Inequality, Wealth and Shares

During his State of the Union address, President Obama focused on the widening gap between the ultra-wealthy and the rest. Beyond the politics, the fact that the top 1 percent possesses nearly 50 percent of the world’s wealth is cause for concern, especially when forecasts see this figure increasing not decreasing in the future. From my point of view the main concern should not be whether all these billionaires should be taxed, put to the stack or burned alive. And before I continue, may I point out that not a few of the world’s ultra-rich, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Ma, started from zero and only stand high through sheer genius and hard work.

My main concern is how, in this financial world, I can step up the social ladder or at least leave a foundation so that my children can reach higher. Statistics clearly show that the gap between the haves and the have nots keeps increasing, and what is often overlooked is that wealth is very often in the form of financial assets. Thus assuming lack of genius or luck, as is the case with most of the population, the average person’s only source of income is his wage.

Now, imagine the world 20 years into the future, at the current rate of technological advance we would have driverless cars, implying no need for taxi and bus drivers, full autopilots in planes implying less pilots, full factory automation leading to less need for un-skilled workers, automated call centers; no receptionists, reliable investment models spelling the end of the investment manager… actually, will there be any jobs left? And what will be all be doing to survive? Probably we would have to accept lesser and lesser incomes or be substituted by a machine while the owners of the capital will continue to get richer as costs go down.

Is this all an exaggeration? Probably it is already happening, and the process will possibly accelerate going forward. Fortunately, on a regular basis, I see bright people setting up their own business and becoming the new owners of capital. Governments would do well to protect these entrepreneurs as they will be the top future tax payers. This leaves the rest muddling into a future of financial slavery unless they embrace a simple concept; save for the future.

For what it is worth, my preference is saving consistently into the blue chip equity market. Buying shares effectively makes you the owner of capital and you get your share of profits through dividends. You may call it a hedge against the above future scenario and at the same time protects you against inflation. And by saving consistently the end reward is far greater. