oh by the way, you are a smart guy, very intelligent indeed, one of the smartest, most informed, well studied men to ever be on this web site.
Too bad it is wasted intelligence because of your habit of posting in such a disruptive trollish manner.
When Capitalist cheat the system, When wall street steals and gets away with it, when corporations make faulty seat belts, ignition switches, prescription drugs and kill people but pay that off with the profits from cheating. When Banks manipulate the interest rates, and use such poor management that it threatens to bankrupt society, When for profit takes over for common decency then Yes inequality comes to play.
As far as taking from one hard working person and giving it to a slug no
What did American politicians do? They bailed out their buddies, NOBODY went to jail and Christopher Dodd has never "found" his sweetheart mortgage from Countrywide.
CORRUPTION should be a death penalty case. The Chicago School superintendent and ex governors need hung in Daily plaza.
Or some nomad in Asia took a bag of eastern rice a couple of hundred miles to the West and traded them for a piece of jade or gold. Then he went home and traded the jade for ten bags of rice and started the process all over again.
Along came some bandit warlord with a couple of tough friends and he discovered that he could demand a share of the knapper's food or the nomad's rice, and government was born.
Later, I am sure, either the knapper or the nomad discovered that he could slip a little baksheesh to the warlord's helper (the first bureaucrat), and get his competitors' throats cut or his taxes lowered. Thus began government corruption.
Anyhow, the point is that capitalism can function quite nicely without government, but once government comes into existence, capitalism also thrives in cooperation with it.
Think about that.
Oh, I almost forgot. Barzillia is smart and well educated. Peace be upon him.
quote:Originally posted by bpost
quote:Originally posted by Barzillia
Evidencing, of course, that you have no rational response.
If you can't muster an adequate response, then fine. It was you who introduced scripture to the discussion.
Thanks for your time.
No he did not, you did.
The word "religion" is not scripture.
In your normal pious manner YOU posted scripture. Your troll response of "it depends" was as useless as teats on a boar when it came to even hinting at answering the OP questions or adding to the discussion.
Oh by the way, you are a smart guy, very intelligent indeed, one of the smartest, most informed, well studied men to ever be on this web site.
Too bad it is wasted intelligence because of your habit of posting in such a disruptive trollish manner.
"Individual character is demonstrated by the adage, "The poor will always be with us."
Please cite the source of the "adage", if not Matthew 26:11 , or John 12:8, et al .
"It depends" is a direct and simple response to the original question, " is inequality of wealth necessarily bad and why ?"
And it does depend.
In some circumstances, it might be necessarily bad.
In some circumstances, it might not.
It depends, does it not ?
I gave you the rationale for my thinking.
If you have problems with the conclusions of the reference, bring them forward.
Name calling, insults, and presuming that you know what I think or my intentions in what I post do not reflect well upon you.
If you have something to add to the discussion besides talking about me, why not post it ?
It is not about Barzillia.
Adage | Definition of Adage by Merriam-Webster
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/adage
Merriam#8209;Webster
Define adage: an old and well-known saying that expresses a general truth.
That is not scripture.
QED
of truth in Barzillia's post.quote:Originally posted by Barzillia
quote:Originally posted by bpost
quote:Originally posted by Barzillia
Evidencing, of course, that you have no rational response.
If you can't muster an adequate response, then fine. It was you who introduced scripture to the discussion.
Thanks for your time.
No he did not, you did.
The word "religion" is not scripture.
In your normal pious manner YOU posted scripture. Your troll response of "it depends" was as useless as teats on a boar when it came to even hinting at answering the OP questions or adding to the discussion.
Oh by the way, you are a smart guy, very intelligent indeed, one of the smartest, most informed, well studied men to ever be on this web site.
Too bad it is wasted intelligence because of your habit of posting in such a disruptive trollish manner.
"Individual character is demonstrated by the adage, "The poor will always be with us."
Please cite the source of the "adage", if not Matthew 26:11 , or John 12:8, et al .I carefully chose the word adage to avoid any disagreement about the authority, validity, or source of those words.
