Forum Post: It's unanimous. The rich are afraid of hard work.
Posted 12 years ago on Dec. 28, 2011, 8:22 p.m. EST by FriendlyObserverA
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Everytime I mention equal pay the response from the rich is the same, " with equal pay they would seek out the easiest laziest jobs!"
The rich have the easiest, laziest jobs. All they do is sit back and collect other people's money.
not that i like oprah , but do you think she's lazy? was steve jobs lazy? Your jealousy and envy are showing.
obviously you have never managed people, directed operations, or handled organization/administration.....
I think Barrack Obama had the same perspective...and now he knows better...after nearly destroying the country with his inadequacy....
Yep. Nothing to do with the polices of Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, Bush II and all the congresses over the decades. Or with corporate control of politics. Nothing at all to do with any of those things, it's all BO's fault.
You, sir, are an idiot. No better than BO himself.
nah...it's not ALL his fault....the democrats elected in 2006 gave him a running start on the destruction......ending the largest growth period (04-07) in US history.....(I know, you anti-capitalists want to forget that)
We need to appoint Bush II again to fulfill your dreams of endless war and more tax cuts for the rich.
no..Bush43 was too much of a Big Government type
the rich didnt get rich by sitting on their asses did they ?
Unless your Paris Hilton
Paris Hilton didn't "get" rich....she got a very small portion of the fortune of men who did.....and much more went to charity and philanthropical interests than ever went to her......
Not to mention the millions of direct and ancillary employment, opportunities and development of enterprises related to the Hotel industry that without the contribution of Conrad Hilton.....
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The reason the "evil rich and wealthy" don't physically work hard is because they "work smart".
Because the ride on the backs of those that do work hard. Free riders they are wealthy back-riding free riders. With a predator nature. Never having empathy and lacking conscience. The only way to turn this on it's head is with a fairness amendment.
So what you are saying that people who work for an employee are being "used" by the "evil rich and wealthy".
Do you agree with this statement?
It's not called working smart.
What is your definition of working smart?
Wow, thats pretty interesting. Even lazier than those on welfare?
Welfare recipients are not lazy. They are innovative and endowed with the entrepreneurial spirit. Their ability to create government and, or, contracted employment while paying as little tax as possible makes them a benefit to our nation.
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Yep. People on welfare have to leap through hurdles to collect. Prove ID, citizenship, job applications, family members, wait in line, etc. Rich people just have other people collect money for them.
You're insane. Those on welfare, usually, wouldnt last three seconds in a high profile managerial job.
There is a reason most of these "rich" people went to college.
Like the CEOs who benefited from TARP?
The only reason they are not on welfare is because their loyal government servants bailed them out with our money. That's the REAL welfare.
Welfare is welfare. Im not defending the corrupted CEO;s, Im just saying you cannot swap the places of a CEO and a lazy bum on welfare.
This is pretty obvious, right?
No. People don't aspire to welfare, they aspire to work. Your picture of welfare is inspired by Rush Limbaugh. Real welfare was eradicated by Clinton. The social safety net is all but non-existent. It isn't even called welfare anymore, it's now Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
Combined social welfare is around $328 billion. TARP - corporate welfare - is $16 trillion so far, and banks have made hundreds of billions off it. And there is more coming for them, but not for those who have exhausted their unemployment benefits, or can't find work.
You should educate yourself on these matters before you go spouting nonsense. Only a lazy bum wouldn't.
TANF's budget for the past 24 months was $4.0 BILLION, THATS IT!
Sorry but I disagree with you when it comes to "people don't aspire to welfare, they aspire to work.
A person on the "welfare dole" can live on $10.00 a day. They don't need anything because it's all provided for them. Three generations of recipiants - what does that tell you.
Now, that is not to say that there are those who want to get out but don't know how because the government "won't teach them how to".
There is no reason why the government can't provide training for these people while they are "on the welfare dole" but they won't because they will be taken to court because of "liberty infringments" .
No one said corporate welfare wasnt way more than social welfare (which includes all welfares, and they all have different names).
And Im certainly not saying that corporate welfare is justified in any matter. I want to throw them all in jail.
But I've known plenty of people who stay on welfare, stay on UE as long as possible, basically try to stay on the system for as long as possible.
And Ive known plenty of pretty well off people, CEO's.
