Ellie Mae O’Hagan seems to think that the bank of Mum and Dad is wrong. Apparently it leads to inequality. Well big deal. We are not equal. I will never be the CEO of a multinational company. I lack the aptitude. Others lack the aptitude to do what I do. So what. It’s the way things are. We are not equal and never will be, so it’s time to get over it. The obsession with equality merely leads to reducing everyone to the lowest common denominator.
Anyway, apparently people who have spent a lifetime working and saving are contributing to this inequality when they lend (or give) money to their offspring. And this is a bad thing, apparently.
But there is also something bigger and much more damning going on here: these figures represent a massive transfer of wealth by the middle classes to their children.
Yes? And? So? It’s their money to do with as they please.
This is essentially a form of wealth hoarding.
Ah… Says it all, really. People have money so we must steal it – ‘cos inequality. The robust response to this is “fuck off!”
Indeed, according to research by Royal London, housing wealth is passed down from generation to generation, and “only around 4 million of the 17 million people in the 25-44 age group are in the fortunate position of having grandparents with housing wealth”. In other words, fewer than one in four.
Tough shit. Get over it. Some people have more than others. That’s life. Want more? Go out and do what others do; earn it. But no, in the retarded mind of the socialists it must be stolen from those who have it.
If we’re going to start talking about this problem, we need to do it properly.
There is nothing to discuss because there isn’t a problem. Some people have more than others. Get over it. I don’t envy the wealthy because I’m too busy doing my own thing – earning my own money.
That means dispensing with grotesquely cuddly terms such as “bank of mum and dad”, in favour of concepts such as unearned wealth and rentier capitalism.
I don’t care what you call it; that money doesn’t belong to you and is therefore, none of your concern, nor is it any concern of the state.
And while the recipients of parents’ money aren’t the super-rich class Standing is referring to, they are nevertheless accumulating relatively vast amounts of wealth by unearned means.
Again, so what? None of your business and no one else’s either. There really isn’t a problem. She then refers to that twat Thomas Picketty.
According to Thomas Piketty, in his book Capital in the Twenty-First Century, the widening inequality caused by inherited wealth is characteristic of a capitalist system.
To which the answer is; all together now; so what? Get over it. This is capitalism working perfectly well. One generation generating wealth and passing it on to their heirs. This is a good thing. That some people don’t benefit is just too bad. They can do what the rest of us do – go out and earn their own, not steal it from others.
To that end, Piketty’s suggested remedy of a wealth tax must now be seriously debated.
Picketty can go fuck himself with the rough end of a pineapple wrapped in razor wire. None of this is any of his business.
I would go further: inheritance tax should also be hiked massively from 40% to 90% – a move that would only affect 40,100 taxpayers but would address the scandal of wealth hoarding.
What the fucking fuckitty fuck!?! Having spent a lifetime earning and paying eye-watering sums in outrageous taxation, these evil shits want to steal 90% of what we leave? Fuck me sideways, is there no evil to which these thieving scum won’t sink? The only scandal here is the idea that stealing other people’s property is in any way moral. These people really are evil beyond measure.
Governments also need to enact legislation to ensure stronger trade unions – in Britain, this could mean the repeal of Thatcher’s 1984 Trade Union Act.
No they fucking don’t. Some of us remember the nineteen seventies and the unions holding the country to ransom. The laws restricting their excesses were brought about as a direct consequence of their bad behaviour. The last thing we need is stronger unions. We don’t need much law and many of those laws on the statute book should be repealed. However, despite the principle of trade union membership being a basic civil right that should be protected by law, so, too, they should not be allowed to carry out the behaviours that they indulged in during the seventies and eighties.
According to the authors of The Spirit Level, Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson, the decline of trade union membership in 16 OECD countries correlates with the increase of inequality between 1966 and 1994.
There we go with that inequality bullshit again. The unions long since lost sight of their core objectives and have become highly politicised. I don’t belong to one and haven’t for a long time and never will again.
While addressing this wouldn’t prevent parents from giving their children an unfair advantage, it would mean workers’ salaries might increase to the extent that housing would be affordable.
No, it won’t. It merely means that companies and the country at large will be bullied by an out of control socialist movement intent on destroying the economy followed by raging inflation and the government going cap in hand to the IMF. We’ve been here before. It didn’t work then and it won’t work now. And if parents want to give their offspring a leg-up, that’s their business, not yours and not the state’s. And if this is unequal, then tough. Get over it.
Pickett and Wilkinson also found that powerful unions correlate with a stronger political left, meaning that the repugnant imbalances created by capitalist economies stand a better chance of being levelled out.
The only repugnance here is a left that believes thieving other people’s property is morally acceptable. It isn’t.
These solutions might sound extreme, but they’re proportionate.
They are extreme, they are nothing like proportionate. They are corrosive and will trash our economy – and it amounts to theft.
It is within our power to address Britain’s increasing levels of inequality, and collectively we need to stop talking about wealth hoarding as some unfortunate accident.
Fuck off! seriously, fuck off. There is no need to do anything about inequality because we are not equal and never will be. There is no such thing as wealth hording. What people have belongs to them to dispose of as they see fit – it is none of your business and you have no right to take it from them. So, yeah, go fuck yourself.
The transfer of inherited wealth between generations of the middle class isn’t a civilised or fair way to run an economy, and those who benefit from it are not victims. It’s time for a more honest conversation.
Indeed. See above. I believe that’s an honest conversation. I also note, that despite it being the Guardian, the comments below the line are largely hostile. Not least because the commentariat have finally cottoned on to the fact that these people really do mean to go after the little people and the little people don’t like it. Well, don’t vote for the fuckers.
Socialism is evil. When will people get it? The state is not your friend. When will people finally realise this?
