If all the world's money was taken up and redistributed evenly...?

Question

so that everyone had an equal amount, do you think the people who were previously poor would end up poor again... and the previously rich would become rich again?

This is just a hypothetical question... not something that I'd ever suggest should actually be done!

Answer 1

Then every human being would be content and many would be without debt. :)

unfortunately we live in a world where greed and self indulgence rules the roost. I personaly pray for a more unified future and peace as the main staple........

Answer 2

Short Answer:
The poor would still be poor, and the rich would still be rich.

Long Answer:
You started from an invalid premise. You're equating money and wealth, but they are two very different things. Money is finite, wealth is not.

The population of the United States on April 1, 2000 was 281,421,906. The total amount of U.S. currency in circulation that year was $500 billion, but two thirds of that was/is held overseas, so that left $167 billion available in the United States. A little division tells us that there's 593 dollars and 42 cents for every man, woman, and child in the country.

I have heard people argue that if some people are poor, it can only be that they were cheated out of their money by some nasty rich person. Well, if cash and wealth were one and the same, we'd be a pretty poor nation, wouldn't we? Cash is just another commodity, like cows, or batteries. We use it as a medium of exchange only because it was designed for that purpose, and is therefore extremely convenient in that role. Cash is the grease that keeps the wheels of the economy turning. Not enough, and things slow down. Too much, and the economy runs "too fast". Here's an even stronger example:

The Federal Government collected $1,825 billion in taxes for fiscal year 2000. That means Uncle Sam collected every single dollar in the country eleven times over, in just one year! How is it then, that we're not all broke?

The answer of course, is that we create NEW wealth, and we do it all the time! The government even keeps track of this for us: You hear it on the news from time to time. It's the Gross Domestic Product. (GDP) The GDP is defined as "The total market value of all final goods and services produced in a country in a given year." For the U.S. in 2000 The GDP was 42,756 billion. That's $152,157 each. To be honest, that figure does include services, which don't result in tangible assets. I think the point is clear though: an awful lot of people are out there creating new wealth.

Answer 3

It actually has been tried before and it failed miserably. The whole point of Communism was that the distrbution of wealth was unfair. They said let's have a "do over," and redistributed everything evenly. That is the whole basis of Leninism.

You can either be free or equal but you cannot be both. If you allow the system the freedom to be unequal, then you guarantee wealth and poverty. If you force everyone to be equal then you must completely suppress freedom.

The challenge is to raise the median standard of living so that the poorest are in real terms rich. America's poor have bear minimum necessities. It is tough, but it does not compare to America's poor 200 years ago or any poor 2000 years ago. True poverty is not being able to survive. Freedom permits protection of the poor. Communism destroys the incentives for individuals to do well, as a consequence no one does well and all are poor.

Answer 4

Yes, but not all of them. There are many who would make the money work for them and many who would simply spend, spend, spend then cry poor. Not all rich people earned the money they have, it could have been inherited from a hard working relo. Then there are those who have had next to no money yet manage to create an empire. Equal money can create equal opportunity but not everyone has the capacity mentally or physically to make things work for them economically. There needs to be both employers and the employed for any economy to work. Money doesn't procreate someone has to make it multiply.

Answer 5

That is a very logical solution to alleviate poverty. Years ago I thought that this was the solution to eliminate poverty for good, it was worrying so much that people were living below basic needs; redistribute food ,money, supplies equally and poverty will be destroyed, a thing if the past. Do this and very sadly to say as Jesus once said " the poor will still be here with us" One needs to redistribute skills opportunities, opportunities for jobs, etc etc. In some areas training and jobs people want are unavailable to them .There are many issues concerning why there is poverty in the world.

Answer 6

Perhaps, or perhaps not. But an important clue is that, while many rich people inherited their wealth, seven of the top ten wealthiest people in the world started out poor.

Answer 7

The poor will improve slightly but eventually the poor still poor.

The rich still rich.

This is because the poor do not know how to spend their money wisely.
The rich know how to make more money from their money.

Answer 8

Why would you want to do that? That's been tried in the former Soviet Union. That failed. You must be a young person that is still uninformed on this topic. What you are suggesting is called communism. To us, who live in the free world, that is contrary to our way of life. For your information, communist countries heavily guard their boarders....not from people who want to get in, but from their own citizens who want to get out.

Answer 9

I believe that is called communism. The end result is that human nature will take control and the same conditions that existed before would be recreated. Someone will want what someone else has, someone will want more.

Answer 10

20% of the people would own 80% of the wealth, and 80% what have to share the 20%