💲From Robber Barons To Bezos, Are We In A Second Gilded Age? Robert Reich

[appalachiablue]

- Is history repeating itself? Oct. 11, 2023. 🎩 Robert Reich, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Reich
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- You Are Being Lied To About Inflation: Robert Reich, Monopolization of America
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1017865817
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- 'How Robber Barons Flaunted Their Money During the Gilded Age,' History, Oct. 26, '23. As American industrialists and financiers accumulated incredible wealth during the Gilded Age, they strove to outdo one another with their lavish spending and possessions. During the Gilded Age—the decades between the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the turn of the century—the explosive growth of factories, steel mills and railroads driven by the 2nd Industrial Revolution made a small, elite class of businessmen incredibly rich.

By 1890, the wealthiest 1% of American families controlled 51% of the nation’s real and personal property. Among the richest of the rich were the so-called robber barons, whose extreme avarice drove them to use unethical business practices and exploit workers to create lucrative monopolies, and in the process amass fortunes that would amount to billions of dollars in today’s money...https://www.history.com/news/robber-barons-gilded-age-wealth
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- ROBBER BARON, a derogatory term of social criticism originally applied to certain wealthy and powerful 19th-cent. American businessmen..By the late 19th c., the term was typically applied to businessmen who purportedly used exploitative practices to amass their wealth. Those practices included exerting control over natural resources, influencing high levels of government, paying subsistence wages, squashing competition by acquiring their competitors to create monopolies and raise prices, and schemes to sell stock at inflated prices to unsuspecting investors. The term combines the sense of criminal ('robber') and illegitimate aristocracy (a baron is an illegitimate role in a republic)...https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robber_baron_(industrialist)

- MONOPOLIES AND TRUSTS. By the late 19th c., big businesses and giant corporations had taken over the American economy. Consumers were forced to pay high prices for things they needed on a regular basis, and it became clear that reform of regulations in industry was required. The loudest outcry was against trusts and monopolies. Trusts are the organization of several businesses in the same industry and by joining forces, the trust controls production and distribution of a product or service, thereby limiting competition. Monopolies are businesses that have total control over a sector of the economy, including prices...https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/monopolies-and-trusts

[peppertree]

1. Let's see...

I think that's a yes.

[appalachiablue]

7. The painful reality, thanks

[peppertree]

9. You're welcome

I'm all for someone being able to afford the oceanfront mansion, if they are so fortunate (that one happens to be next door to Vanessa Bryant - Kobe's widow).

But to have millions who now can't even rent?

Housing needs to be treated an an essential service - not the "as much as the market can bear" playthings of the greedy landlord class.

Which, as you know, is how it was in the 19th century.

[Uncle Joe]

2. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread appalachiablue

[NowsTheTime]

3. Yes we are, and throw in RW politics with it.

[DENVERPOPS]

4. WE ARE ALREADY IN THE SECOND "GILDED AGE"

and this one is about to be worse than the first one..........Look around Folks, The corporations are all playing: Getting while the Getting is good.........Record Prices and RecordProfits across the boards in every industry...........and all being blamed on Biden.....LOL

We are being overwhelmed by gasoline/diesel prices, Utility Prices, and the massive increases coming in Residential Property Taxes are about to obliterate us.......

[appalachiablue]

6. ++

[CitizenZero]

5. Robert Reich Is Always On Target

Professor Reich is always reliable, smart, and insightful. One of my favorite public intellectuals.

[stage left]

8. Yes

For quite a while now.

[appalachiablue]

10. For sure, I'd say we're in stage 2-3