To think rich people steal money all the time and that’s often why they’re rich?

[MyAmusedOpalCrab]

We hear so much about “hard work” and “smart investments” but let’s be honest, so many rich people didn’t get wealthy by being ethical. From dodgy business practices to exploiting workers, tax dodging, insider deals and straight-up corruption, wealth often comes at someone else’s expense.

Governments bail out billionaires while ordinary people struggle to afford rent. CEOs cut wages and benefits while pocketing massive bonuses. Huge corporations find loopholes to avoid taxes while the rest of us get squeezed.

Obviously not every rich person is a thief but AIBU to think that a lot of them are? That the system is rigged in their favour and they keep getting richer by bending or outright breaking the rules?

Jesus Christ what a simp.

Yeah the tradie saving a few quid for beer money is so much worse than politicians lining their pockets through dodgy VIP lanes during a pandemic

Cheated may be strong - but they’ve ensured the rules are written 8n their favour. It’s impossible to be a billionaire other than by exploiting workers though, and that’s pretty despicable.

And worse than that, the billionaires who also benefitted. There was a massive speed up in the movement of wealth to the 1% during covid.

Not really sure about the top lot but there seems to be tax evasion in the middle lot, lots of well known figures have been in the news over the years for it.

A little. But the real problem isn’t anyone who earns a living in a profession or a blue collar job, however well laid. It’s the super rich.

Of course you are. Thats what they (the government and the media) want you to pay attention too.

It's a tiny TINY fraction compared to tax evasion.

Ah, right, I would put MPs and dodgy lanes in with this middle lot. The super rich just do what they like, always have.

Yup

Mate lives in a massive house, X 2 audis etc

Goes out for a cup of tea and takes her own tea bag

Just buys a cup of hot water
.

What’s the basis for this ?

I think this is true of those billionaires from poorer countries. How did they suddenly acquire the local grain factory…. Etc

In Western countries having incredibly sharp elbows and a willingness to destroy competition has a lot to do with it. This is in part how big tech has become so incredibly successful.

Hard agree. My DB is a retired private wealth consultant and he always says 'Nothing makes money like money.' He is a multi millionaire, but many of his clients were billionaires.

So many threads like this lately.

You realise that's a contradictory statement, don't you? Anyone who pays as little as possible is relying on others paying it.

It’s really not. It’s SMEs that are responsible for 60% of tax evasion, the wealthy drive 5%.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/measuring-tax-gaps/1-tax-gaps-summary

Everyone agree that the pandemic VIP lanes enriched scumbags, but it’s small and medium sized enterprises that are to blame for evasion.

Why? What they take is peanuts compared the the top 5%.

This is obvious as you can get a much better rate of income when you have £10m to invest rather than £10k, and you can also afford to take much bigger risks.

Eh?

my mum Is quite rich, largely because her and my dad bought a house in 1980 and it’s value has gone up many times over.

she’s never stolen from anyone in her life and worked from age 16 to age 60 with 5 years break to have kids.

I mean the whole point of capitalism is extracting surplus value from the labour of workers so this is not a stunning new insight

This whole idea that rich people work hard is utter rubbish. They have inherited wealth or exploited others. I'm talking super rich eg multi millionaires/ billionaires, not people on a good salary. Somebody like Elon Musk has never done a day's work in his life. Tax the fuckers, I say. They are a drain on society - far more so than benefit cheats.

Government figures/estimates. It’s on this diagram. Ignore the tax bit - it’s not helpful because it conflates tax evasion and avoidance. We do need to deal with both, but one is legal and anyone with an ISA is doing it a bit.

She’s not super rich though. She’s affluent. She’s not what this is about.

Have a look at how the gap between workers wages and those at the top of organisations has increased. It’s possible to extract surplus value from workers without exploiting them and taking the piss.

Didn't say they didn't.
I was just making stupid inflammatory comments based on no real thought whatsoever.

There seems to be such a raft of socialist worker style student politics on these boards recently. The country’s woes are not going to be solved by taxing the very few ultra wealthy who will choose to remain resident in this county while Corbyn et al rifle through their wallet. If we want better public services we all have to pay for them.

Try looking to impartial, respectable sources for public finance information. OBR and HMRC stats. There are some excellent podcasts on the IFS website as well as detailed research papers. Dan Neidles untaxing podcast on BBC sounds explains tax concepts - who is and is not evading tax, and what actually works in terms of tax policy - in simplified ways for instance.

So do you not think the super rich are a problem?