Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

The top 0.1% has a lot more wealth than you're giving credit for.



The US has about 300 million people (well, more, but math is easier if you round it). At $1000 per month, that's a total cost of $300 billion / month, or $3.6 trillion dollars a year.

The US government spent $3.5 trillion in FY2014, according to Wikipedia.


It is $6 trillion. Will last for less than two years.


That's assuming there isn't a loss of value in being forced to liquidate $6T in holdings, which there certainly would be. For every seller there has to be a buyer and most eligible buyers would be having their assets seized by the government.


Right, which is significantly more than the parent indicated.

I'm not claiming that simply taking all the billionaires' wealth is any kind of solution, but that doesn't justify obscuring the facts.


The parent indicated "perhaps a year". In fact, "slightly less than two years". Not a big difference.


Twice as much is not a big difference?


No. Because these $6T are not liquid money. Once you cash these assets out, you'll get $3T if you're very, very lucky.


It's obviously not $6 trillion in cash...


[citation needed]




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: