Davos 2015: Less Innovation, More Regulation, More Unrest. Run Away!

Freshly Exhumed writes: Growing income inequality was one of the top four issues at the 2015 World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, ranking alongside European adoption of quantitative easing and geopolitical concerns. Felix Salmon, senior editor at Fusion, said there was a consensus that global inequality is getting worse, fueling overriding pessimism at the gathering. The result, he said, could be that the next big revolution will be in regulation rather than innovation. With growing inequality and the civil unrest from Ferguson and the Occupy protests fresh in people's mind, the world's super rich are already preparing for the consequences. At a packed session, former hedge fund director Robert Johnson revealed that worried hedge fund managers were already planning their escapes. "I know hedge fund managers all over the world who are buying airstrips and farms in places like New Zealand because they think they need a getaway," he said. Looking at studies like NASA's HANDY and by KPMG, the UK Government Office of Science, and others, Dr Nafeez Ahmed, executive director of the Institute for Policy Research & Development, warns that the convergence of food, water and energy crises could create a "perfect storm" within about fifteen years.

Comments

Regulation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that they've got theirs, it's fine if regulations hold back everyone else.

Re:Regulation?

[Jane Q. Public]

Now that they've got theirs, it's fine if regulations hold back everyone else.

I have nothing against people being rich, if they got there honestly and without coercion. Government lobbying, for example, is one form of coercion because it influences regulation of others via money.

But let's face it: most of them did not get there quite honestly or without resorting to coercion. And in fact, regulations helped to get them there. Not only is that obvious on its face, you can see it in the statistics: the more "statist" and regulatory governments have been, the less well economies have done and the more income inequality we've seen.

Now they're proposing to try to fix the problem they created, by doing more of what created it. Typical government idiocy.

And as for "unrest", they aren't going to be able to regulate that away. On the contrary: at least here in the U.S., if they don't start lightening up on Federal regulation, they're going to see far worse problems and more unrest than they have so far.

Re: Regulation?

[cyber-vandal]

The greatest income inequality in the developed world can be found in probably the least statist country, the US.

Re: Regulation?

[ArmoredDragon]

You seem to be forgetting WWII, the repercussions of which are still - to this day - haunting many countries, especially in Europe.

Ok let's look at one of the countries that got hurt perhaps the worst by WWII: Japan. (Two nuclear bombs, starving population, totally decimated manufacturing infrastructure.) Meanwhile they're perhaps second only to the US as far as a high tech economy. They also rank very high on many income inequality lists.

While they might be statist in some respects, economically they are anything but, and in many respects they make the USA look like a command economy in comparison.

Also the US isn't the country with the highest income inequality in the developed world.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fac...

But nice talking points anyways, I'm sure they make you feel good about yourself.

Re:Regulation?

[dywolf]

How do you possess these completely opposing thoughts at the same time?
I swear you are a textbook example of doublethink.

You start off good, then you say things like "the more "statist" and regulatory governments have been, the less well economies have done and the more income inequality we've seen" or " if they don't start lightening up on Federal regulation, they're going to see far worse problems and more unrest than they have so far".

The sheer idiocy and blindness required to actually believe this things while at the same time acknowledging that inequality is a problem and talk about holding the rich responsible for rigging the system is staggering.

You are seriously blaming the government and regulation for the inequality we see, and suggesting we do LESS of it?
You are a moron.

Re: Regulation?

[dywolf]

Oh BS.

No, not all tech companies are from the US or originated here. Not even close.

Middle class incomes are higher in Canada.
Purchasing power parity is higher in Europe.
Standards of living are higher as well.
Health standards are higher.
And inequality is lower.
People are happier, work less, earn as much, and yet as just as productive as US workers.

And then you even make the "well the poor have microwaves, so therefore they aren't poor" argument.
Sheer idiocy.

Essentially, you don't know what F you're talking about.

Re: Regulation?

[dywolf]

You fool.

That chart disproves your entire stance.

You may be technically correct that the US is "not #1".
But if you actually looked at, and understood that chart,
you'd have noticed that the only country with more inequality than the US is Chile.

The US is #2 on that chart.

The chart is sorted according to the pre-tax numbers, but its the after tax numbers that matter.

Inequality may start out higher in other countries thanks to old (seriously old) money, but thanks to their redistributionist policies, actual inequality is lower, and everyone lives more equality, with better healthcare, working conditions, benefits, standard/quality of living, and overall better access to and representation in the market.

