Inequality Figures Dollar millionaires now own around 44% the world's wealth, according to Credit Suisse's new Global Wealth Report, which also says there are now nearly 47 million millionaires out there (an increase of 1.1 million over the last year, mostly from the U.S., though China and Japan also added quite a few). That's 0.9% of the world's population; 56.6% of people have less than $10,000 to their name, collectively accounting for 1.8% of wealth. CNBC
Agree completely with Jeremy Irons: And if you live in a Western World? You are automatically among the wealthiest people in the world. As well as agreeing with Paul Bettany: When you take the attitude that the alternative is to rot, die and starve, and no one in the world at large cares? You start working real hard to do well. And be thankful for everything you build for yourself.
,, When there's nothing that motivates you, then at least run away from that which you don't want to happen '' - Tony Robins ,, Well, lets look, what an alternative do you have in giving up - that would be, your own personal hell. And you don't want to end up in there, believe me. Imagine all of your worst habits & let's say, for the next 3 - 5 - 10 years you do nothing about them and even worse, you allow them to manifests to it's full scale and consume your life. How your life would like ? That would be a hell on earth '' - Jordan Peterson
The obvious flaw in such simplistic reasoning there being no linear or even monotonic relationship between effort and income.
Maybe i got your point in a wrong way. People who work over-time hours, makes unproportional more, than those who do not. In Netherlands it used to be 300% hourly wage for Sundays, 200% for saturdays. The most simplistic example.
Implying that income inequality in general exists because some people being lazier than others is ridiculous. Those that inherit their wealth and at the same time sit in passive investments barely have to lift a finger. Yet people can work their ass of to survive and be unable to make enough to escape their situation. Even success in business is fairly random and if we think of people like Bill Gates, he is one of many that happened to be in the right place at the right time. Returning to what I said, the stochastic function Income(Effort) has data points scattered all over the place with a slight trend towards effort yielding higher income. Of course, this is an assumption, and it would be nice to actually be able to plot this - but I can come up with all sorts of examples illustrating why I expect this to be true.
Ok? Doesn't make a difference. Some people will make out. Some people won't. Effort doesn't mean they "should" or "have to". It's more vital to learn that people learn failure is perfectly acceptable as well, and be allowed to do so ... Everything is relative, and dumb luck, and effort is yes, a part of it. You can put in a ton of effort, and still lose for this reason or another. Ok? That's why life is not made up of single opportunities, but if you're alive, healthy, and live in a place where the rule of law is SOMEWHAT respected, you try again. You can put in a ton of effort, and make out, let's say you make 10 Mil, and the next guy does the same thing and makes 10 Billion. Ok? Dumb luck. Again, that's why life is not made up of single opportunities, but if you're alive, healthy, and live in a place where the rule of law is SOMEWHAT respected, you try again. I think it was very wise that one of the Ten Commandements was: "You must not covet ..."
Mostly a response to the post above mine putting an equal sign between effort and income. I entirely agree effort is hard to quantify except it in the US tends to be thought of as the number of hours worked, and since that's measurable it's the natural basis of a discussion. That said, the options of what to do (as opposed to how much of it to do) is entirely dependent on where you are born and where your friends are. But as Bill Gates (is said to have) said: The world is unfair - get used to it.