Check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Econophysics

And especially https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoeconomics


Also, from a future thread of mine:

... the prescriptive analogue of the descriptive ontological concept of substance is wealth: wealth is stuff of value. And just as in my ontology I hold real objects of substance to be constituted by the things they cause to happen (ala "to be is to do"), so too I hold that the value of wealth is constituted by the purpose that it serves: a thing is of value for the good that can be done with it.

This concept of wealth can be further decomposed into concepts of capital and labor, which in turn can be further decomposed to familiar ontological categories: capital is of value for the matter and space that it provides, while labor is of value for the energy and time that it provides. And just as matter is ultimately reducible to energy, so too capital is ultimately reducible to labor: capital is the distilled product of labor, worth at least the minimal time and energy it takes to obtain or create, and no more than the maximal time and energy it can save elsewhere.

Similarly, just as physical work happens when matter and energy flow through space and time, what we might call "ethical work" happens – good gets done – when wealth flows in an economy, each kind of wealth diffusing from where it is in higher concentration to where it is in lower concentration.


The concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands is not only unnatural (it's a result of state intervention to protect capital and wouldn't happen in a truly free market), but it's exactly counter to the flow of wealth that does "ethical work", that makes good happen.

Since they're the "masters of the universe," it's worth understanding exactly who they are. — Xtrix

It seems to me that everyone’s done everything except address the OP.

1: They’re very hard workers

2: They’re very good a setting an objective and then making a plan to get there

3: They’re very good at projecting into the future

4: They’re very adaptable

5: Many of them are very innovative

6: They’re very good at choosing people to work with, understanding them, motivating them

7: They inspire people within their circle

8: They have a through understanding of the world they’re operating in

9: They’re very good at networking

10: They create opportunities for others

Edit: Actually ignore number ten, that’s not about who they are.

11. They are societal parasites.

Some things about them we may not be impressed with.

1: They make decisions in a pragmatic way that may hurt others: what do I need, what don’t I need, how do I get what I want?

2: They measure all actions, all success, in terms of profits

3: They may at times bend the rules to achieve their objectives

4: They probably lie and deceive often

5: Their egos are all powerful

6: They view politics as merely a tool to achieve their objective

7: They’re never satisfied

The concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands is not only unnatural — Pfhorrest

It may be dishonest, it might be destructive, but how is it “unnatural?

how is it “unnatural? — Brett

it's a result of state intervention to protect capital and wouldn't happen in a truly free market — Pfhorrest

Yes, I would agree that a free market is the closest to a natural economy. Do you think there should be government regulation?

it's a result of state intervention to protect capital and wouldn't happen in a truly free market — Pfhorrest

What would a "truly" free market consist of, given that, historically, markets are state creations?

What's the source for most millionaires being self made? I know Forbes tried this once with billionaires, claiming most were self made, but the methodology was terrible. Donald Trump was labeled self made because he claimed he only received a single $1 million loan from his father. As it turns out, his father passed him the better part of a billion dollars, continuing to pump money into his failing businesses into Trump's 50s.

Another guy came from the bottom because "he worked at a gas station as a teen." In reality, a solid percentage were born rich and almost all were at least upper middle class.

I went to extremely selective schools so I met a lot of people from that class. Two physician families, etc. People vary the way they always do. I think the main difference is generally more educated and nuanced views, coupled with some insularity.

That is on average. I definitely taught young adults of the 1% and worked with plenty who were pretty dumb and unmotivated. Their success seemed totally due to peer effects, wealth, and networking. Couldn't write a coherent memo but got into one of the most selective schools in the world... hmmm.

Thomas J. Stanley's The Millionaire Next Door. I think they're just asking who inherited that sum, and if you didn't you were "self-made." I know, it's not perfect but I don't know how you get perfect stats on that given how difficult the notion of "self-made" is. After all, is anyone really self-made? In any case, you'll see this 80/20 number on numerous online sources as well.

I will say though that it's certainly possible for middle class people earning a stable salary, investing in retirement funds and living frugally to become millionaires. Class mobility is still certainly a thing in this country.

I think the mobility issue now is less that people cannot move upwards from middle class, but that you're more likely to move down than up and, once down from middle class, you're unlikely to get up again.

I agree with the first part you wrote about risk: Someone with more wealth is generally speaking in better place to take on risk even if this risk doesn't always work out.

Also, on the topic of ambition, and your conversation with apokrisis: society should be structured such that an unambitious person who just wants to stay at home and tend to their little garden can do so. — Pfhorrest

See, to me this isn't really a question of "shoulds." Lets say we're both 18 and we graduate HS together and I tell you "Hey Forrest, all I want to do now is live in an apartment or some sort of home and tend to be garden all day." Now the question is: Do I have the means or am I going to have to rely on the taxpayer - you, that is - for support? If I have the means to sit home all day and watch my garden, then that's fine; I'm not hurting you. But if I'm going to need support to that and I'm going to need you to chip in to support my habit that's a different issue.

So with great pain and reluctance I resigned myself to an "ordinary" life. Instead of trying to achieve great things, I would aim low, just try to secure my basic necessities like a house, just the minimal level of financial security, so I wouldn't be poor and on the verge of homelessness like my parents by the time my kids (that I then expected to have some day) were adults. — Pfhorrest

I honestly think this is a fine, reasonable goal. This goal is quite doable on the median US income, but not in expensive areas. In much of the country you can find decent homes for around $250k or even lower.

...how fucking impossible it is for anyone to achieve even that bare minimum of security: the right to sit and starve somewhere without paying someone for the privilege. — Pfhorrest

Thanks for sharing your story, dude, and with such devastating clarity and eloquence. Alas for Mr & Mrs Average in this situation. Here in the UK, our adoption of American values has reached the point where Covid is that minor set back that has more and more folks literally going hungry and homeless. A priest on TV last night in tears as he described how as he delivered food parcels, children would literally tear it open on the doorstep to get something to eat. Yea, freedom!

If the great transformation happened tomorrow, your life wouldn't change much. You don't need to be rescued. You just need a more flexible attitude.

It's the millions of people working multiple jobs with no social network and locked into it by obligations to kids and parents. They are the ones who need to help.

You just need to move to Wyoming and get a mortgage on a cabin. A greenhouse tent costs $200. Start gardening.

I think the mobility issue now is less that people cannot move upwards from middle class, but that you're more likely to move down than up and, once down from middle class, you're unlikely to get up again. — Echarmion

Where are the stats that people are more likely to move from middle to lower class than middle to upper middle? I feel like if this were true we'd be seeing an increasingly large lower class which I don't think we're seeing. Keep in mind the "bottom 20%" of income earners is not the bottom 20% population-wise. It's actually a significantly smaller percentage.

Yes, I would agree that a free market is the closest to a natural economy. Do you think there should be government regulation? — Brett

In an ideal world, no, but you’re missing the point: I’m against “government regulation” that you’re probably in favor of, government action that benefits those who already have excess property in a way that they would not be able to benefit if it weren’t for that government action. In a truly free market we would expect capital to flow from areas of high concentration to areas of low concentration: a free market should have egalitarian results. That’s what Adam Smith expected.

What would a "truly" free market consist of, given that, historically, markets are state creations? — Echarmion

I disagree that markets are entirely state creations, although so-called “free” markets that capitalists love are full of state intervention to protect capital.

In my view the thing that makes such markets unfree is primarily the existence of rent and interest, which are only tenable institutions because of state enforcement of the contracts that create them. I think there are good deontological reasons why those kinds of contracts, as well as others, are not valid and so should not be enforced. The reaction of the market in the absence of such enforcement will then lead to significantly more egalitarian results.

I think the mobility issue now is less that people cannot move upwards from middle class, but that you're more likely to move down than up and, once down from middle class, you're unlikely to get up again. — Echarmion

This connects closely to my issue with rent and interest. If you own capital exactly sufficient for your needs, you don’t have to borrow but you also can’t lend or let. That is how I define middle class, and for people in that class, their mobility really is a product of their work.

But the further below that threshold you get, the greater the costs you must incur from borrowing the capital you need to live and work, so the more likely your mobility is to be downward. And the further above that thresholds, the more you can afford to lend or let out your excess for profit, and so the more your mobility will tend to be upward.