So the point that the chart then makes is that redistribution works.
The chart you provided therefore undercuts your own argument and disproves your point.

Re: Regulation?

[dywolf]

and if you'd have bothered to read the article, the author even makes that point:

the U.S. had the second-highest level of inequality, behind only Chile.

Re:Regulation?

[deadweight]

Is this a standard Fox/Rand template? Every place with more government has more of this problem (easily proved to be not true in 5 minutes), so the obvious solution is to have less government (also easily proved in about 3 minutes). Are you all utterly impervious to reality?

Re: Regulation?

[drsmithy]

Yet my income is well below the poverty level, [...]
Then how do you afford the things you say you have ? Because a thousand bucks a month minus necessities like food and shelter, doesn't leave a lot left over to pay for iPads, big TVs and cars.
The rest of your post is just straw men and non-sequiturs.

Re:Regulation?

[whitroth]

This is insightful? I suppose, if you're a libertarian.

Reality check: in the US, Congress almost *never*, sitting around in the room, decides, "hey, let's make a new regulation, we ain't doin' anything else anyway, and we need to look like we're working." This seems to be what the poster I'm replying to thinks.

Let's see: St. Ronnie and the Republicans push through banking and s&l "reform", and cut the budget for the regulators. Several years later, the S&L disaster, of which, according to the papers at the time, 30% was internal, white collar crime.
Deregulate telecoms*, and several years later, the tech bubble bursts, wiping out many retirement investments, and causing a recession.

Bush & co cut regulation of banking and stocks; and we get the current Lesser Depression.

Anyone else notice a pattern here? Sort of like less regulation and regulators, and the majority of us get screwed, and loose money, while the top 1% keep going up?

And I *do* have something against "people being rich". How 'bout we just have a 100% tax on all wealth above $1G? Or maybe above $500M? What', a hundred million dollars isn't enough incentive, people will just fraudulently get themselves on welfare, and sit back and drink light beer and watch tv? Don't bother talking about job creators, either: they've been getting richer and richer... WHERE ARE THE JOBS? (Other than the ones in Pakistan, and China, and India, and ....).

*And as for "coercion", is that like, oh, in the mid-nineties, when I worked for Ameritech, and we were ORDERED by our division president to write our Congresscritter and Senators to tell them to support deregulation, *and* he wanted copies of our letters (nice job you got dere, be a shame if somet'in' were to happen' to it)?

                  mark

Re: Regulation?

[deadweight]

It all belongs to his parents!

I feel sorry for rich people,

[Black Parrot]

what with the rabble's concerns boiling over and impinging on the fringes of their attention.

Re:I feel sorry for rich people,

[Anonymous Coward]

The Democrats did not pass a plan for health care, they passed a plan for health insurance. They are not equivalent. My insurance was cancelled and now I pay 50% more with four times the deductible. My income is hardly among the rich. Gee, thanks Democrats.

You might also take another look at what you think was wealth transference from the rich. The rich are not paying significantly more taxes as a percentage than they did previously. But, the middle class, through the previously mentioned higher insurance fees and forced reduction in health care usage (deductibles), are subsidizing the previously uninsured.

Stop believing the propaganda and open your eyes. The rich will never surrender their positions. They simply pay for exclusions, exemptions, exceptions, etc. and putative increased tax rates do not equate to increased receipts. In 1962, the top Individual rate was 91% for income over $400,000. Do you believe that anyone actually paid anywhere close to that rate?

Re:I feel sorry for rich people,

[ShanghaiBill]

My income is hardly among the rich.

The vast majority of rich people don't think they are rich. The median household income in America is $52K. If your salary, plus your spouse's salary, plus all your other income, is more than that, then you are at least in the top half. For a single person, the median is $31k. The income threshold for the top quintile, who many people consider "rich", is $102k. A family with two spouses earning $51k each would qualify.

On a world wide basis, assets of $800k or more puts you in the top 1%. Where I live (San Jose, California), simply owning a house puts you way over that threshold.

When politicians talk about "taxing the rich", they mean you.

Re:Big Myth #1

[Maxo-Texas]

You need to do your research.

If you had said bill gates of the gates family, you'd be right. They were wealthy.