The first couldnt keep up with the later. Im not questioning your work ethic, Im just saying that Ive known a wide range of people, and those that love the handouts cant keep up with the CEO's.
Frankly I cant even believe Im arguing this with you.
The fallacy is that someone who gets paid more works harder, or is in some way more intelligent, more responsible, better looking, more socially conscious, etc. than someone who gets paid less.
We all know this is false, and the only thing you can say with accuracy about people who get paid more is that they get paid more.
ENRON is a good example. They hired the best and the brightest, paid them enormous sums and gave them billions to play with. When the best and the brightest LOST money, they were promoted, given raises and even more money to play with.
Promotions often don't come from competence but rather from nepotism, brown nosing, social climbing, etc. In some protected environments, such as civil service, incompetence is often promoted to a position where it can do less actual damage.
As such your sweeping generalizations are bullshit.
No one said pay was a direct relationship to work either! Where are you getting these assumptions?
You are saying that those that dont work are more skilled than those that run Fortune 500 companies.
I am saying no.
If you can get me an example of someone who DOESNT WORK that would make a great CEO, Id love to hear about it...
No.....your assertions are bullshit, you are lumping TARP in with Federal Reserve action, the Fed is independent, if you want to discuss reining in or eliminating the Fed, that is another discussion entirely....Tarp expenditures were a hair under 300 Billion..ONE TIME, and combined Social Welfare, EACH YEAR (including direct benefits and administration) is in excess of 2 trillion, NOT 328 billion......
Those who get paid more DO work harder, longer, gain more experience, pay dues, learn, educate (both formal and self education), sacrifice, and they don't fill their lives with massive amounts of entertainment and sensory diversion like those who make little or nothing.......
Promotion is massively competitive, and yes the things you mentioned are factors, given equal or nearly equal qualifications.....but, relationships, obsequious behavior, etc DO NOT replace proficiency, merit or ability....
Examine the typical life of a Middle or Low income earner and that of a HIgh income earner and the disparity in compensation pales in comparison to the disparity of effort over time......If you do not see, or accept, that...then you have no idea what you are talking about and you are merely making hyperbolic emotional arguments with no basis in fact...PERIOD
"high profile managerial job", meetings about outsourcing to india and then eight balls of cocaine, booze and high priced hookers is sooo hard
Haha
And the wealthy investor wouldn't last a day in the workforce.
Yeah, like Larry Ellison and Steve Jobs. That's funny.
CEOs who benefited from TARP
Rick Wagoner, CEO General Moters (2009)
Dan Akerson, CEO General Moters (2010)
Robert Benmosche, CEO AIG
Jamie Dimon, CEO JP Morgan Chase
Michael Carpenter, CEO GMAC/Ally
Lloyd Blankfein, CEO Goldman Sachs
Vikram Pandit, CEO, Citigroup
Ken Lewis, CEO, Bank of America
John Mack, CEO, Morgan Stanley
John Stumpf, CEO, Wells Fargo
Stanley O’Neal former CEO, Merrill Lynch
Charles Prince, former CEO, Citigroup
Michael Williams, CEO Fannie Mae
Charles Haldeman Jr., CEO Freddie Mac
Mack Whittle, CEO South Financial Group
Brian Moynihan, CEO Bank of America
...
FYI Apple's profit margin on the iPhone is 58%.
Is this per unit? Does it include R & D?
The top ten actors make over 100,000,000 a year--The top ten sports figures make over 60 million a year--The top ten CEO's make 43 million a year. Where is your outrage?
If bullshit had wings you'd be in the stratosphere.
