[Silentio]

The idea that the wealthy started from nothing and ascribing their wealth to the "hard work" of building from nothing is romantic, but ultimately it's a fantasy. No doubt much individual hard work goes into building a fortune, but the fortune itself owes much more to the labor of thousands, if not millions, of workers, right down to the janitor who sweeps the floor, than it does to the individual who had the next big idea. Labor certainly has more to do with wealth than capital itself.

Inequality is embedded in capitalism. When the invisible hand moves capital from one place to another, it does not only give, it takes away. For someone like Bill Gates to give as he does, he has to have taken away (you might prefer "created") in the first place.

It may be muck-stirring, but I am less interested in saving the world than I am in understanding the ideological assumptions implicit in, for instance, Gates's actions, and the systems that allow those actions to take place. To leave the muck unstirred, to forget it exists, is to live in a world that does nothing but support conventional wisdom, excludes alternatives, and limits debate. The useful question is not, "is this True or not," but rather, "what would it mean if it were true."

Finally, if Zizek is a conspiracy theorist, was Hegel, was Marx?

[swombat]

Inequality is embedded in capitalism. When the invisible hand moves capital from one place to another, it does not only give, it takes away. For someone like Bill Gates to give as he does, he has to have taken away (you might prefer "created") in the first place.

That is where your misunderstanding lies. The world is not a finite-sum game. Wealth created is not wealth taken away. Someone like Bill Gates accumulated a lot of wealth because he created a lot of wealth - not because he took it from someone else. The difference between "taking away" and "creating" is like the difference between murder and sex.

[zouhair]

How is that our World is not finite? Simply take the U.S., the difference between the rich and the poor widened immensely, because most of the profit (or what you call "created wealth") is not shared equally among those who made it. I doubt Bill Gates would have gained so much if he were alone doing the job, we favour only the one who bring the money not the one who do the actual job. There is a capital gain in people's work and their wages are far from covering it.

[blhack]

You're assuming that wealth and money are closed systems.

They are not.

Money is just a universal currency that we all use for work. Do you want a new ipod? Well, apple doesn't trade in man-hours, they trade in dollars. So what you need to do is get a job with somebody that will trade you some of their dollars for your man hours (think of an employer like a currency exchange). Once you have exchanged enough of the currency you have (time) for the currency that the currency exchange (your employer) has (dollars), you can take them to apple and trade them for an iPod.

Apple then reverses the transaction. They take some of the dollars that you gave them, and trade their workers some of the dollars for some of their man-hours.

Dollars are just a common currency. The INPUT (making it a non-closed system) is work.

So no, by creating wealth, you are NOT simply robbing it from people. This is appropriately called "robbery".

There is a slightly longer explanation here:

http://www.gibsonandlily.com/cgi-bin/reply.cgi?thread_id=177...

[zouhair]

And what about the Capital Gain, the salary doesn't cover that. And what about the minority owning the majority of the money. The game is utterly rigged in favour of the powerful.

[GeneralMaximus]

Inequality is embedded in capitalism. When the invisible hand moves capital from one place to another, it does not only give, it takes away. For someone like Bill Gates to give as he does, he has to have taken away (you might prefer "created") in the first place.

I, for one, am mortally afraid of living in an "equal" world. Your website tells me you want to pursue a PhD, so let's talk about that. You are a person who has worked hard for achieving your academic goals. Would you like to be considered equal to a person who spent his life partying and clubbing and not giving a shit? Would you like it if someone gave this party animal the PhD you deserve?

Yes, Gates had an advantage. His genius lies in recognizing that advantage, and building on it. Gates came from a rich family. Instead of wasting away what he had, he used that wealth and power and built Microsoft -- one of the most recognized brands on planet Earth.

Mind you, I'm not against philanthropy. Heck, I wish my government spent 100x more cash on building schools in backwards areas, and that a few local millionaires threw some cash in, too. What I'm against is this prevalent notion that people should be "equal". Created equal? Surely. But after that, nobody is equal.

Inequality is good. Inequality makes the world go around.

[visdo]

Please leave hacker news, this is not your place.

[GeneralMaximus]

Hey, this is HN. Everyone has their say. Besides, arguing is fun :)

[Silentio]

Damn, I guess I will.