Ask HN: What should be the point of being rich?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9899141

by dudul • 11 years ago

8 18 11 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

It is clear to everyone that being wealthy is a great asset in our world. Having money allows one to get good quality food, access to health care, good education, stimulating leisure, etc.

However, it is generally accepted that it is unfair for poor people to not have access to a lot of resources, like health care or education. Therefore governments take measures and use part of tax money to make these resources accessible to low-income households. Some examples: - education with scholarships - health care with lower premium/rates - internet recently with a project to offer $9 plans to low-income households - public transportation with lower fares etc

The way I understand these measures is that the goal of making money should not be to provide a good education to your children, or keep them healthy for example - since society tries to support low-income households and helps them get access to these resources regardless of income.

Now, I know all these programs are not good substitutes for "having a truckload of money", but imagine a world were they are 100% effective. What would be an acceptable goal to making money? Since everyone, regardless of income, should have access to schools, leisure, health care, etc why should we try to make more money? Philosophically, what resources should be accessible only to wealthy people?

kkt262• 11 years ago

Capitalism works because having money gives the people an incentive to work harder and fit within the "system" of the government. This is why it's generally seen as a more favorable system than communism/socialism.

toomuchtodo• 11 years ago

Does that mean capitalism breaks down when everyone's basic needs are met?

NhanH• 11 years ago

Most likely then the bar for basic needs increases.

If all needs are fulfilled regardless, then we have moved from scarcity economy to abundance economy, in which case capitalism breaks down (and that's the basis for communism/socialism actually). Note that the main importance of capitalism is a way to efficiently distribute resources, in an abundance economy, we don't have to do that efficient either.

lsiebert• 11 years ago

Capitalism breaks down when wealth is allowed to substitute for merit or the ability to produce, and where a lack of wealth impedes the ability of individuals to succeed on merit.

It also breaks down on public goods. The idea of capitalism is based on rational self interest, but rational self interest for individuals doesn't inherently lead to rational self interest for larger groups. Wealth also allows people to distort the political process away from representation of the interests of the majority.

Society loses out, in terms of lower productivity, higher crime, increased prison costs, pollution, etc.

6d0debc071• 11 years ago

Capitalism works better than command economies, within certain domains, because it's a more immediate feedback mechanism. Rather than peasants dying in the fields while Comrade Stalin reports another glorious success of the five-year plan, the peasants can simply go and buy themselves food.

I'm not sure how effective an incentive system it is once your basic needs are met though. Lots of people don't seem to have ambitions for which large amounts of money are a desirable aspect. Not that they'd turn it down if you offered it to them, mind, but they don't work to advance themselves either.

Someone12342• 11 years ago

If everyone had access to healthcare, education, food, and so on then being wealthy would continue to do what it does today: Give you access to premium things which aren't the 101s of life and are a luxury.

For example, holidays (e.g. cruises, international travel, resort stays, etc), fine foods (e.g. exotic ingredients, better chiefs, etc), nicer vehicles, bigger TVs, larger homes, better quality clothing, and so on. Essentially anything expressively not listed in your tiny list of core requirements is up for grabs.

The things you're talking about really aren't motivators above middle class anyway. Poor people lack them, the middle class have them, and the wealthy are so beyond caring that those aren't even things on their radar.

Do you really think someone with over a million dollars wakes up in a cold sweat because of a sub-10K healthcare bill?

Philosophically, what resources should be accessible only to wealthy people?

None. They should only be accessible to people who can afford them regardless of wealth. If a middle class person wants to spend $2K on a first class plane ticket, let them.

dudul2• 11 years ago

Thanks for your answer. The thing I'm trying to understand is how do you define the 101 in life? Is Internet a 101 in life? I believe so, but so is a car some may say. So are vacations.

When I was asking what should only be accessible to rich people I wasn't talking about forbidding access to others. I meant what resources should not have incentives attached to them, what resources are considered pure luxury.

Someone12342• 11 years ago

Have you seen Maslow's hierarchy of needs? It tries to address this topic:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

It is, of course, just one idea but it is fairly well fleshed out so at least worth throwing in the pile when talking about things like this.

Essentially full middle class-ness stops at self-actualization. If you can achieve that and all of the lower tiers, everything above and beyond is unnecessary.