Basically, rent and interest create a pressure away from the middle class, making the rich richer and the poor poorer. Absent that, there isn’t even any motive to own excess, so it would tend to be sold off to those who need it — and thus, on terms they can afford, since nobody but them are buying — so that those with excess can spend the proceeds on things of use value to them — which, since they already have sufficient capital, would be the labor of those who need more capital and are willing to labor for it.

And so in the absence of rent and interest capital would naturally dissipate from concentrations of useless excess to the places it is needed, in exchange for the labor of those who need more — exactly like early market advocates like Adam Smith expected.

In my view the thing that makes such markets unfree is primarily the existence of rent and interest, which are only tenable institutions because of state enforcement of the contracts that create them. I think there are good deontological reasons why those kinds of contracts, as well as others, are not valid and so should not be enforced. The reaction of the market in the absence of such enforcement will then lead to significantly more egalitarian results. — Pfhorrest

But that doesn't seem related to the freedom of the market. Or, rather, since I don't really know in what sense a market could be free, the proper statement is that this seems a very specific definition of free.

What about the state not enforcing any contracts, a system where contracts are governed by trust. Such systems exist, but with some exceptions aren't usually called markets. The Islamic world of the middle ages apparently had well working markets with no state enforcement (and also strict bans on usury).

Well, I can't say I completely understood you but it makes sense at some level. What you call ethical work is, if I catch your drift, the place where the real action takes place in terms of entropy. I can imagine money being spent to purchase energy (fuel & food) which ultimately is expended on activities [physical (machines & humans) and mental (humans)] that, at the end of the day, is about manipulating energy in order to do useful work.

Where does entropy figure in all this?

Well, from the little I can understand, money enables us to restore/maintain a low entropy state (a necessity it seems to get any useful work done) through food and fuel we purchase with it. This low entropy state, as we do work (useful work), transitions into a high entropy state which will require energy (food and fuel) to return to a low entropy state - basically, a cyclical process made up of a low and a high entropy state made possible by food and fuel we purchase with money. In that case, money is the link between energy (food and fuel) and the low entropy state we and machines have to achieve/maintain for useful work.

However, it's not that simple. Nothing is free and just as we need money to purchase food and fuel, we need money to engage in activities - using services, buying goods, general activities we carry out everyday requires money. So, it's not only in the restoration/maintenance of a low entropy state of our bodies and machines that use up money, it's also accessing services and consuming products. Money is involved in both cases - lowering entropy and increasing entropy and this is a critical fact to keep in mind.

When it comes to using services, buying goods (food included), we have preferences - we like certain brands and a customer loyalty is a real phenomenon - and they inevitably lead to the concentration of wealth in the select few, the popular brands. This concentration of wealth is what I've described as a lowered entropy state of money and it serves the following purposes:

1. The accumulated wealth can be used to employ both humans and machines and enable the former to buy food and the latter's fuel supply can be consolidated. Put differently, it becomes possible to both create and sustain low entropy systems at a larger scale which, in turn, results in more useful work being accomplished.

We can, with immense wealth, create and sustain large scale low entropy systems.

2. How different is the useful work done when huge amounts of wealth is involved? The only thing that I can think of is improvement in quality. Quality is defined in terms of durability, safety, aesthetics, efficiency, and so on. If you take a moment to consider quality in this sense, you'll notice that, all in all, it's about preventing or delaying high entropy states i.e. the main idea is to keep a system in a state of low entropy.

Huge capital, by improving the quality of services and goods, block/delay the progression from low entropy to high entropy

It seems then that the low entropy state of money in the bank accounts of the 1% results in either restoration of a low entropy state and in the obstruction/delay of a high entropy state, both at a scale much, much larger than would be possible if the money were in a high entropy state (evenly distributed among the population).

The bottom line is the entropy-increasing selective, preferential, work/activities (goods and services brands) we engage in is being transformed into entropy-decreasing concentration of wealth in the megarich. When the immense accumulated wealth gets distributed i.e. the money enters a high entropy state, there's a concomitant block/delay in the evolution to a high entropy system which is another name for quality.

