I don’t get it. Why would anyone be forced to seem their assets? Do they invest with money they actually need? Just wait out the storm.
Comment on Do people really think setting up domestic manufacturing in the USA is easy?
vvilld@lemmy.world 1 week agoIt’s not that complex or Machiavellian.
Look at what rich people have done after every recession of the past 40 years and how what’s happened to their wealth after the recovery. The economy crashes forcing middle-class people to sell off what scant assets they own. Even people on the lower end of upper-class tend to sell off assets when the stock market crashes. Super rich people who have enough money to weather the economic downturn buy the dip, gobbling up all those assets people are selling. Then when the economy recovers the rich people make out like bandits (which they are).
That’s all that’s happening. He’s tanking the economy so Musk and his other rich friends can buy the dip and increase their wealth even more when the economy improves.
Thaurin@lemmy.world 6 days ago
vvilld@lemmy.world 6 days ago
Two things:
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People see because they see the markets going down and want to get out before it hits bottom.
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The bigger issue, though, is that a hell of a lot of people will lose their jobs and have no money. Remember the Great Recession? When the job market is that shitty and you lose your job, there aren’t other ones available. No job means no income. You can apply for unemployment insurance, but that only covers a fraction of the income from your last job. So people can’t afford to pay their bills. When you can’t afford utilities, rent, gas, etc, but you have a 401k sitting there, it becomes the only option to pull money out of that. It’s a super shitty decision to have to make, but when it’s a question of losing your home or sacrificing your retirement, short-term material needs win out.
Thaurin@lemmy.world 5 days ago
That would be after their emergency funds run out, which should be at least a year in. But yeah, when it lasts many years…
vvilld@lemmy.world 5 days ago
If you genuinely belive most people have a year’s worth of money saved up they can just live off of if needed then you’re incredibly out of touch.
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AlexLost@lemm.ee 1 week ago
Time will tell. It’s all about the layers, but if you look at the current situation at face value, it makes very little sense, ergo something more sinister is a foot 3-4 steps down the road.
vvilld@lemmy.world 1 week ago
It makes complete sense if you are looking at it from the perspective of an oligarch. They are just trying to tank the economy to hoover up even more assets. They’re banking on an eventual recovery, after which they’ll be even richer and more powerful than they are now.
As with most things in life, assuming some grander Machiavellian scheme is usually wrong. People don’t think and plan like that outside of movies and TV. Most people, especially the very rich and powerful, only plan for the short term.
There is no 3-4 steps down the road. They’re just trying to repeat exactly what they did during/after the COVID recession. And the Great Recession. And the '01 dot-com recession, etc, etc, etc.
AlexLost@lemm.ee 1 week ago
Except he is using a playbook built by other people that we’ve only seen the gist of. This is manufactured, not eventual. He is also removing all consumer and worker protections. There is more too it, but keep turning a blind eye to just “more of the same” and see where that gets ya. I am saying the same thing as you, but I am alluding to it being a byproduct and not the simple end goal. They want housing under their thumb as well as worker protections and healthcare. There is malicious intent there, I’m sure of it. It is more than the accumulation of wealth.
vvilld@lemmy.world 1 week ago
I’m not turning a blind eye to anything. I’m just not making up conspiracies where there’s clearly none. There isn’t some hyper intelligent grandmaster planning everything out 15 moves in advance. This isn’t Lex Luthor or Doctor Doom running the show. It’s a bunch of morons whose understanding of economics ended with mercantilism asking ChatGPT how to run an economy.