Friday, January 11, 2019

Wealth and money are not exactly the same thing

Comment:

There's this mayor in the Big Apple that's going full blown pinko, and he hopes to ride this to power.

It is the promise of easy money, or money for nothing.

No doubt that it is true that many people who have money may not really deserve it.  It may also be true that people who deserve money may not have it.  This is a matter of equity, and to address it is to some extent worthy of some merit.  However, it can easily morph into an platform for demagoguery.

I am not rich myself, nor have I ever been...  But this mayor's talk requires some kind of response.

When this mayor says that there's a lot of money in New York, but it is in the wrong hands, how does he propose to change this?  How do you decide who should have it, and who shouldn't?  In short, who and how does this get decided?  It should be easy to see who this mayor has in mind.

Another thought that came to me is that by simply spreading money around does not make people wealthy.  For that, you have to define what wealth is.  Let's put it this way--- wealth isn't just passing out greenbacks.  If you could make everyone wealthy that way, it would be a trivial exercise.  If the government wanted to make everyone a millionaire, why they could print out a check for a million dollars, and give it to everybody.

But that diminishes the significance of the money.  If everybody had a million bucks, there would be no significance to having a million bucks.  Surely, this is not hard to see why.  Nobody could outbid anybody for services.  There is just so much of the good stuff to go around.

Would having a million bucks make you any better at what you do?  Would it change you at all?  It would not distinguish you from what you were before.  You have to do something in order to get better at whatever you do.  Handing a million bucks to someone doesn't make them smarter, wiser, or more accomplished.

Easy money is not the way to easy living.  It is just the siren song that lures you to the rocks.  It is folly.  But politically, it is highly effective.  In my opinion, the people most attracted to it are the politicians themselves.  People are also attracted to it, but find to their ultimate dismay that it is ruinous.

Venezuela is an example.  Chavez was elected, you know.  There are many others.

Will people ever learn?  Probably not.  Especially since the culture does not truly inform anybody.




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