Where are the stats that people are more likely to move from middle to lower class than middle to upper middle? I feel like if this were true we'd be seeing an increasingly large lower class which I don't think we're seeing. Keep in mind the "bottom 20%" of income earners is not the bottom 20% population-wise. It's actually a significantly smaller percentage. — BitconnectCarlos

Stats for which country? That the middle class is, broadly speaking "in trouble" has been a common theme for years. Whether or not the middle class is shrinking or being "squeezed" depends on the way you calculate.

But that doesn't seem related to the freedom of the market. Or, rather, since I don't really know in what sense a market could be free, the proper statement is that this seems a very specific definition of free. — Echarmion

A free market is one in which all trades are uncoerced.

I consider certain kinds of contract, including those of rent and interest, to be coercive because rather than just agreeing to owe some capital or labor in exchange for some other capital or labor, they require you reflectively agree to agree to owe more, and not even in exchange for anything more, just in "exchange" for the other party allowing you to keep what they've already given you. It's in the same category as selling oneself into slavery: it's giving up not just a first-order liberty (by taking on an obligation) or claim (by transferring property), but a second-order immunity (from having new obligations placed on oneself, or one's property transferred away from oneself). You can't freely give up your freedom like that; and it's not even really a trade at all, which are entirely on a first-order level.

What about the state not enforcing any contracts, a system where contracts are governed by trust. Such systems exist, but with some exceptions aren't usually called markets. The Islamic world of the middle ages apparently had well working markets with no state enforcement (and also strict bans on usury). — Echarmion

A market with no enforcement of contracts at all would be strictly freer, yes. Though I'm not sure it would be strictly better; I think some contracts are morally justifiable. Some narrow limitations on freedom are better than the alternative: I shouldn't be free to punch you in the face, for example, or to burn down your house (even if nobody's in it).

And yeah, not only the Islamic world of the middle ages but much of it today, as well as the Catholic world of the middle ages, have/had strict bans on usury, and I think that's great, except that they had a huge gaping hole: they only cared about money-lending, not any other kind of capital-lending. Renting out housing, for example, is perfectly okay by them. So there are convoluted contracts involving a combination of money lent "interest-free", property rental, and insurance, which replicate the effects of money lending at interest, and circumvent the whole ban, making the whole thing pretty toothless.

For simplicity, just picture money as energy.

Stuff only happens when energy flows from concentrated areas out to less concentrated areas. That increases entropy, but it does work, in the physical sense. That's why doing work of any kind always increases universal entropy.

If some mechanism was in place to keep all the energy concentrated in one place, then no work would get done. Nothing would happen. Concentrated energy is potential for work to happen, but the work only happens when you let that concentration dissipate.

Of course, if you let all the energy flow out from its concentrations until it couldn't flow any more, then at the end of that you would have maximal entropy and no more work would happen, unless more energy was pumped into the system somewhere, from which it would flow to other parts of the system, doing more work along the way.

In an economy, that "energy", i.e. value, which money is representative of, flows into the system when humans do work, in the economic sense, which I called "ethical work" earlier to distinguish it from "physical work": when they create things of value. If one human does way more work than anybody else, creates a lot more value, then there will be a concentration of value around them, and that will then flow out into the rest of the economy and make more good stuff happen.

But merely concentrating pre-existing value (e.g. money) around one person doesn't make anything good happen. Rather quite the opposite. It's like how running a heat pump to pull all the heat from one area into another doesn't actually create a lower-entropy state: you (or the heat pump) are having to do work to achieve that, and wasting that work on just fighting the natural flow of energy that would otherwise power useful work.


In extremis, the physical and the ethical merge, because the source of human productivity (that is the input into the economic system that keeps new value being created and flowing around accomplishing good things) is ultimately the fuel that goes into humans themselves, food, which comes through the food web ultimately from sunlight. All our economies are in the end solar-powered, and without a source of energy like that -- and the heat sink of space to dump our waste energy into -- plants couldn't create sugars to fuel the ecosystem, and so humans couldn't create anything of value to fuel the economy.