Top 10 Hedge Fund Managers pay (2010):
John Paulson $4.9 billion
Ray Dalio $3.1 billion
Jim Simmons $2.5 billion
David Tepper $2.2 billion
Steve Cohen $1.3 billion
Eddie Lampert $1.1 billion
Carl Icahn $900 million
Bruce Kovner $640 million
George Soros $450 million
Paul Tudor Jones $440 million
Total gross pay top 10 Hedge Fund Managers: $17.530 billion
Top ten CEOs pay (2010):
VIACOM Philippe Dauman $84,515,308
ORACLE Lawrence J. Ellison $77,556,015
LYONDELLBASELL INDUSTRIES James L. Gallogly $77,061,964
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM Ray R. Irani $76,107,010
CBS CORP Leslie Moonves $57,729,020
GAMCO INVESTORS INC Mario J. Gabelli $56,608,736
GENERAL GROWTH PROPERTIES Adam S. Metz $53,275,790
JEFFERIES GROUP INC Richard B. Handler $47,349,121
MCKESSON CORP John H. Hammergren $46,149,360
DISCOVERY COMMUNICATIONS David M. Zaslav $42,589,296
Total gross pay top 10 CEOs: $619 million (3.5% of what the top ten hedge fund managers were paid)
Highest paid actors (2010-2011):
Leonardo DiCaprio $72m
Johnny Depp with $50m
Adam Sandler, with $40
Angelina Jolie $30m
Sarah Jessica Parker $30m
Jennifer Aniston $28m
Total pay top 10 actors: $349 million (1.9% of what the top ten hedge fund managers were paid)
If there was a cap on profits they would all be affected.
what difference does the % of profit margin make? you don't have to buy the product.
I don't understand, are you saying these people don't work?
i think it is the exact opposite, those people who succeed in lifer are the one who work the hardest.
All they did (after raping and pillaging the US economy) was collect bailouts. TARP is "other people's" money. You call that hard work?
Money is only a measure of success for those lacking in human values.
I owned 3 companies. (Not at the same time!) I worked 10 to 14 hours a day--7 days a week. If you want to succeed in any business, that is expected. For every successful business there is at least a hundred failures. I'm not defending the person who got where they are by inheriting the position. (Not all of those are bad either!). I'm defending the entrepreneur.
Funny how that works
and your cherry picking of profit by specific product is sad....Apple's net profit margin is 23.43%......
Only 23% profit margin?! How did Jobs ever eke a living out of that?
who said "only"....I was just pointing out your fallacious data...
Data on iPhone is accurate. At least as accurate as your libertarian fantasy is for you.
Companies don't make net profits on single product offerings.....are you really that stupid?
Exactly where did I use the word "net"? LOL, talk about stupid. Got anything to contribute other than the echoing sound of talking out of your ass?
if it's not "net" it's not really profit......have you ever filled out a tax return?
Can't read, can't answer the question, goodbye TROLL. And good luck with that cranial-rectal inversion.
yep...that's about the reaction I'd expect from someone who doesn't know anything...diversion.....
Let me help you...Profit = Income over expenses..... taxation is an expense, as is the cost and revenue of other products a company produces.....so, a single product "profit" is a fallacious figure to quote in regard to the company in general....it's illogical....like most of your arguments....
You like to cherrypick and create false links between unrelated items....
In your world a troll is someone who brings reality into your fantasy world of "everyone is equal regardless of contribution "......typical
No one is forced to buy an Apple Iphone. Ihones are pretty much souped up toys. A cheap basic cellphone for peanuts is all one needs. I dont understand why anyone cares about Apple's profit margin. They produce a great product in a competitive market and sell the shit out of it.
you must be a troll too....hahaha
I actually dont understand why Apple is now a target. They didnt take Tarp money. Everything they sell is discretionary. Not one thing is required to live. If we are going to get mad at companies that compete, make stuff people worldwide want to buy, and dont take government handouts, thats nutz.
Welfare recipients are not mentally lazy either. They are innovative and endowed with the entrepreneurial spirit. Their ability to create government and, or, contracted employment while paying as little tax as possible makes them a benefit to our nation.
That's a bunch of crap, you think they sat on their butts and became rich? If you took all the cash in the US and divided it up evenly between everybody, it would all end up back with the same people that have it now. You lazy a**'s would do anything with it to better your selves, in a couple of years you would be in the same place you are now, broke and unemployed.
For the most part, yes. Investors sat on their butts.
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Absolutely
That is because that is the perception they were t(h)ought. Whether they are lying to make their case, have over worked themselves into hysteria or are speaking from experience, I have yet been able to decipher. But i don't like their demeaning condemnation of a class who are just as smart, maybe more. They don't willy nillaly jump on the hamster wheel of success. Their, the bottom Rung's, priorities seem more grounded. But, hay who knows, i may just be rationalizing my existence Just like everyone else.
Keep rationalizing you're doing fine. Someday we will have equality.
