Source: Bloomberg
The Robin Hood Index
September 24, 2015 6:00pm by Barry Ritholtz
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I wonder what the transfer would look like if it were for all 400 of the world’s richest people. Anyone know?
I should’ve guessed this index didn’t come from Forbes…
This is an apples to oranges comparison. It uses 1 billionaire against wildly varying populations. A better number would be the top n% of wealthy citizens distributing their wealth.among the rest.
Yes, this is a wildly meaningless metric unless you are named in the list and the poor can vote to Robin Hood your money.
I suspect that if each of the above was stripped of what they earned and the proceeds distributed amongst the asset poor if would be but a temporary victory for socialists.
Within a decade, maybe less, there would be the same number of billionaires, or more, who through their own creativity and hard work would accumulate fortunes. The same percentage, if not more of the Earth;s population would be in poverty, having continued their habits that led them to poverty in the first place.
There have always been rich and poor.And there always will be. One thing I can imagine being worse is if despots play the poverty card with voters to accumulate the ultimate power – controlling everyone’s standard of living and becoming dependents of the State. The progress of civilization in so many vital areas of the human condition would grind to a halt.
Indeed, without the power of the State, the worlds 1,800 Billionaires would be at serious disadvantage when defending their property from the petite bourgeoisie and their peasant armies.
Yes, let the peasants suffer lest we impede civilization’s progress.
… who through their own creativity and hard work would accumulate fortunes …
Please name any billionaires who were not jump-started from wealthy families … and who did not rely almost completely on the creativity and hard work of others … there are a few, but they are VERY few, and they are not the ones that normally spring to mind … Sara Blakely, Elizabeth Holmes, Warren Buffett and Elon Musk fit, but none of the prominent billionaire stereotypes (Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Koch Brothers, Donald Trump, etc) could have ever created the fortunes they sit atop without the creativity and hard work of a lot of other people.
MOST of the billionaires that run around congratulating themselves on the creativity and hard work of others would be unknown today if they were not commensurate snake oil salesmen launch at opportunity from positions of some wealth to begin with … all the “self-made” millionaires and billionaires.
The legend of smart and capable millionaires rising up to conquer the world is nearly all myth … luck and opportunity (another kind of luck) are most of what is required.
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To turn $100 into $110 is work.
To turn $100 million into $110 million is inevitable.
– Edgar Bronfman, Sr.
constantnormal
In you haste to paint a straw man argument, you fail to account for even one billionaire in Asia or Russia. Or the Middle East, or the Near East.I rarely respond to posts as everyone has there view.But you are entitled to your own opinion – not your own set of facts.This was too easy to pass up.
If it is so easy to become a billionaire, why haven’t the Kennedy’s, Rockefeller’s and other bastions of Democrat excess fallen so far short of the mark with each generation? Bad luck, no doubt.
Everyone knows that each billionaire fell from their mother’s womb, crawled into the wilderness, and then ascended the mountain alone, armed only with their wit and guile.
Once again, my name appears nowhere in this list. Lots of songs, god bless the child that’s got his own.