Jobs wasn't wealthy. Was adopted. Did not have a good relationship with his bio father when he finally turned up (tho it was a reasonable adoption case- young pregnant mother and father with no means). He also denied his daughter was his daughter for several years when he knew better.

Jobs started from the middle income layer- did not do the ivy league college bit- did not have a silver spoon in his mouth.

But I'm sure some good ideas came from wealthy pompous people. They have more time and they have the money to try their ideas.

Escaping only helps you until a war.

[Maxo-Texas]

A bunch of rich people with no real military protecting them will be like ripe fruit for the picking (as they have been over and over and over for centuries).

They would really be much better served by being in a functioning healthy country. Give up 10% of their money to taxes and spread it around the population and they will be immeasurably safer.

But I think their greed just gets the better of them. As it has over and over and over for centuries.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ten percent? TEN PERCENT? Sounds like paradise:

http://pgpf.org/Chart-Archive/0102_tax-rates

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[paazin]

The key here is not a ten percent tax rate but ten percent of wealth.

I assume the GP was stating this in reference to a suggestion by Thomas Piketty as to what would be a more "just" (in his definition) tax approach to tackle inequality.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[guises]

Wealth tax: 0%. Some states and municipalities in the US have a property tax but that functions in essentially the opposite way, since it hits people the most who have a large amount of property relative to their income (farmers and retirees), making it a regressive tax. There is no federal property tax.

The closest thing to a redistributive wealth tax is the estate tax, removed all together in 2001 and brought back in a lessor form in 2011. It's primarily politics which keeps us from having a proper wealth tax (though there's some question about implementation and catching tax dodgers), so we're stuck with an income tax instead. The trouble is that higher incomes are good for the economy, ideally we should be encouraging that sort of thing and not taxing it, while sitting on wealth is bad for the economy. But, like gas taxes, Americans can't seem to stomach doing things the sensible way because... I don't know, communism or something. Maybe too many people yelling "socialist!" So we're stuck with income taxes and excise taxes and sin taxes and yadda yadda.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[Anonymous Coward]

Taxing wealth is practically difficult. It's relatively easy to catch money when it's changing hands. Counting the gold in someone's basement, so to speak, is an entirely different matter. Attempting to do is arbitrary - you don't really know the value of something until you sell it - and incentivizes the movement of large amounts of money out of open and transparent markets, which would be disastrous. Whenever you think of trying to tax something, you also need to think about what the broad consequences of avoiding that tax would be, because the motivation to avoid taxes is always high.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[phantomfive]

The key here is not a ten percent tax rate but ten percent of wealth.

It's surprising how little wealth there actually is in the world. If most of us decided to take a year off and live off the savings, the world would collapse. It depends on us constantly creating new value.

So if we followed that suggesting, and took 10% of the wealth from everyone in America, including corporations, then spread it around to each person in the US evenly, it would be about $70k per person. Most people would spend it quickly and be back where they started.

If we took 10% of the global wealth and spread it around, each person would get much much less.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[khasim]

The Army alone has about 500,000 soldiers. A lot of them are in support roles but a private military also needs support.

Where are the families of the people in the private military? Because if they have to go back to the USofA (the "enemy" in this scenario) to visit Mom and Dad then there's going to be a problem. So you'll need room on the uber rich estate for the families of your military. And your support personnel.

Which brings up the infrastructure to support those families. Schools, hospitals, etc. Which means more support personnel.

Which means more schools and hospitals, etc.

Of course you can skip that if you want to. But remember who has the guns.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[GameboyRMH]

Same here. This is the second time I've heard of NZ being used as the real-life Elysium, and the first time I thought it was a joke. NZ is going to be among the first of the first-world countries to revolt, they're not an economic powerhouse. 1%ers would land on their airstrips to find their compounds looted and burned, and walk right into an ambush ready to Gadhafi them, if they don't find an IED in the runway first.

Freedom Ship was actually a clever idea. Basically a floating Elysium station. If they're really clever they could even get protection on our dime in the form of a few battleships.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[rgmoore]

So if we followed that suggesting, and took 10% of the wealth from everyone in America, including corporations, then spread it around to each person in the US evenly, it would be about $70k per person. Most people would spend it quickly and be back where they started.

This is wrong for two reasons:

1) Many, many people would use a big chunk of the money to pay down debt or to buy capital goods that would last them a good long time. Both of those things would have very large, positive, long-term effects for poor people.