Like our own members of Congress?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/25-richest-members-of-congress/2011/07/11/gIQAmtxiMK_gallery.html?hpid=z2#photo=52
That is what you get from that response? Really?I'm not rich by any stretch of the imagination and I know that in that situation most ( but not all) people would indeed seek out the easiest jobs. Why wouldn't they?
You have lazy people in every economic class.
Best answer. There is no class stereotype that every human being easily fits into, so both sides need to cut it out.
Yes there is. The wealthy are predators.
I understand your anger, but your original premise was about hard work, not predation. I managed a warehouse for a small business owner for seven years and while I could say a lot of negative things about him (including predation), he did not lack a work ethic. He worked very hard.
Now, if you want to make an argument that the very act of seeking to gain wealth off another's labor is an act of predation, then do so, but don't stereotype work habits. It simply isn't true.
I had an uncle that would cut cordwood during the winter months for sun up til sundown. With a hand saw manual labor. Strongest man Ive ever known. Now that was hard work. But when I would ask him about it he never mentioned hard work but what he did say was one knee would get wet. You see he had to kneel on one knee beside the tree to cut it down. My HERO.
What your boss did in the warehouse. Would be considered " light duties. Of course I am sure it was hard for him.
You and Diogenes have a lot in common. You think every rich person is lazy and he thinks every poor person is lazy. So according to you two people, everybody in the world must be lazy. Crazy!!!
JadedCitizen, we don't know if you are male or female, but yes I believe the back-riders need to get off and earn their keep like the rest of us.
FriendlyObserverA, back-riders is an argument against predation and greed, not work ethos. I stand for fairness and truth at all times. When you start sounding like Diogenes, you are not being fair and representing truth, you're allowing your judgment to be skewed by your agenda to demonize an entire class of people. No class of people is entirely lazy, the faults lie in their values. The rich think they are entitled to profit enormously off the labor of other people and they work very hard to do so. If the rich were all lazy, we wouldn't be in the position we are in today.
As I mentioned in my opening statement, the response from the rich to equal pay is unanimous. They want easiest laziest jobs. You could look at all the posts to see the responses.
And yes back- riding is unethical.
Then, they (the rich) should know that 75% of American fire fighters are volunteer and get paid nothing. Firefighting is hard, not to mention dangerous, work. These volunteers are not motivated by money/wealth, but by other factors like community, duty, honor, or pride.
Of course the rich want everyone to believe that people will seek the easiest work if you remove the incentive of earning more money than everyone else, but their underlying motivation to say this, results, not from their laziness, but from their desire to justify their own greediness and selfish, predatory behavior.
They believe what they are saying though; It's a reflection of their number one value (greed) in reverse -
WITH unlimited money on the table,
--people will take advantage of those around them and act in their best self-interest to take wealth from other people.
REVERSE, WITH money taken off the table,
--people will take advantage of those around them and act in their best self-interest to do the least amount of work.
The rich, and those who think like them, take the culmination of human incentive and erase all the good stuff until they paint it into a very negative, tiny framework of greed.
Bottom line - the value systems of the rich - are poor. pun intended.
And yes, the rich have poor ethics. pun intended again.
Well they will be in for a rude awakening because with equal pay the incentive will be to compete for the career one desires through performance and ability. The underachievers will fall to the bottom with less options at their avail.
It just dawned on me. The rich are the only ones who make the claim they work hard. Thanks for for the response jadine
Hopefully, Diogenes Truth will be first in line for that rude awakening. They don't come much more two-faced and rotten than that fool. Lol.
equal pay for unequal work is never happening. are you 17 years old? looks like the dumb genes in your family are dominant.
so, your uncle was REALLY stupid. Why cut wood with a hand saw when there are gas and electric chain saw? sounds like he dumber than a box of rocks.
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http://www.cnbc.com/id/39778909/The_Young_Millionaires_Club
http://smallbusiness.aol.com/2010/05/27/meet-the-new-young-millionaires/
Sit on your butts and complain and make excuses
The rich/elites/globalists, etc are really afraid of "WE THE PEOPLE" WE WILL PREVAIL
I like it. Very optimistic !
I want to be a school crossing guard. Work twice a day for about 2 hours, get great benefits and summer/holiday vacations. COOL! All that with equal pay.....YEAH!!!!
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Just saying....if everyone gets paid exactly the same, then I want to be a crossing guard.