Wealth stops being about living when you tick all of those "boxes" and start spending on things that aren't really characterised by any of them.

I meant what resources should not have incentives attached to them, what resources are considered pure luxury.

It might be one of those cases where it is easier to define what ISN'T rather than what is. Since everyone that isn't required is inherently a luxury, be it a $1 soda or a $3K+ plane ticket.

Mz• 11 years ago

Well, if there were some kind of justice in the world, then we would all have access to some basics like clean air and clean water. But, at the moment, being rich helps you get things like that when they aren't universally available.

This is a complex subject and not one you are going to sort out with a single question on a public forum. For starters, the primary value of money is to lubricate trade. It doesn't have inherent value. You can't, for example, eat it. In order to really be rich, you have to understand what has real value, not just how much money things cost. That's not an easy thing to grasp, especially if you are blinded by the dollar signs we attach to just about everything today.

insoluble4• 11 years ago

... the goal of making money ...

Personally, I feel that if one finds money itself as a goal, then he or she is missing the point of life, or at least that he or she has a pretty shallow goal. It sounds more like your real question is, "What is the purpose of life?". If you can find a purpose, then you can let money play a part in that purpose when and if money should be needed. If money should not be needed for a particular goal, then money has no place there. Money is a tool like other tools, and it sounds like you are trying to find the purpose of the tool, rather than letting the purpose find its place naturally.

Philosophically, what resources should be accessible only to wealthy people?

If you were to ask what should be available only to those who work harder and smarter for the better of humanity, I might say greater success and social recognition. If you are speaking of monetary wealth on its own, then I say nothing extra whatsoever should be available. Money is just a number, like the value of a variable. Looking at the world as a whole, the value of this variable has more to do with fortune, luck, and morality than with hard work. True, if these factors are the same between two persons, the one who works harder and smarter will likely have more money, but these prerequisite factors are never equal in reality.

dudul2• 11 years ago

"Personally, I feel that if one finds money itself as a goal, then he or she is missing the point of life" And that is exactly the purpose of my question.

I don't see having money as a goal in itself but as a mean to acquire resources/services. But some services/resources are considered necessary/mandatory, I was wondering where we draw the line and what would be the point of having money if all basic needs were satisfied.

NateDad• 11 years ago

All my basic needs are met plus some.

That doesn't mean I don't still want a Tesla, a lakehouse, a new deck on my house, landscapers to mow and pull weeds for me, etc.

I don't think you're asking what the point of having money is, I think what you're really asking is, if everyone could live comfortably without working, why would anyone work?

My reply would be twofold:

1.) Why is it a requirement that everyone work? 2.) There are plenty of people that work a lot harder than they need to, because they love their job or they love the pay, etc.

Teachers don't teach because they like the pay. Lawyers don't work 100 hour weeks because they couldn't make ends meet if they only worked 40 hour weeks.

In theory I could probably get a job working 20 hours a week, make half what I do now, and still live like a typical middle class household. But I'd have to move to a crappier town and a smaller house and wouldn't be able to vacation for a week at a cabin on a lake, wouldn't be able to buy new tech toys when I wanted to, etc. So I don't do that. If the world suddenly had guaranteed income to give everyone $40k/year per adult, would I just stop working? Probably not.

insoluble4• 11 years ago

If the animal instinct of greed shows us anything, we can probably rest assured that no matter what the average quality of life, many people will want more, even if for no reason other than to show off. I imagine there was a time, long ago, when simply having shelter, food, and physical safety was sufficient to be considered successful in life.

I have seen people who would be basically satisfied with playing video games all day the rest of their lives. There are others, such as some junkies, who would feel mostly fulfilled as long as they have their fix. Ambition is a curious thing. Although it would seem that most people have ambition, for some people this ambition is directed toward the most useless things.

For those who dream bigger, or at least more grounded in reality, there may always be a goal that would drive them to work in one way or another, despite having basic needs met. Like most lines in society, such as where to draw the line between legality and illegality, opinion will differ from person to person. The consensus, or average, will probably shift as a particular quality of life becomes the norm.

