Ok, I'll bite. How are the "wealthier ... stealing [our] money"? We don't have to use doordash or claude code or aws or amazon or anything else. We get to choose. When it comes to paying for government, however, I don't believe we're allowed to "opt out". Maybe Mamdani will give us stores so great we'll be forced to shop at them!
> We don't have to use doordash or claude code or aws or amazon or anything else.
I know you think you're dunking here, but unfortunately you're just proving that either: - You genuinely don't understand how the real works for vast amounts of people, in which case it would behoove you to educate yourself (maybe start by looking into topics like food deserts or Walmart's business practices in small towns) - You're consciously making a strawman argument, in which case please don't insult us with that BS
You don’t get to choose, that is the illusion of choice that everyone (or rather most) believes. The stealing is indirect, and it has many forms like:
- tax structure: investment income get taxed less than payroll etc etc
- tax avoidance: offshore, trusts, using companies to write off the tax plus the benefit provided by the government on these write offs. Using assets to loan more with speculation, worse, the buy borrow die model where they borrow against the asset and the heirs inherit the gains never taxed, among many ways and loopholes.
- asset inflation: low interest rates increase the stock and property, good for who owns it, while the poor get to pay higher rent, the cantillon effect
- the housing and zoning topic, and how it’s one of the pillar of such indirect money stealing, a topic that needs a book to describe but the solution is simple, depreciating housing as assets.
- monopolies and few (or one) companies controlling the price, or hold down the wages, to keep poor people poorer and shifting the money more to who controls the scheme
- poor people end up usually paying even more with overdraft fees or higher interests, punishing the poor even further, and these interests goes to lenders and shareholders.
- that leads the wealthy to be able to lobby to shape the interests and taxes to their liking, the subsidies etc. when a crisis or hard time happens, all tax payers get to pay and shoulder that but in times of booms the profit stay and remain private.
And many more cases or situations, hell, not just monetary stuff, even remote work was attacked because it shifts a slight of power dynamics to employees rather than the employers.
Wealthy choose the goverment amd most of its agenda. People dont get much choice and choosing from available options is framed as "support".
Doordash - ie "the wealthy" - spent to prevent Mamdani from getting elected. They failed. What on earth are you complaining about again?
You're insulting the intelligence of everyone on this website by even attempting this argument. The handful of upset elections by young socialists who want to decrease the political hegemony of billionaires does not amount to evidence that the political hegemony of billionaires isn't real.
Mamdani is very much the exception that confirms the rule. And ever since he's been inaugurated, he's been turned into a boogeyman by the right, successively called a "communist", then an "islamist", and often both.
And even in his own party, the dominant """moderate""" branch does everything it can to hide his success and popularity, from fear that the electorate would wake up to how utterly corrupt and ineffective the DMC is.
> How are the "wealthier ... stealing [our] money"?
Wages not catching up with inflation? Everything getting more expensive? The BBB giving massive tax cuts to the rich, while cutting government programs (which are a form of redistribution)?
> We get to choose
Up to a point, and it's naive to think that people are getting poorer only because of bad personal choices. The younger generations not being able to afford homes isn't because they're all bad with their finances. Treating housing as a speculation vehicle instead of an essential commodity is a political choice, and it was made by a political class completely permeated by moneyed interests.
Look, you don't even need to know about the "how". The gini index is getting worse, billionaires are turning into trillionaires while public infrastructure and social services are crumbling. It's natural, and correct, to connect the dots.
> The younger generations aren't able to afford homes because they're all bad with their finances
Home ownership of Gen Z is aligned with millennials’ home ownership at their time. I agree about the K shape economy stuff, but it’s a bit more tricky than “everyone is poor”.
Millenials were in college during the Great Financial Crisis. They're not exactly an example of a generation whose aspirations were met.