Once a phrase or truism or bit of wisdom comes into common usage, it matters not the source. If one were to write, "Early to bed, early to rise," that would not invite a discussion of Benjamin Franklin. Rather, it would obviously refer to the principles of hard work and self-improvement.quote:"It depends" is a direct and simple response to the original question, " is inequality of wealth necessarily bad and why ?"It depends is also ambiguous. It means nothing without expansion.quote:And it does depend.
In some circumstances, it might be necessarily bad.
In some circumstances, it might not.
It depends, does it not ?
I gave you the rationale for my thinking. So you say, but the fact is that your entire post consisted of the two words, "It depends."
If you were truly interested in expressing your thinking, your reasons, you would have continued by stating just exactly what it was that "it" depended upon. But you didn't. You left it to the reader to guess at your meaning and thereby fall into error.quote:If you have problems with the conclusions of the reference, bring them forward.
Name calling, insults, and presuming that you know what I think or my intentions in what I post do not reflect well upon you.Guessing about what you think is about all we can do since you make it a practice of posting partial, obscure, and ambiguous statements.quote:If you have something to add to the discussion besides talking about me, why not post it ?
It is not about Barzillia.
It is indeed about Barzillia.
One of your most over-used practices is to post some obscure reference, some partial statement, and then jump on anyone that tries to guess at what you really meant. You do it over and over. You have done it several times in this discussion alone.
Or you cite the Bible and then pounce on anyone whom presumes to know what the reference means. And of course, the obvious interpretation is never correct, so you then have the opportunity to tell that person how stupid they are.
You commonly phrase your statements in such a way as to be able to deny anything that anyone else might assume is your real meaning. You are duplicitous in the extreme, dishonest, double-dealing, and of bad faith.
You give only partial positions, and rarely commit yourself by completely stating your position so that you can wiggle you way out of any corner when you are shown to be wrong...which in your mind never happens.
You set traps. You post provocative assertions and then dance around them when challenged. You try to make it an absolute certainty that no matter what the reply, you will be able to declare that it is wrong, assert that you know much more than the person replying, and then demonstrate your knowledge and intelligence by "explaining" what you really meant.
If you were honest, which you are absolutely not, you would simply explain yourself to begin with rather than repeatedly setting the stage for your correspondent's belittlement.
What surprises me is that while nearly everyone on this forum knows your habits, you seem to be unaware of them.
Oh, I almost forgot. Barzillia is smart and well educated. Peace be upon him.
Liberals make a great fuss over the unequal distribution of wealth common to capitalist society. Let me pose this question: is Inequality of wealth necessarily bad and why?
I have been thinking about this question a lot today. The poorest American is uber rich when compared to billions across the globe. As I stated before if your measurement for wealth is dollars inequality is the natural state for mankind. I am leaning towards inequality as being good not only natural; it gives people something to strive for the betterment of their lives.
If your measure of wealth is happiness then even the poorest among us can have wealth we can only imagine.
Since 1963, various governments have instituted literally dozens of welfare programs. Are any of these programs figured into the pre-tax cash income used to determine poverty? Does anyone know?
quote:Originally posted by bpost
quote:Originally posted by Barzillia
Evidencing, of course, that you have no rational response.
If you can't muster an adequate response, then fine. It was you who introduced scripture to the discussion.
Thanks for your time.
No he did not, you did.
The word "religion" is not scripture.
In your normal pious manner YOU posted scripture. Your troll response of "it depends" was as useless as teats on a boar when it came to even hinting at answering the OP questions or adding to the discussion.
Oh by the way, you are a smart guy, very intelligent indeed, one of the smartest, most informed, well studied men to ever be on this web site.
Too bad it is wasted intelligence because of your habit of posting in such a disruptive trollish manner.
"Individual character is demonstrated by the adage, "The poor will always be with us."
Please cite the source of the "adage", if not Matthew 26:11 , or John 12:8, et al .
"It depends" is a direct and simple response to the original question, " is inequality of wealth necessarily bad and why ?"
And it does depend.
In some circumstances, it might be necessarily bad.