On another note, part of the drive for gain is based on how one is perceived by his or her peers. If one feels unwanted or unappreciated, he or she is more likely to feel unfulfilled. It could also be said that capitalist consumerism drives this feeling of unease, which may keep pushing the minimum acceptable quality of life further and further. On the other hand, if this feeling can be alleviated, such as through religion, drugs, or virtual reality, then this drive for gain may cease.

insoluble4• 11 years ago

To answer your question more directly, perhaps a reasonable place to draw the line would be where all inherently capable individuals have a fair chance at gaining or fulfilling their (reasonable) dreams if they so choose. Government subsidies generally are supposed to exist with the goal of the greater society in mind. Hence, the line must allow persons from poorer backgrounds to get whatever education is necessary in that particular society to have the potential for upward mobility. A caring society would not let health, education, or other barriers of upbringing stop people from working their way up, should they possess the ambition and inherent potential. Naturally, of course, as the education (or knowledge) barrier to entry for employment grows ever higher, there will presumably be a greater proportion of society that is naturally unfit for work. Hopefully technology is able to keep up with the growing load of unemployed persons so that society as a whole can still progress.

AnimalMuppet• 11 years ago

The point of making a lot of money is that you provided something that a lot of people wanted. That is, you met a need (or at least want) for a lot of people. (I'm presuming that the way you made money was legal and ethical.)

If you did a bit to raise the standard of living for others (by making something that they couldn't get before, or making it affordable), that's a pretty good motive for getting rich. In fact, if that's the motive, the "getting rich" is more like an accident. You're just trying to do something that will help a lot of other people, and you suddenly look around and wonder, "Why do I have all this money?"

shoo• 11 years ago

here are a few arbitrary thoughts:

* superficially, being wealthy offers an advantage to the individual, at least in the short term. it isn't necessarily helpful to other people (e.g. how did that person become wealthy? did they do something useful that contributed to society? did they merely figure out a clever way to reallocate wealth from other people? is it at the cost of long-term environmental damage?)

* the world is not fair (not a justification for anything, just an obvious comment)

* supposing the government is socially progressive and provides everyone with basic welfare, where does the government get the money to do that from? e.g. in our capitalist society [the government's] income might come from income tax, company tax, sale of natural resources, etc. suppose no-one participated in any economic activity because the government's social programs met their basic needs. then it might be difficult for the government to maintain this [since who would be actually doing the work of growing crops, teaching children, fixing potholes, etc?]!

* some governments try to support low-income households to some degree. but there are huge advantages to growing up in a wealthy family. there is certainly no level playing field. there was something in the economist about this a few months ago.

* in itself, i do not think the goal of making money is morally defensible. sure, it can be a means to an end - but the end does not justify the means. there are many ways to make money, some of them have merit, many (most?) of them do not have any merit.

* philosophically, "philosophical" arguments are perhaps irrelevant, as we live in a very flawed society, as flawed individuals. only certain imaginable worlds are feasibly reachable from the one we find ourselves in.

* money can give you power, and status. these are useful, and you are likely to live a more comfortable life with them than without them.

For some reason now I'm reminded of something Chomsky wrote about "expanding the floor of the cage" [1]. This is more relevant if you are in a position where you do not have much opportunity or power, or if you care about those people in such a position:

Millions of workers have become organized into rural unions which are very rarely discussed. One of the slogans that they use which is relevant here, is that we should "expand the floor of the cage." We know we’re in a cage. We know we’re trapped. We’re going to expand the floor, meaning we will extend to the limits what the cage will allow. And we intend to destroy the cage. But not by attacking the cage when we’re vulnerable, so they’ll murder us.

[1] http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/199704--.htm

edit: it is perhaps useless to think about money without thinking much more broadly about the system that money forms a part of. which human activities are encouraged and discouraged by the system? which individuals benefit? which individuals suffer? is the human economy separate from the physical/natural environment?

insoluble4• 11 years ago

did they merely figure out a clever way to reallocate wealth from other people?

Although it seems that money was indeed created to help distribute the fruits of work (a noble cause), one of the problems, as you have pointed out here, is that the system can be hacked. The monetary system takes real-world resources (including human labour, health, and dignity) and plays them like a board game. Even worse, the rules of the game are barely known and inconsistently enforced.

hkiely• 11 years ago

Why would anyone work a paying job if all of these necessities were provided to us? Wouldn't an individual choose to peruse a passion or educational / research goal full time, rather than possibly working a job he or she didn't like but need to pay the bills?

Ask HN: What should be the point of being rich?

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