Quote Originally Posted by Watchman View Post
Actually, by your own work you're pretty much not going to get past "comfortable" wealth levels. True wealth is only possible through putting yourself into a position where you can profit from other people's work. This being you, I feel it necessary to point out this is in no way passing judgement on people who do so; it is merely an observation of how socioeconomics work.
Yes, most of the wealthy profit by their labor and the labor of others - others they gave employment to. So I think gaining profit from other people when you gave them jobs is fair.

Also, quite a few folks plain inherit most of their wealth, or something similar, and don't really need to do much else than *own* it - the practical management of the assets tending to get delegated to salaried experts, so the owner can focus on spending the surplus.

I find your fantasy of only hard-working and succesful people populating the upper income levels both quite amusing and hopelessly naïve.
Case in point: Paris Hilton. Though IIRC her gramps disowned her at some point, so she may not strictly speaking count anymore.

I never said only hard working and successful people are rich. Certainly there are people like Paris Hilton, people who didn't earn their money, who inherited it. But someone's got to provide capital to banks for loans, don't they?
HT can speak for himself, but don't go putting words in my mouth. I dare you to show wherever did I express a wish for something so silly.
Perhaps I confused you two.

CR