As soo as I read the title ” The spirit level ” it all fell into place. This scciopath got it wrong then and as per the progressive norm, has got it wrong now. If this horrible, selfish person actually had to go out and sweat hard for a living, she might have a different perspective but being an ‘ academic ‘ with an easy income, she will never be able to ally with those she thinks are hard done by.
How exactly are we defining unearned income then? If someone benefits from being given money by their parents that is bad because the money is ‘unearned’ even though it is the parents’ money and theirs to do with as they see fit. If on the other hand someone benefits from money stolen by the state, the fact that this is also unearned somehow doesn’t matter?
Of course the guardian’s comentariat will be mostly middle class champagne socialists who would be first in line to have their money nicked by the government if this writer got her way. So it’s not really surprising that they are hostile. Maybe some of them will eventually gain enough self awareness to stop being lefties.
And if they do, she has done everyone a favour.
For someone who has so clearly got a cob of corn up her arse about people receiving unearned wealth, Hagan seems to be very quiet about benefits claimants doesn’t she?
My Grandfather, an ex Bedwas Independent Councillor, had this definition of Socialism… What’s yours is mine, but what’s mine is me own.
I’m guessing “Miss Ellie Mae” doesn’t have children. The majority of parents willingly try to help their offspring (granted, not all have the means to assist with house purchase). Does she believe that any form of parental support is wrong? I think I can answer my own question!
And the looking after one’s offspring is the core of our society – not the state doing so on our behalf.
Indeed. I mean where would the Miliband brothers be without thier father’s dowerage and substantial inheritance? Or Peter Mandelson, or Harriet Harmon, or Tony Blair, or Polly Toynbee?
Mr & Mrs A buy their council house, their neighbours Mr & Mrs B don’t.
Mr & Mrs A don’t go on holiday, there is the mortgage to pay and the bathroom needs replacing. Mr & Mrs B go to Lanzarote, which is convenient as the council is fitting a new kitchen, bathroom and kitchen to their house. And so it goes on for forty years.
Sadly Mrs A and Mrs B are now widows and their health isn’t too good. Mrs. B’s unmarried granddaughter has moved in with her as she can’t stand her mum. Mrs. B goes into care, all expenses paid. Mrs B’s grandaughter takes over the tennancy. Mrs A goes into care. The council sells her house to pay for her care. Mrs A’s granddaughter visits her in the care home.
Isn’t ‘equality’ good!
Rats! The second kitchen should read central heating!
I am OK with anyone feeling so strongly about those who have less, that they voluntarily give a lot of what they have.
I am not OK with anyone telling me what I have to do with what is mine. They have no right – moral or otherwise – so they can get stuffed.
With respect you should probably stop taking the bait and wasting time dissecting Hagan’s articles. She is quite clearly a complete moron, incapable of writing opinions beyond those of a 13 year old, whose purpose at the Guardian is to write fuckwitted clickbait.
However, people might see this, read it and look at her crap from a different perspective?
What is it with the Guardian and quarter-witted females?
“Daft Bints ‘R’ Us.”
It’s not just the women. They all get off on the idea of taxing others to penury. It’s almost a religion.
“While addressing this wouldn’t prevent parents from giving their children an unfair advantage”
Yeah, so what. Using that particular metric means that inter alia merely by being children of such parents they are already born with and “unfair advantage”. That is to say they have all the genes necessary to have a successful life (providing they knuckle down and work for the bastard of course). Hey, ain’t life a bastard. Fucking deal with it!
All this Spirit Level shit is “You have it and I don’t, and I’m going to take it off you by force if need be, because inequality.
They can fuck right off.
How about everyone who claims to be a socialist has all of their assets seized by the state and redistributed to the unproductive. And when they are in penury they can come back and tell us just how wonderful it all is…
I’m all for that. It shows how much these people really believe what they’re saying by how few actually practice what they preach.
Without the ‘Bank of Mum and Dad’ my youngest wouldn’t have been able to afford law school and become a full fledged lawyer (She qualifies as a full fledged solicitor this year). My eldest wouldn’t be working on the other side of the world having paid off her student loan through sheer hard work.
Would ‘the state’ have done this for them? No. Because stupid lefty’s would have pissed all the money up the wall on their pet causes. Because most socialists and academics don’t understand basic, real-life economics.
Well it’s fairly obvious O’Hagan doesn’t from the drivel she’s written here.
Hagan is proof that if you attempt to educate a fuckwitted child with clever books on socialist economics you end up with a fuckwitted adult.
The problem with the referred article is that it confuses two topics that deserve to be thought out separately. One is the legitimacy of wealth. Some is earned, some is stolen, like a corrupt politician’s payoff. The stolen money should be tracked down and returned or otherwise dealt with. The second issue is inheritance. Legitimate money might have been earned by a parent solely for the purpose of providing for his/her children. In other words, it might not have been generated if there was no option to leave it to descendants. This is demotivating, and would undermine the generation of useful products for the whole economy. The referred author’s confusion of these two issues leads to confused conclusions.
There’s no need to be confused, though. If it is stolen then it is contrary to the law and prosecution should follow. Anything else is no one else’s business. And, of course, providing for one’s children is a basic instinct and should be encouraged as it provides independence from the state.
There seems to be an assumption that those of us who have benefited from bank of mum and dad and are in turn giving our own offspring a leg up are part of some undeserving elite. Neither my parents or my in laws started out with anything much and, although they have helped us out from time to time, we have hardly had lives of cushy privilege. We are now fairly comfortably off but not rich by any means and we got were we are through hard work and living in a responsible way. We certainly were never the beneficiaries of government largess.
My parents were never in a position to help me and that was fine. I don’t expect others to have their wealth seized and redistributed in my direction.