Lots of good reading. Pretty long, but good data and perspective.
An excerpt:
But in fact, the $50 trillion transfer of wealth the RAND report documents has occurred entirely within the American economy, not between it and its trading partners. No, this upward redistribution of income, wealth, and power wasn’t inevitable; it was a choice—a direct result of the trickle-down policies we chose to implement since 1975.
We chose to cut taxes on billionaires and to deregulate the financial industry. We chose to allow CEOs to manipulate share prices through stock buybacks, and to lavishly reward themselves with the proceeds. We chose to permit giant corporations, through mergers and acquisitions, to accumulate the vast monopoly power necessary to dictate both prices charged and wages paid. We chose to erode the minimum wage and the overtime threshold and the bargaining power of labor. For four decades, we chose to elect political leaders who put the material interests of the rich and powerful above those of the American people.
I don’t particularly like the “We chose…” language (I do understand why they are using it; a sort of royal “we”), as this has been largely and primarily instigated and perpetuated by the Wall Street network & regime and the culture they’ve force-fed the population, exported across the nation and world; a culture of selfishness, greed, deception, and, frankly, psychopathy.
Article comes from a paper put out by the RAND Corporation: https://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/WRA516-1.html
This post currently has 69 upvotes –– currently the highest scoring post on the front page of the WhyDRS server. I think that the users of other federated Lemmy servers like this kind of populist message. Compare to the following other high-scoring posts on our server. What can we learn from this about appealing to a broad audience? How can we take the general feeling of injustice and target it specifically toward DRS?
I love where your head is at Animorph!
Direct Registration is a path of clear action that retail investors can respond with when confronted with the normally spectral and nebulous abuses the top percentage perpetuate on the labor class through capitalism.
It’s so rare that a simple and affordable change in understanding - in this case, a different choice in how securities are held - can hit the established powers in the only place they can feel - their bottom line.
abuses the top percentage perpetuate on the labor class through capitalism
Yes, I think that this is exactly the kind of messaging that appeals to federated Lemmy users. For example, the Leminal Space server says, “Take a break from the slow-burn apocalypse of late stage capitalism’s race to the bottom.” I think that bad actors have given outsiders an impression of apes as cheerleaders for late-stage capitalism –– merely degenerate gamblers using questionable technical analysis to make a quick buck and leave someone else holding the bag.
But, as you know, we’re actually trying to make a financial system that works for everyone. This gives us a lot in common with federated Lemmy users. For example, the post “You didn’t bought it you rented it” has 3,988 upvotes –– one of the most upvoted posts in any Lemmy community or server. They don’t like that their printer manufacturer can remotely disable the printer that they own. We don’t like that gaming services can remotely disable video games that we own. Or that brokerages can lend out shares that we own.
Everything was ‘ok’ when the capitalists simply owned/controlled the means of production, but now they own the product as well, even after selling it.
Didn’t occur to me that’s where a lot of the upvotes are coming from. Yes, yes, yes… hmm…
