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Comment by deathless | Hacker News Reader

It's like saying no one deserves anything but an hourly wage, and damn anyone that actually builds something.

And yeah, it was "easier" yesterday than today, given today's knowledge of the winners. Today is easier than tomorrow, if you know tomorrow's winners.

The internet / pop-culture narrative of "everything is against me, I'm too late, and there's nothing I can do about it" is actually great for people that want to go out and do something about it. The competition is sitting around bitching on Reddit.

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Oh come on - the wealth realized here wasn't gained by building more for everyone, but by making sure others don't build their homes so the exiting owners gain wealth without actually creating anything.

And if voting NIMBY they're pulling the ladder up, denying their neighbors the same benefit. Strikes me as parasitic behavior.

I was generally taught to buy only what one needs and can maintain, and work for wealth. Maybe naive, but the rent seeking and praise of extractive wealth is noxious the more I learn to recognize it.

The wealth was not generated by the person doing anything, but by all the activity occurring around them! Adam Smith despised landlords and wealth accumulation based on land-ownership for exactly this reason. They’re a parasitic drag on market economies that shifts capital from productive activities to unproductive ones (i.e. speculating on real estate).

“As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce.”

People deserve the fruits of their own labor. They do not "deserve" to charge rent to others. And appreciation of real estate without productive labor to improve that particular parcel is collecting the work of others.

Nah the competition is glorifying and engaging in rent-seeking behavior.

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