See e.g. Steven Pinker:
"...the most effective ways of reducing inequality are epidemics, massive wars, violent revolutions and state collapse."
https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/twenty-questions-steven-p...
Possibly the least flame war worthy example is the French Revolution. While the popular image is of the great terror killing off nobles, the reality is that most of the killings in Paris were either politicians or unfortunate merchants who refused to sell their goods at state mandated prices (at a loss) and were denounced.
And that’s not even including the 160,000 mostly poor soldiers killed in the Vendée after peasants revolted against forced conscription, nor the extra 40,000 civilians killed in the brutal reprisals after the war was over.
And the kicker? Not only did France eventually get a different king, but most nobles were able re-buy their old estates, and the government even went deeper into debt to compensate various nobles for their confiscated land.
Std pareto curve. population of 100. 10 are aristocratic. 90 lower class. if you net equal losses, population 80 and you have increased equality. This is a simplification.
Just skimming this, it seems the french and the entire world was left better-off actually
If you already exist in a system that is pliable, like a democracy, revolution really wouldn't bring you any of the benefits the French revolution did in the centuries that followed. You'd really only get the downsides.
Let's not forget the context of the conversation here an talk about completely different circumstances.
There have been numerous revolutions with positive benefits to the world at large as well as to the society/culture in which they took place. I would chance to say that the majority were net-positive. If you find yourself scared of revolution, you should maybe take an introspective moment and ponder why the poor and downtrodden of the world (or just in your own country) would consider you their enemy.
Unless you are planning to massively alter the political (IE not have a democracy anymore) or economic system (IE not have capitalism anymore), a revolution does more harm than good, because you are only getting the short-term byproducts which are predominately bad. If the political and economic system remains largely the same, then a revolution is just a period of time where people are committing violence or protesting instead of making things.
I count throwing out a foreign oppressor, like the American revolution or the Czech "velvet revolution" as a separate category. Those can be good.
If the decades of war and communism that followed were an improvement can be debated, but it's a quite separate issue.
But any revolution that lasts enough to make into the popular definition of the word will cost more than it gains.
The USA had one too.
Afterwards you don't have to choose between coexisting with them, or killing them.
The reign of terror in France may not have improved France, but it did scare the European aristocracy, and ended up indirectly giving a lot of political and economic rights to the general population. Aristocrats very quickly realized that they did not want a repeat of that performance in their home countries.
The Soviet Union, especially under Lenin and Stalin was no picnic, but it scared the West shitless, thus forcing it to concede rights, benefits, and legislature to labour movements, to prevent full-scale communism. Social democracy, as an institution, can credit much of its existence to the communist revolution.
People with power over you never give anything up, unless they are scared. Violent revolutions tend to make neighboring oligarchs quite scared.
Also look at all the damage the US did to other societies in the name of preventing "red danger" - the repercussions of which are still being felt in some countries.
The revolutionaries were British citizens, just like the soldiers they faced. Sure, England shipped in more soldiers, but neither side was more foreign than the other.
I think the important part is that the overthrown regime was based outside the (new) country, and was no longer a factor in the internal politics.
Though maybe people didn't revolt before, since ultimately the Soviets would roll in the tanks if they ever toppled Ceaușescu.
Thanks for making me a little less sure of my universal revolution theory :)
In fact most of the deaths happened out in the countryside, Infernal Columns, Revolutionary Weddings (masss drownings of clergy) and the Revolt in the Vendee.
But if we're trying to compare the impact on rich vs poor we should probably use per capita numbers because there are far more poor than rich.
There's one way to make everyone equal: kill everyone. Inasmuch as these revolutions have made people more equal, it has largely been due to how effectively they did exactly that.
That’s unlikely to cover the cost of getting tested for COVID-19, let alone any treatment or deductibles. Not sure how that qualifies as “significant.”
In most actual cases, some combination of a sort of free market, monopolies over labor (unions) and capital (large corporations), and government regulation does.
The "fairness" view assumes everyone is born into their jobs somehow and stuck there. If people could choose any job they wanted, fairness is irrelevant because everyone has an equal choice. This is obviously an ideal, but then the opposite extreme is unrealistic too.
however in the real world people are forced to work by a need to survive, which puts disempowered people in a position to be exploited. and there is unequal access to education, to the leisure time to participate in education, and to the material security required to have a brain that is able to focus on education, so not everyone will be able to even make an attempt to qualify for every job. not to mention the fact that there is unequal access to the networking and connections, and to the non-merit-based "qualifications" that bring certain people to power (e.g. race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. all the isms).
so exploitation and injustice abounds in an unregulated system which tends to entrench and concentrate power within the hands of those who already have it
I also take it you concede that pursuing fairness leads to reduced efficiency? You can't very well serve two optimals.
Efficiency of what? Yes, it reduces the efficiency by which overall wealth is created (whatever that means). And yes, it enhances the effiency by which a society provides for the needs of all.
If so, is it appropriate for a childless 18-year-old on minimum wage to earn that much (he could probably lease a Ferrari or retire at 38)
Is it appropriate for a company to pay a childless person less than a person with children? Why? What if he’s sterile?
Seems very tricky to me.
Just pick a floor that's good enough for everyone, accept that will be people with low expenses who will be "overpaid", and stop trying to figure out what every individual deserves.
It's not tricky, and has been going on for the last fifty years or so just fine.
We were talking about wages, not state benefits.
State benefits are a much better way to address income inequality or poverty than minimum wages are.