Comment by mptest | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mptest | Hacker News Reader

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>> The Republican party is the party of generational wealth transfer.

>I'm not sure what this is supposed to mean.

They oppose estate or "death" taxes in general. That is what they mean.

>The Republican party is half the country.

They're half of voters. They haven't won the popular vote in how many years? 40? They're an obnoxiously loud minority.

>All of them?

Probably not all, but nearly all. The maga tariffs and then subsequent bailouts of farmers harmed comes to mind. reagan's austerity is another easy example.

>>Is the Culture War so important/motivating to these people that they are willing to help implement their own economic destruction? This is the culture war.

>You're doing it right now.

No, they aren't. The republicans bemoaning the 1% of people who identify as trans to distract their uneducated voters while banning books and attacking public education funding, libraries, women's rights, etc, are.

Don't fall in to the bothersider ism trap. Look at republican policy in a red state like texas[0] to see why the comment you replied to is the truth.

[0] https://www.chron.com/politics/article/texas-gop-2024-priori...

The estate tax doesn’t mean too much.

“Generational wealth” is generally a myth. The second and third generations burn through any inheritance and sprint back to middle class rather quickly.

> “Generational wealth” is generally a myth. The second and third generations burn through any inheritance and sprint back to middle class rather quickly.

Ref? That was definitely not my impression from listening to "Capital in the 21st Century".

Piketty is not my favorite. I consider him a pure academic who tends to cherry pick data.

In reality, wealth tends to cluster around people who are good stewards of it. They allocate capital efficiently and we are all better off.

The government is NOT a good steward of wealth. They allocate inefficiently (because no accountability) so we should minimize what we give them.

Here is a quick and dirty reference discussing how lazy kids of rich people blow it: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/generational-wealth-curse-cau...

This is wild to disagree with Pikettys magnum opus with a reference to a yahoo finance news article

The dude is a pure academic and just trying to sell socialism with hand waving.

I look at it differently: His ideas are so weak and removed from reality that they can’t even stand up to a Yahoo Finance article.

We should be careful taking policy advice from people who have never had real jobs.

So teaching isn't a real job? Authoring books isn't a real job? Someone should probably tell a lot of people the bad news...

>selling socialism with hand waving

Lol, more like selling it with award winning, best selling, taught in colleges books? If you're convinced that's "hand waving" you're beyond lost

uhh not sure what constitues a real job if not an author, consultant and teacher (on top of being a successful academic). Have you read his book? It's quite good.

> The government is NOT a good steward of wealth. They allocate inefficiently (because no accountability) so we should minimize what we give them.

Have you ever actually looked at how large companies allocate wealth, and how much actual accountability there is there? I can't tell you how many billions of dollars the company I currently work for burned with acquisitions whose products they shut down and teams they laid off two years later; and they're definitely not worse than normal, as far as I can tell. How many products has Microsoft attempted and then killed? How big is the Killed By Google graveyard? And in many cases people who make catastrophic decisions are rewarded -- "failing up" with golden parachutes and higher more influential posts.

In my experience, people who say things like this have a double standard. If you judge the government and corporations by the same standards, they come out about the same -- a bit of really good, a bit of really bad, lots of mediocre. The difference is that the government is at least nominally trying to work for the voters, whereas corporations are explicitly only working for their shareholders.

> Here is a quick and dirty reference discussing how lazy kids of rich people blow it:

The only evidence presented is assertions by companies selling wealth management services:

> "The “third generation curse” indicates that 90% of wealthy families are likely to lose their [money](404 ERROR) by the third generation, according to AMG National."

The only link to further evidence results in a 404; and the only advice is, "Train your kids not to be stupid", and "Use one of these wealth management services".

I think I'd actually seen that exact article before I listened to Piketty's book; but Pikkety actually provides evidence across many different countries, sometimes going back to the 1700s. Absent other evidence (which again you simply assert without giving a reference to), I'd trust an academic more than a company who has a vested interest in drumming up business by scaring people.

ETA: Even supposing we take the article at face value (which I definitely have doubts about), it makes two claims:

1. Of "wealthy" families, 90% will lose it within 3 generations

2. This can be prevented if children are taught money management skills growing up

Even supposing those are true it doesn't support the statement that "generational wealth is generally a myth".

Why? Because % families != % wealth. It's perfectly possible that 10% of wealthy families who consistently teach good money management to their children control 90% of the wealth.

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