In some circumstances, it might not.
It depends, does it not ?
I gave you the rationale for my thinking.
If you have problems with the conclusions of the reference, bring them forward.
Name calling, insults, and presuming that you know what I think or my intentions in what I post do not reflect well upon you.
If you have something to add to the discussion besides talking about me, why not post it ?
It is not about Barzillia.
I love it when you speak in third person.....now! if there was no bible,no Quran, and no Scrolls (to tell you what really happened)..would you believe a rock smashed against your head will determine who eats today?...."Pecking" order.is the answer...
I'm not going to comment on whether inequality of wealth is "fair" or not, but history has shown it is great at destabilizing governments...particularly democratic ones.
Is it really the unequal wealth or is the government laws and regulations giving rise to crony-capitalism that causes the destabilization? Much as the Boston Tea Party was caused by taxing folks to fund things across the pond, we see special interests gaining enormous wealth because the game is rigged by bankers, the fed, Wall Street and government corruption.
Lie. I stated that, "I carefully chose the word adage to avoid any disagreement about the authority, validity, or source of those words."
In fact, I did not bother to verify the source, but simply cited the adage. I don't really give a damn where it comes from; the source is irrelevant to all but you, and all you want is to turn it into a discussion about the Bible so that you can show off your self-proclaimed superiority.
quote:Posted by the all-knowing barzillia"The reference I gave directly contradicted your simplistic outlook , and went directly to those things on which human conditions depend.""Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn." Rhett Butler
Thank you, barzillia, for hijacking what was, before your contribution, an intelligent discussion on the subject of inequality of wealth.
If you would like, we can now argue about the true message of Gone with the Wind.
You remind me of a wolverine: what you can't consume or destroy you crap all over.
Does that matter to you?
quote:Originally posted by bpost
Barzillia, do you realize that you are widely considered a troll?
Does that matter to you?
Back to name calling again, eh ?
Doesn't the truth matter to you ?
It it truly sad to see the potential of your gifted intellect wasted in such a disruptive, useless manner when you could contribute so much more in a positive manner. I suppose that is what internet trolls do, and Barzillia you are truly a master internet troll of the lowest order, you must be very proud of yourself.
I bet the Training of Pavlov is also strong in this one. Ding Ding! [^]
Our lives hath cometh between us,
And we art falling apart.
2. I sayeth what about breakfast at Tiffany's?
Then the voice of God did spake from above,
3. 'Breakfast with a woman not thine wife
Is adultery, a most grievous sin!
Repent, else Mine words striketh ye down!'
4. Trembling, now, she sayeth,
I think I doth remember that film line!"
-One Hit Wonders 13:1-4
Got that?
Understand it?
Need a biblical citation to support the assertion?
inequality of wealth is a subject pondered on mostly by those who do not seek to improve their own situation by an equal application of effort
That is a fine reason for wealth inequality! While folks are in the streets protesting minimum wage, supporting Bernie Sanders and complaining about the cost of student loans the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs is busy trying to improve his lot in life by working!
Low effort expended, low results reaped. Those folks that strive to just get by in life sometimes come up short. Just living is not a goal, just living is a finite gift.
Is it really the unequal wealth or is the government laws and regulations giving rise to crony-capitalism that causes the destabilization? Much as the Boston Tea Party was caused by taxing folks to fund things across the pond, we see special interests gaining enormous wealth because the game is rigged by bankers, the fed, Wall Street and government corruption.
Wealth and power go hand in hand. That's a law as old as civilization itself.
In the absence of Government intervention, wealth and power will coalesce on their own.
With intervention, that can be reversed.....or in case of crony capitalism, it can be accelerated.
Again, this has nothing to do with "fairness". It simply is what it is.
A large enough, angry enough underclass will bring down a Republic, just as it did Rome.
quote:Originally posted by tallcharlie
Barzillia, you are a crashing bore.
Got that?
Understand it?
Need a biblical citation to support the assertion?
"I find it hard to hate a man for whom I have prayed." D. Bonhoeffer
Hate? Me? For speaking the truth? I shall pray for you, too.