Why do 5% of the people own 95% of the wealth?

Question

Do they really work harder than us, or the is the system designed to favor just a few?

Answer 1

This is hard to answer, but differs from nation to nation.

The answer would be that some systems are especially in favor of few.

US is such system. With income disparity being enormous, some people work 3 jobs and can't pull through month, some earn 500+ million $ a year.

Income disparity goes hand to hand with dire US social picture. Beggars, homeless, enormous amount of murders etc.

While income disparity itself is NATURE of capitalism, the aim should be for everyone to live well.

US won't solve its problem even if 10 million people are in jail... middle class is struggling because health expenses etc. are feeding the rich, while people die without HI.

People are happier, and quality of life is generally a lot higher, there is less crime where income disparity is not extremely high.

Answer 2

Believe it or not, the "system" favors those who create the most value for others.

Sure some people get a lucky windfall and others become wealthy by dubious means, but all systems have these characters.

Most wealth in the U.S. is created from selling something others value enough to voluntarily buy. Why did you buy an iPod or a laptop? Why do you pay for Internet service? How about electricity, food, clothes and water? You buy all of this stuff because it makes your life better. You don't have to raise your own food, make your own clothes and use candles to read by at night. You can connect with others from all over the world or download the music you want to listen to. You can connect your laptop up just about anywhere and you can carry your whole music collection on your hip.

Did the people that brought you all of this stuff work harder than you? Perhaps, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that they made something that you bought.

Were they favored by the "system"? Well, they were favored by you. Are you the system? Why did you pick one particular product over another?

Answer 3

The system favors a few but it is not a chosen few. Many people work hard, start businesses etc, but usually one wins and gets most of the gains so extreme wealth get concentrated among a few people. This is true in sports and entertainment as well as business and globalization has increased the possible gains for the winners. Bill Gates is an example of this phenomena. There were many companies competing for dominance in computers and Microsoft won and now has a virtual monopoly while most of the others went out of business, and Apple remains as a weak competitor. This means that much of the gains of the computer revolution that was the result of the effort of tens of thousands of people has gone to Gates. He probably know this which is why he is giving most of his wealth to charity.

PS. I don't think your numbers are right if you count homes and farms, In the US counting everything it is closer to 60% but there is a lot of wealth concentrated at the very top,

Answer 4

no. They work "Less hard" then the other 95% but in a capitalist society, it is the ones who have the wealth who are rewarded.
But the again it ended just the same in a socialist society in the USSR the party has the wealth, the working class had the work.
The wealth will always be disproportionate to the work people do.

Even in tribal systems, the leaders and their family's have the wealth and power, everyone else has the harder work.

That is what inheritance tax and progressive taxation is for, redistributing the wealth (If not income)

Answer 5

On average wealthy people certainly DO work much harder than people of average or low income -- that's one of the reasons they got to be wealthy. The vast majority of affluent people aren't Paris Hilton, they are doctors, lawyers, business owners, entrepreneurs, corporate executives, who work preposterous hours to get where they are.

HOWEVER, people aren't financially rewarded based on how "hard" they work. That would be an incredibly inefficient system, since anyone can "work hard" without actually doing anything of value to anyone else.

They are rewarded based on how much value they deliver to the marketplace. Some manager who can figure out how to increase a company's revenues by $10 million in a year is worth far, far more than a whole truckload of hard-working manual laborers, who will never in their lives create $10 million of value.

And yeah the system does most favor "the few" -- but it's the few people who have unusually rare talents and skills and drive to create things that other people value with money.

Answer 6

Because money and power are handed down from generation to generation.

That is one of the reasons that the Republican party fights so hard against the estate tax. I am a Republican, but this issue is only self serving for them.

They keep talking about the family farm, that is fine, then exempt farming from the law. Problem solved!!

Answer 7

In the free enterprize system you can only get paid for serving your fellow man. Unfortunately 95% of the people just aren't very good at serving their fellow man.