Market crashing?

[u/OkName77]

People have been saying that the market is going to crash forever now, is it ever going to? Everything is so expensive and it feels like inequality is just going to keep continue growing

[u/PhilRubdiez]

Is there anything inherently wrong with inequality? The economy is not some zero sum game where if a person is a billionaire, then some poor shmuck has $0. The people who whine about inequality are sour grapes about not being as successful as other people.

As far as market crashes, there are requisite boom and bust cycles. Whether you feel like it’s the government’s job to fix them (Keynesian Economics) or to let the market sort it out (Austrian School) depends on which you subscribe to.

[u/LooseYesterday → u/PhilRubdiez]

Couldn't agree more, read somewhere that most inequality can be explained by personality traits more specifically neuroticism and consciousness, so if someone is very anxious and can't execute their plans they will end up poorer, you combine that we with the fact that such disorganized people are more likely to have kids and get divorced etc you can see how someone ends being poorer

[u/Whole_Gate_7961 → u/PhilRubdiez]

Is there anything inherently wrong with inequality?

I think it depends a lot on the gap between the top and the bottom. Everyone should expect that some people will make more money than others. What people are upset about is the massive and continuously growing gap between the top and the bottom, as it appeaers as though its only going to widen further.

If someone makes 200k per year, they are likely a whole lot closer to being homeless on the streets than they are to being a millionaire.

What smart decisions can someone who makes 100k per year need to achieve to become a billionaire?

Is it about working harder? The very wealthy are not wealthy because they went to work 16 hours a day, 6 days a week, makimg a contribution to societies needs. They are much more likely to be wealthy because they started out with a large sum of money and invested/manipulated that money in a way to have large ROI.

Is there a way to become a billionaire by working hard at something that doesnt involve manipulating money? The majority of people don't have the resources to start a business or patent new inventions. My understanding is that the majority of new businesses fail anyways.

[u/Asato_of_Vinheim → u/PhilRubdiez]

The economy is not some zero-sum game where if a person is a billionaire, then some poor shmuck has $0.

I'm really not sure why so many capitalists don't understand the fixed pie fallacy. At any given point, there is a limited supply of resources available, and one person having exclusive access to more necessarily results in another having access to less.

Something not being a zero-sum game doesn't change this, it simply means that the total supply of resources can change over time. The fallacy comes into play when a certain distribution of resources would result in greater long-term prosperity for everyone involved but is rejected on the basis of currently being less desirable for the objecting party.

Needless to say, this doesn't impact how desirable or undesirable inequality is on its own, it simply states that other factors can be more important and must be considered.