Why don't you do that now?
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The comments in this thread alone continue to spark my motivation.
The rich work harder and smarter. They don't fear hard work, they realize that only fools work for someone. Rich guys set goals and they take on the real challenge of meeting a payroll. Dopes on this forum seek to meet paychecks.
The rich buy real estate and let renters pay off their mortgages. How smart is that? right now there are very smart folks buying up all these foreclosures and re renting them. House sold for $300k 4 years ago can be bought for $150K out of foreclosure and rented right back to the sap that over paid originally. So the sap that overpaid is making us rich guys even richer.
Is this a great country or what?
The rental market these days is huge. All the realtors I know are making a killing on these rental homes. The days of flipping houses is over.. the ones with capital are buying them up like you said and renting them right back out. Which in turn is putting more of the tradespeople back to work. ( painters, carpenters and so forth)
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The smart live off the backs of the dumb would be a better phrasing. That's how its been for the history of the earth from the smallest single celled creatures, to dinosaurs, and now to man. Survival of the smartest.
Here is a simple solution. If you are poor, just become rich, it is that easy. Don't stay poor, that is stupid.
Problem solved.
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yes the manufacturer is dumb. by your own admission, the middleman rakes in the profits, so why doesnt the dumb manufacturer sell direct? he could sell more of an item for less and still make a good profit. so he has to be stupid for giving away so much of the profit, right?
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cowardly? how? shrewd, yes.
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as he laughs all the way to the bank. cowardly and rich? coursgeous and destitute?
hmmm?
Hmm. You know the payroll of the yankees is all over the place. The ones riding the pine would like a shot at everyday play, because they get more money. It's about productivity. Produce little, get paid little. Produce more, get paid more. It makes perfect sense.
I don't care how much they make as long as the have the living shit taxed out of them.
That's why so may are leaving the great state of New York. New York is suffering the loss of 2 congressional seats because of so much population shifting out of the state.
Yeah...that will stimulate their initiative and motivate their efforts...they can contribute more and end up with less....great plan,,,,stupid
Exactly what do they contribute now, my son?
look around, almost everything you can touch or see is the result of the organization of effort and capital......not labor...labor is the lowest contributing factor....none of the perks of life we now know would exist because of labor alone....only because of organization of labor and capital do they exist.....
Nothing would exist without labor.
labor is a given, labor must be exchanged for the simplest of things, food, clothing, shelter......but, for more complex technologies and advances.....organization is a bigger factor than labor, since with organization, and capitalization of labor the simple things can be done by fewer people, and those with particular skills can be utilized in ways which utilize those skills......the culture we now enjoy would not exist without organization of labor.......if only simple labor and effort existed, it would be a much more primitive and hostile world
When you say the capitalization of labor you basically defeat your own argument.
really? adding capital to labor defeats the argument? hardly....shovels and hand tools were the first capitalization of labor as setting future benefits in the cost of those implements....
Now we have machinery and computers as well....labor now can produce far in excess of what it could before capitalization....
Do you argue this point?
Everything we have is a result of labour. Mental or physical.
In an early statement of yours you claim " not labor". I was simply pointing out your error. And yes organization is definitely the advances of civilization.
I'm not going to play semantics with you, when my comment clearly illustrated the difference between thought and labor....labor being a physical pursuit.....
It is thought that creates organization, not "mental labor" as you use it so it fits your definition......
As long as you realize your error.
there is no error....thought is not labor
IF there is an error, it is you trying to expand the definition of "labor" to include thought
What is thought if not labor.
um....."thought", perhaps...?
You would really want equal pay? That would destroy this country.
As if the country hasn't been destroyed already ...
Which would destroy the country:
Paying CEOs like fruit pickers or paying fruit pickers like CEOs?
Paying fruit pickers like CEOs you dumbass. Have you seen the pictures of people taking wheel barrows of money to get a loaf of bread. That's what our country would turn into if you paid minimum wage jobs more than they deserve.
It is because of CEOs that the Fed has been pumping trillions into the economy ... it won't be long before the US dollar is on par with the old Zimbabwe dollar.
Fruit pickers are more deserving and would be more responsible with the money than the corrupt class that has bankrupted the US and global economies for their own profit.
And how do you conclude that the rich are afraid of hard work. Your statement doesn't make any sense?