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

While I agree with you and disagree with the original poster, indeed, not everyone agrees that some wealth disparity is a good and necessary part of a healthy economy, I think the discussion merits more than a dismissive "Nope". Perhaps, if you are one of those that disagrees, you could lay out your position and argument.

It is difficult to see how to avoid wealth disparity. We can argue all day about whether that is good or evil, but it is a dangerous and destructive proxy for the complex question that, I believe, most of us actually want to answer: How do we get the most good to the most people while simultaneously preserving most or all of the autonomy, freedom, and privacy that Western cultures traditionally also value?




You can't disagree with either cperciva or btilly, because they've merely been presenting facts and figures. I don't see an opinion there


The original article said: Is there too much inequality in the world? Sure. And cperciva reiterated that opinion above.

That's what drunkpotato is disagreeing with. It is clearly an opinion that isn't purely a matter of facts and figures. (One with which, as I happen, I agree.)


I don't think drunkpotato is disagreeing with that at all. He's supporting someone that states that wealth disparity is not a good thing.


I was acknowledging that not everyone agrees that wealth disparity is necessary. I did not state my opinion on the matter, merely that it is difficult to see how it could be avoided should we want to. I was trying to point out that a glib "Nope" doesn't bring anything new to the table.

Moving on to my personal opinion, I think it's more productive to think in terms of how much wealth disparity is part of a reasonably robust and functioning economy. We've all seen the numbers that show a steady trend upwards over the last 3 decades. That does not seem to be a good thing.


Whoops, yes, I got that backwards. Anyway, the point is that what he's agreeing and disagreeing with are opinions that aren't just a matter of unambiguous facts and figures.


I don't think that opinion of cperciva is relevant to the point btilly made, which is the subject of this subdiscussion. As such, there are no opinions to disagree with. I may be imagining things, but I've seen too many cases of people discarding facts because of some not directly relevant opinion the author/collector/presentor of the facts also happens to have.




Consider applying for YC's Spring batch! Applications are open till Feb 11.

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

Search: