While driving to the airport last evening listening to CNN on XM radio some news reader was commenting on "Fall of the Fat Cats" piece that the Special Investigations Unit is doing and the enormous amounts of money that the Wall Street Executives make, the long waiting lines for Ferraries, the $ 100 Million paintings, they are spending $250 Billion per year and how the Gordon Geckos have taken over reality.
The discussion went into - "What are these fat cats doing for which they should be paid the multi million dollar salaries?" someone answered - "Oh, they are the smartest brains and they put in long hours." and the obvious rhetoric came as - "Hey! even I work 10-12 days and still earn 1/100th of the what those guys are making".
But take the same argument a step further and imagine it in a cafe in a country that is not a fat cat in the global economic scene - "What are these people in the fat cat countries doing that lets them buy a car in whereas I cannot even get a bicycle?".
It is how capitalism works. The rich get richer because greed is good. There is no altruism in the free market. Man by nature is a selfish animal, after all he has to survive. And he does not have to survive against chasing hyenas or poison mushrooms, we were over that evolutionary hump long ago. He simply has to survive against other men. And that is what we enact every day - Wall Street vs. Main Street; Rich countries vs. Poor countries; Haves vs. the have nots.
The person commenting on CNN probably makes more money than 99% of humanity. Why? Just for telling us that people on Wall Street are earning more than people on main street and buying privet jets for money that could have fed people in Darfur? Step back and think... the 24 hour news channel that churns incessant barrage of sound bytes and pays them 100's of thousand dollars for helping them doing so also has no relevance to a poor hungry child in a third world economy. They don't even have television. But there is a paying market for news and analysis beamed through million dollar satellites and watched on a $2,000, 52" LCD screen.
The raw power of money is why I am able to write this and why you are reading this. So stop whining that someone is making more than you are... if you had half a chance to buy that privet jet, you would.
The discussion went into - "What are these fat cats doing for which they should be paid the multi million dollar salaries?" someone answered - "Oh, they are the smartest brains and they put in long hours." and the obvious rhetoric came as - "Hey! even I work 10-12 days and still earn 1/100th of the what those guys are making".
But take the same argument a step further and imagine it in a cafe in a country that is not a fat cat in the global economic scene - "What are these people in the fat cat countries doing that lets them buy a car in whereas I cannot even get a bicycle?".
It is how capitalism works. The rich get richer because greed is good. There is no altruism in the free market. Man by nature is a selfish animal, after all he has to survive. And he does not have to survive against chasing hyenas or poison mushrooms, we were over that evolutionary hump long ago. He simply has to survive against other men. And that is what we enact every day - Wall Street vs. Main Street; Rich countries vs. Poor countries; Haves vs. the have nots.
The person commenting on CNN probably makes more money than 99% of humanity. Why? Just for telling us that people on Wall Street are earning more than people on main street and buying privet jets for money that could have fed people in Darfur? Step back and think... the 24 hour news channel that churns incessant barrage of sound bytes and pays them 100's of thousand dollars for helping them doing so also has no relevance to a poor hungry child in a third world economy. They don't even have television. But there is a paying market for news and analysis beamed through million dollar satellites and watched on a $2,000, 52" LCD screen.
The raw power of money is why I am able to write this and why you are reading this. So stop whining that someone is making more than you are... if you had half a chance to buy that privet jet, you would.
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