2) The money that people spent wouldn't just disappear. It would wind up in other people's pockets as wages, giving those other people more money to spend. The net result would be a larger overall benefit than just the straight value of the cash handed out.

Re:Escaping only helps you until a war.

[Maxo-Texas]

Moving gold or large amounts of dollars from your basement when the country goes to hell doesn't happen. Over and over, wealthy people have had to leave their physical wealth behind when they fled for their lives.

So put it in electronic banks? Well -that "wealth" can be invalidated by an over turn in the government and new policies with the stroke of a pen. That also happens all the time in less stable countries.

It is very much in the wealthy segment's self interest to promote a stable happy society where they are currently based.

Most people don't need a lot of money to be non violent. Give them 3 squares, a roof over their head, some entertainment and a couple grand of spending money a year and they will never be a problem.

Once they lose faith in the system and lose hope, they are capable of anything. It is in every one's self interest to avoid letting people get to that state.

Education?

[EzInKy]

Is it the lack of education that keeps the poor taking from each other rather than taking from the rich? I'm sure mine is not the only city that has "Boardwalk" located close enough to "Baltic" that the poor without much effort could take what they want from the rich. Yet still, the poor continue to rob from the poor.

Re:Big Myth #2

[sycodon]

The "Wealthy" have Billions of dollars.

They own assets that could be converted into Billions, but not in any practical sense. Most of their wealth is in stocks and bonds. You have to sell those to get cash. If Gates sold all of his stocks so he could roll around in a Billion dollars cash with naked teenagers, M.S. stock would probably crash, reducing his wealth by orders of magnitude.

Sure, they have access to a shit ton of money, but it's almost all on paper.

Re:Big Myth #1

[eli pabst]

Jobs wasn't wealthy growing up, but he sure as hell was wealthy when he came up with the iPhone. The day the 1st gen iPhone was released in 2007, Apple's stock price was already at $122 a share.

Re:"They" is us

[sjames]

Time to put the cool-aid down. You are told that so you don't pick the pitchfork up.

You are NOT a temporarily embarrassed millionaire. You are working class and will always be working class.

Re:"They" is us

[Pi1grim]

Heh, that's right, throw in whone countries, that are poorer than an average US citizen to dilute the statistics. When people talk about 1% they talk about 1% in their country. That's where the inequality strikes, because governance is done within that country and ability to influence the outcomes of political struggles is dependent on the resources one has.

Inequality's Mossad?

[Bob9113]

With growing inequality and the civil unrest from Ferguson and the Occupy protests fresh in people's mind, the world's super rich are already preparing for the consequences. At a packed session, former hedge fund director Robert Johnson revealed that worried hedge fund managers were already planning their escapes.

If I recall correctly, Mossad was formed by Israel with one of its primary missions being to go around the world hunting down and assassinating former Nazi officers who had gone into hiding.

If the world gets to the point where the underprivileged gather their pitchforks and torches, and the ultra-rich flee from mob justice, why wouldn't those who remain take over their nations' governments and form Inequality's Mossad? If the super wealthy really do check out, the people left behind will gain all the authoritarian powers that are being built up right now to suppress change for as long as possible. They'll also get all the resources and production of the biggest powerhouse nations on the planet, because that's where the rich will be fleeing from. And they will be very angry.

The 99.9% who would still be in their home nations, having just seen the banks get cleaned out, will have the muscle of the G20, the influence of the G20, and the rage of Ferguson. Yeah, super-rich guy, go hide in New Zealand. See how that works out for you.

Re:Big Myth #1

[sjames]

Yes, and yet somehow, Branson can have another 10 or 20 Virgin Galactics and still not have to get a 9 to 5 in order to eat.

The guys who create those things may not be rich, and often don't become rich as a result, but the big bucks those ideas end up making go to the rich.

Re:Where am I?

[Anonymous Coward]

I keep reading it as Davros and that he will EX-TERM-IN-ATE the world in 2015.

Re:"They" is us

[roman_mir]

You do realise that there is nothing wrong with being a 'working class'? There is also nothing wrong with being a billionaire.

If your first reaction to somebody who is wealthier than you is a 'pitchfork', then maybe the problem is you.

Re:"They" is us

[sjames]

The only problem is when working class delude themselves into thinking they are not working class and vote for people who piss on the working class from great height.

Re:"They" is us

[sjames]

There is a time and place for everything, but there is no case in history where the rich kept getting richer while the poor got poorer that didn't end in pitchforks.

Not one.

There are some cases where the rich wised up long enough to placate the masses. See the New Deal.

Re:"They" is us

[phantomfive]

I'd speak for yourself if I were you. I'm not aware of anyone I know with a net worth of $800K or more - or even half that. Maybe a few in the $200k range, that have a bit of equity in their house, but that's the limit.

Then you are probably young. As you approach retirement, more of your friends will be approaching that net worth, because they've been saving for a long time.

Re:"They" is us

[NoOneInParticular]

Globally, you're probably below the lowest 1%, as nobody in the developing world is allowed to rake up this much debt without being killed or going to prison. Interesting paradox of wealth.

Re:"They" is us

[houghi]

For the Billionaire, it depends on how you got there. By itself it means nothing, but if you got it over the backs of others, then yes, that is a problem.

If you scam people and then get money from the government if your scam fails, you are a problem. If you buy out the government and get laws that favor you, but hurt all the rest, then you are a problem. If you are a shareholder in a company and you have millions your staff needs food coupons to survive, you are a problem.

Everybody knows that by just working hard, you won't become a billionaire. Perhaps a millionaire, but not a billionaire.

And sure, what they did might all be legal. But morality has nothing to do with legality.

Re:"They" is us

[sjames]

Actually, I have dug into the numbers. They say all but the rich are losing buying power. They say the 1% are doing OK but the 0.1% are making out like bandits.

There's a whole industry based around Elite Panic

[flarb936]

A friend of mine got into reading investment books targeted at the extremely wealthy. They were pretty funny. These books had to trump up nearly impossible end of days events and then promote investment strategies that will keep the reader amongst the 1% when half the world's population dies from a space disease delivered by a comet impact or some other highly unlikely scenario. Elite Panic is big business.

Maybe the new path to the middle class will be in selling doomsday bunkers to paranoid trillionaires.

Re:Yet we have the tech

[Luckyo]

The sad part is that while fighting over wealth has been a necessity for survival when we had to breed a lot and resources were limited, we don't have to any more. We have means to control breeding speed and can easily sustain people we have on the planet today in very decent living conditions if we had a proper distribution system.

But we do not. Our wealth distribution system is derived directly from our resource-limited past where struggle for resources was a key to survival. Attempts to rebuild it resulted in massive suppression from systems using the old distribution system who understood that all it takes is one such new system becoming functional to destroy them.

No we are not them. Re:"They" is us

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

First we need to distinguish Financial Wealth from Net worth. FW = NW - (owner occupied homes + jewelry + cars + collectible and other personal valuables). Second 800K is for the world. For USA as of 2013 the number is 5 million according to IRS and 8 million according to the Feds.

A wealth manager for very wealthy makes a distinction between top 1% and top 0.5% (8 million according to IRS and 15 million according to the Feds). The top 0.5% is reached only by people with inherited wealth, or very lucky people who get to top 5% by smartness and hardwork, and end up in 0.5% due to good fortune, or stock options. Professionals, doctors, lawyers, accountants are very unlikely to reach top 0.5%, and increasing not even likely to reach top 1%. He used to see very successful professionals retiring in top 1%. But no longer.

He calculates that a person starting at low end of 1% by income for that age group, and staying at the same band (99% dividing line by income) all his/her working life will NOT end up in top 1% by financial wealth. A persons starting in the low end of 1% by wealth, will stay there if he/she draws the same amount of money our 1% by income professional, and might go up in scale.

In USA money earned by blood, sweat, tears and brains (wages, earned income) is taxed at much higher rate than money earned by money (capital gains, carried interest, qualified dividends, etc). This is the root cause of the inequality. For 30 years, since Reagan, the US Govt has been coddling the super rich by funneling all tax relief to them. They turned their back to the USA, invested all the savings in low wage countries to maximize their profits.

Re:No we are not them. Re:"They" is us

[Solandri]

In USA money earned by blood, sweat, tears and brains (wages, earned income) is taxed at much higher rate than money earned by money (capital gains, carried interest, qualified dividends, etc). This is the root cause of the inequality.

That's not quite true. Look at the individual income tax stats for 2012. Scroll over to column T. That's the actual tax paid as percent of gross income. It neatly sums up the effect of graduated tax brackets, tax credits, and deductions.

