|
| quote: | Originally posted by gurra
I understand why people have the same opinion as you. But I sure don't want a society where some are enormously rich (even if they "deserve" all their money!) and some incredibly poor. Of course you should be able to do better for yourself, but how are you going to afford a good education if you're born in to poverty? The society must give everyone the same basic conditions. |
There is a universality that people are born with in capitalist style economy: hard work equals prosperity. How many countless examples of people going from rags to riches do we need? Only a very, very small portion of those considered in the upper class are from so called "old" money.
I would also strongly argue the true meaning of "poverty" at least in the United States. What constitutes poverty is extremely subjective from country to country, and more importantly from decade to decade. Examine those living in poverty from other countries, and even look at what constituted poverty 100 years ago for an American and you will see drastic differences.
I wish I could find the article, but I read an interesting interview with a bottled water producer from Denmark. It had gotten to the point that he would actually stop working when he got to certain income level, because anything more the government would completely take away. True, the entire population is guaranteed certain privelages, but at the cost of incentive to work any harder than those around you. If I am guaranteed that even if I work twice as hard as my neighbor, I will only reap the same rewards, what is my incentive to work harder? Socialism in this form destroys incentive by punishing those that would work to get ahead.
|