Since they're the "masters of the universe," it's worth understanding exactly who they are. — Xtrix

All I know is their crap smells the same as ours and are ultimately subject to the same laws governing life and death. They can just do whatever they want at any time, or can they? I imagine it'd be something like a lifelong jail sentence. You can't go (just) anywhere or do anything and you'll never really know how other people are. Everyone you try to meet or run into on the street or anywhere will either have their best face on because of what you have/can do or their worst because of what they don't/cannot. Sure you'll be able to do and experience things here most never will ie. private island parties, yachts, exotic cars, homes that are like castles, weekend vacations that cost more than the average person makes in 2 years, but you'll never have a normal family life or be able to let your kids grow up normal. You'll walk around your whole life with a target on your back. I wouldn't care for it. Reminds me of the saying "A nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there."

In the 1% you certainly have successful people but I'd hardly call someone with a net worth of $10MM one of the "masters of the universe." — BitconnectCarlos

That's a good point. I wanted to add that the more accurate figure is a tenth of 1%, but thought it was too specific. So I'm using "1%" more to signify the masters fo the universe, as in the Occupy slogan and as a shorthand. But you're right.



Excellent, as usual.

These are all things I believe: 1) The rich, on balance, have more opportunity than the poor. 2) Even in a completely economically equal society, there would be no equality of opportunity. 3) The notion of "equality of opportunity" is a dubious one. — BitconnectCarlos

It's not a matter of "opportunity," which is basically meaningless; it's a matter of conditions. Sure, a kid in the ghetto can become a millionaire -- plenty of examples of things like that happening.

I notice people of conservative and libertarian ideologies loves to speak about things like "opportunity" and "access" (access to healthcare, for example). Gotta watch the language. It's really a sneaky way of defending a savage variant of capitalism, in my view.

Since they're the "masters of the universe," it's worth understanding exactly who they are.
— Xtrix

It seems to me that everyone’s done everything except address the OP. — Brett

True, but still interesting. As for your list -- I was thinking more in terms of ideologies and values, not necessarily the character attributes you mention. But where do you get that list, may I ask? What makes you say that? In fact, I'm sure a significant percentage were already born into wealth. You don't have to be a hard worker or very future-oriented for that.

But regardless, even if this were true for the majority, isn't most of your list also true for many people you know?

The concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands is not only unnatural (it's a result of state intervention to protect capital and wouldn't happen in a truly free market), — Pfhorrest

Massive state intervention.

Also, the idea of a "free market" is often invoked as an ideal of some kind, by Rand and Friedman and others, but it's pure fantasy, as you know.

Class mobility is still certainly a thing in this country. — BitconnectCarlos

Where's the scholarship on this? I'd like to see some evidence. Because it's often claimed, and of course there are examples and thousands of anecdotes, but I have a hunch it's complete nonsense -- at least when talking about what we're discussing here, which is the 1%.

It's a lot like talk about voter fraud -- yes, it happens, but so rarely as to be imperceptible.

In an ideal world, no, but you’re missing the point: I’m against “government regulation” that you’re probably in favor of, government action that benefits those who already have excess property — Pfhorrest

One of the constant problems on this forum is that a question is taken as some form of entrapment, or by asking it I’m saying I support the thing I ask about.

Just take it as a genuine question about whether you think it’s a good idea or not. Assuming I’m “ probably in favour of government action that benefits those who already have excess property” because I ask the question is very presumptive and obviously unproductive.

As for your list -- I was thinking more in terms of ideologies and values, not necessarily the character attributes you mention. — Xtrix

Well we have to start somewhere don’t we? How can we determine their ideologies and values unless we identify them and look at their background?

What makes you say that? — Xtrix

What do you mean?

When people talk about the 1% in the US, one has to remember that you are talking about 3,3 million people.

So you have people like physicians:

According to the New York Times, among all groups of physicians – academic, private practice, and hospital or clinic-based – roughly 200,000 doctors, or about 20% of the profession, belong to the 1%.

A great site where you see who actually are the 1% top income by profession can be seen here.

So it goes like managers, physicians, chief executives and public administrators, lawyers, teachers...

Yes, teachers like professors in universities etc. Who people refer to with the 1% is usually more of the 0,01% or smaller...

Assuming I’m “ probably in favour of government action that benefits those who already have excess property” because I ask the question is very presumptive and obviously unproductive. — Brett

I didn’t assume that just because of that question, but because of the impression I get from your other posts in this thread.