4.1% - $15,000 under $20,000
5.2% - $20,000 under $25,000
6.1% - $25,000 under $30,000
6.8% - $30,000 under $40,000
7.4% - $40,000 under $50,000
8.6% - $50,000 under $75,000
9.5% - $75,000 under $100,000
12.7% - $100,000 under $200,000
19.6% - $200,000 under $500,000
24.0% - $500,000 under $1,000,000
24.6% - $1,000,000 under $1,500,000
24.6% - $1,500,000 under $2,000,000
24.3% - $2,000,000 under $5,000,000
23.4% - $5,000,000 under $10,000,000
19.8% - $10,000,000 or more

As you can see, you have to be making about $200,000 or more before the actual average income tax rate exceeds the 15% capital gains tax. That is, on average, people making less than $200,000 pay a smaller percentage of their blood and sweat income as taxes than the 15% capital gains tax. (If you make less than $200,000 and pay more than 15%, you are a statistical anomaly.) The effect you ascribe to the capital gains tax doesn't kick in until about $1.5 million in income, when the actual tax rate begins decreasing. Someone making $10 million or more on average pays roughly the same tax (as a percentage) as someone making $200,000-$500,000.

So what needs to happen is the capital gains tax rate (1) needs to increase if your income is about $1 million or higher, and (2) needs to decrease if your income is less than $200,000. Right now, the 15% capital gains tax rate is so high that it discourages middle- and lower-income people from investing, which is the most direct way to partake in the country's economic growth. And the fruits of the country's economic growth will instead continue to fall mainly in the lap of the wealthy.

Re:We don't all live in the USA.

[swb]

I think the problem is you can't pack up a whole economy and move it.

If your wealth is dependent on the US domestic economy and it tanks because of civil unrest, a lot of wealthy people will be unwealthy before they can even reconsider relocating.

There's also the question of "what is money?" and are you really rich still if you have to convert your money to another currency with a different local buying power, especially if your native currency dives or is sinking when you try to convert it.

There's also the question of competition for safe overseas havens; if the availability is limited, you're now competing with just the rich, so unless you're elite rich, you may lose out altogether.

And what kind of haven are you expecting? A self-sustaining kind of pre-20th century British estate of farms and light industry? At the end of the day it sounds like a mash-up of a Ralph Lauren ad with survivalism.

USA used to be a country you described

[Anonymous Coward]

This is what you said:

... Virtually all of the world's top technology companies were founded in the US, most of them within the last 10-20 years as well. A lot of their founders were first to third generation Americans. Is that because Americans are overall smarter than say Scandinavians or Germans? Or maybe luckier? None of the above.

Those opportunities come from there not being a government telling you what you can't do, meaning there's no cap on your potential for economic growth ...

I am a first generation American, and since I have landed on the American soil several decades back, I have started or helped started (as sole proprietor or as partner or as investor) more than 70 companies

What you said was true, that the fact I have started over 70 companies because there wasn't anyone telling me what I can not do

I came from China, and the China during the time I left was a place where nobody had any right to start any business unless that individual had a death wish

Today's America, however, is no longer that America that I went to, some 4 decades ago

Today's America there are so many restrictions, either from the government (in terms of laws / regulation / rules) or from society ( 'gender diversity in the work place', for example )

Today I have businesses in both America and outside America, and yes, I have business in China as well --- and I can tell you this one thing ... it is much more free-ier to start and run a business in China than in America

Re:Big Myth #1

[dywolf]

So when the richest 0.1% control fully half of the worlds entire wealth, you don't think have any power, let alone more power than the rest of us?

Heck, you even think its a free market.
Hint: it's not; not at their stage of the game.
You are a fool.

They crashed the WORLD'S economy.
Possibly intentionally, as they profited off of the entire ordeal.
They profited off the toxic loans that drove the housing bubble.
They profited off the crash.
They profited off the bailout.
And then they captured nearly the entire recovery, 95% worth.

That's why the economy still stinks for most people. It's like if you shove 100 people in a room, and take 100$ from each of them, then give one guy 9500$, and everyone else 5$. That's our crash and recovery in a nutshell.

Re:There's a whole industry based around Elite Pan

[crunchygranola]

Luckyo should have explained that he is from the Bizarro Planet where the rich don't the legislation they desire, and the entire legal system is not designed around protecting their property.