The economy is not a zero sum game

[NobleSavage]

why restrict to billionaires?

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It's just a convenient way to look at. No more arbitrary than saying the top 600 families or the .01% or whatever.

 

[NobleSavage]

For the record there are 1,645 billionaires.

 

[Nexus]

If you agree that we're better off than cavemen (or 198th / 19th century farmers) on average, then economy since then has not been a zero sum game. Why do you think that it is a zero-sum game now? When did economy become a zero sum game? 50 years ago? 10 years ago? Last tuesday?

Have you considered that wealth can increase worldwide over long spans of time? And a transitional period can last generations? So that wealth is effectively zero sum for many people during their life time. Its like you're asking why don't we observe evolution in real time.

 

[none]

isn't the deficit evidence of a zero sum game when it comes to the economy?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No, games that are scored have winners and losers. The winner just has a higher score. With that said wealth is mostly zero sum. Obviously it can grow overtime with population, improvements in labor efficiency etc but there are limits.

Yes and no. The primary way you win the economic game is to find a better way to do something. You pocket the improvement but that doesn't mean you took away from anyone to do so.

In time this will spread and become the new standard, at that point everyone benefits.

The losers are those who won't or can't react to the change. (For example, plants that make the old technology.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

If it's not infinite then it has to be zero sum whether it's growing or not.

The US economy generates about $16 trillion in income a year. The net worth of households and non-profits is about $55 trillion. That's a really big, finite number. If 600 families control the vast majority of that wealth then that leaves less for everyone else. And if those 600 families are able to increase their share, which they have been, then less and less will be left over.

That sounds like zero sum to me.

Something I have never understood about these allegations--pension funds. The wealth supposedly controlled by the richest is too great a percentage, it precludes the trillions in pension money out there.

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why restrict to billionaires?

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The Forbes list lets you see how those people at the top got their money.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The question was asked upthread how there can be winners and losers without it being zero sum.

Lets try a simple game: You roll a die and advance that many steps. The first to the end is the winner.

Note that there's no way to go backwards even if there are variations in what the various players can roll. Thus it's clearly not zero-sum, everyone makes progress. Yet it also clearly has a winner.

 

[bilby]

By the way, I nailed it. The argument is that the aristocracy deserves to be rich, everyone else deserves to be poor, therefore the economy is not a zero sum game. As stupid as the logic of that argument is, that is exactly the argument that is being made in this thread as far as I can tell. Taxes are stealing!

Our FFers went to war over taxes, so there is precedent. The reason that the poor aren't still rebelling like they did over 100 years ago is because they know your argument isn't true and that they could be worse off then they are.

No, they didn't. They used taxes as an excuse for a war that was really about preventing outsiders from undercutting their lucrative smuggling operations. The US War of Independence was about rich people defending their means of getting richer; they persuaded the poor people to fight and die for them by claiming that they were opposing taxation.

That sounds familiar, but doesn't actually make the point I think you were hoping to make.

 

[ksen]

The question was asked upthread how there can be winners and losers without it being zero sum.

Lets try a simple game: You roll a die and advance that many steps. The first to the end is the winner.

Note that there's no way to go backwards even if there are variations in what the various players can roll. Thus it's clearly not zero-sum, everyone makes progress. Yet it also clearly has a winner.

Except most people today are going backwards.

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[NobleSavage]

ksen, your argument reminds me of the right wingers who are anti immigration because they "take our jobs away".

 

[ksen]

Ok

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[Cobalt]

Why should I accept that "standard of living" is the measure to use to decide if the economy is zero sum or not?

And who says our standard of living is increasing?

Almost everyone, your link notwithstanding.

Would you rather have been born into your parents' generation instead of at the point in history in which you actually were born? How about your grandparents' generation? How about your great-great-grandparents' generation? If your answer is no, I suggest that you are tacitly deem your current standard of living is higher than theirs was.

 

[barbos]

On a longer time scale is clear that it's not a zero sum game. But on a longer time scale it is not an economy what determines it, it's technology and technology is clearly a not a zero sum game.

On a shorter time scale it is clear that big chunk of the "economy" not only is zero sum but in fact negative. Look at Wall Street and banking,

 

[dismal]

On a longer time scale is clear that it's not a zero sum game. But on a longer time scale it is not an economy what determines it, it's technology and technology is clearly a not a zero sum game.

On a shorter time scale it is clear that big chunk of the "economy" not only is zero sum but in fact negative. Look at Wall Street and banking,

"technology" and "economy" are not two different things.

Technology is part of the economy.

 

[barbos]

On a longer time scale is clear that it's not a zero sum game. But on a longer time scale it is not an economy what determines it, it's technology and technology is clearly a not a zero sum game.

On a shorter time scale it is clear that big chunk of the "economy" not only is zero sum but in fact negative. Look at Wall Street and banking,

"technology" and "economy" are not two different things.

Technology is part of the economy.

Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

 

[dismal]

"technology" and "economy" are not two different things.

Technology is part of the economy.

Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

 

[barbos]

Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

And your point is....?

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Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

And your point is....?

 

[dismal]

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

And your point is....?

The economy is not a zero sum game. See topic.

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Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

And your point is....?

The economy is not a zero sum game. See topic.

 

[barbos]

Yes, technology is the part which works, the rest - no so much.

Technology is not a separate thing from the economy it is part of it. Time and resources spent developing a technology could be spent on something else. Like, for example, food - without which many technologies seem less important.

And your point is....?

The economy is not a zero sum game. See topic.

Wall Street is zero sum game. Wall street is a part of the economy, therefore economy is zero sum game, done!

 

[dismal]

Wall Street is zero sum game. Wall street is a part of the economy, therefore economy is zero sum game, done!

ksen? Is that you?