if you're seriously implying that people who put in a little work and built a software program or internet website that they managed to sell for billions at the turn of the 21s t century worked 'hard' then you're very out of touch with reality

working hard is someone slaving away in a coal mine or farming day in and day out. proportionately for the money, Bill Gates didn't work 'hard'. he worked hard probably in the sense of his job but a lot of it is LUCK. 

someone like Bill Gates could do all of the work in his life 100 lifetimes over and it wouldn't justify the amount of money he has

and I'm not throwing judgement per say directly on someone like him, because it IS a free market. but I mean to throw judgement on the system as it is. no government should allow individuals to become that powerful and that wealthy

I don't think anyone here could give me a reasonable and logical explanation of how its HEALTHY for the world to have people with that much of the percentage of wealth

it would be like the comparison of 10 people being stuck on an island and exploring it, right? and one person working the hardest to find where a patch of the only food, the melon trees where. Just because the one person worked hard and found the melon trees doesn't mean they should automatically be allowed to keep ALL of the melons (wealth)

I actually generally support capitalism and a free market but there NEEDS to be caps. if left totally uncontrolled what happens is the wealthy get wealthier and the poorer get poorer

if you look at the past few decades that's exactly what's been happening. some people may be fooled with inflation and think that the poor are not getting proportionately poor as the richer get rich, but they are

take a simple stat like the minium wage from 1980 and compare it with today and you'll see that if it was adjusted accurately for standard of living then the national minium wage would be like over 15.00$

there needs to be SOME administering of rules about wealth and income. We have a tax system yet there are no particularly special rules about people with insane amounts of wealth and there should be. like raise it to 75% tax if someone is making hundreds of millions of years

of it not that then maybe something like a 50% total wealth tax / death tax when someone dies.

there needs to be something in the system to prevent a never ended caste system in which a few select individuals become wealthier and wealthier and others become poorer and poorer. I speak specifically about the USA, but in a lot of other places it worse obviously.

there's no reason that stricter tax rules haven't already been enforced on the ultra rich EXCEPT for the fact that the rich family's / corporations control the media and politics to some degree. that's the only reason it hasn't happened

again though, the concept is not socialism but just putting wealth caps. No one can give a reason as to why one individual should have billions of dollars. No reason. it would take many lifetimes to 'honestly' have put in enough work for that

Don't worry too much. The whole thing is bound to collapse sometime. Without dramatic political changes, the US won't be able to pay its bills rather soon. It almost happened not too long ago, but they were able to dodge that bullet (once again). However, the day will come when that isn't possible anymore. Just imagine the US filing bankruptcy. All those US dollars will become worthless over night, making most billionaires on this planet poor in an instant. The world as we know it will break down, but it will recover. The really interesting thing is who will come out on top afterwards? China? The EU? Russia? Hell if I know.

History just keeps repeating itself. After all, capitalism just isn't perfect. Communism isn't either, before you ask. We just don't have an optimal solution for stuff like this, so we just have to roll with it for now. It could work in theory, but there are too many people way too fucking greedy for that. So until we find something better, we will just continue to see empires rise and fall, like it happened always in history. Best thing you as an individual can do is to make sure to stand on the right side. Which isn't that easy all the time.

I do agree however that astronomical high taxes for both companies and stupidly rich individuals are a good thing. If someone earns 10 million a year or more, he should totally pay 99 % taxes. He would still be rich as fuck. But there are major problems with such measures. You can't do it as a single country, because people will just move away to some place with lower taxes. So we would have to come up with some global solution. Yeah, just try to bring together China, the US and russia to a table and on top of that make sure they all agree. Lulz. That aside, money is power. So many of the rich people have a serious influence in politics, which is why there won't be changing too much anytime soon.

Tell me the last time anyone here has read about a family which had the most powerful banks in all of Europe and split itself up  and spread into five european nations ruling over even its royal elite for two hundred years. The power of royalty today has been proven to be a sham by men such as this.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. No sarcasm.

Sports players and models gain millions because many many people idolize them.

Its because they are valued higher because of their skill. You see the sport itself generates revenue, but the player is the workhorse which brings money ito the owners. The most valuable player gets paid more to make sure they keep winning. People idolize players because they stand out from the pack. The majority of the money athletes makes comes from marketing endorsements. You see...because of modern public relations, marketers have found out how to get people to spend money by creating an embellished image of prominenet members of teams, modeling, acting and high society and profit off of their image.

This man...Edward Bernays  whom was the nephew of Sigmund Freud, is considered the father of American public relations, aka American propaganda.

His philosophy is why modern marketers and creators of propaganda have your number. Every wonder why reality tv is so big? Karadashians? This guy is responsible for the propaganda philosophy.

LOL. Yeah. Let's not value intelligence at all. Just because he isn't slaving away doesn't not make it hard work. That's the silliest fucking thing I've ever heard.

No one said intelligence isnt valuable, but at some point it can be a malevolent force. When used for good it can change the world, but when it is used for greed and causes disparity, it only becomes dangerous. The best part about it all is that common minds never inquire. As I stated earlier, there is a reason why the wealthiest people on the planet are not listed in any major publications. The money they have is obscene and if anyone knew they would demand a cap on income.

In cases like this you should be more constructive ...

You lie, the truth is most billionaires have earned their wealth. The vast majority huge corporations are either state owned or publicly traded so I highly doubt family owned businesses make up a large portion of the billionaires like you say ... 

Taxes are often just government mandated thievery and you should feel ashamed for advocating such a thing ... 

Why can't we have billionaires in poor countries ? Better the few getting quality lifetimes than having none at all ...

Why should the rich have to support the poor or feel guilty for the less fortunate ? Life is not supposed to be some charity you think it is ...

Effort =/= Gains

It's not all about working, it's about been financially smart ... 

Is this just income gap? Small tidbit bonuses for the poor is goverment funded stuff like free healthcare, food and education have improved since 1988 I assume. So while things might seem mightily worse, it might actually be better for the poor. The rich will have to pay for this, which barely lowers their income but they still have to pay.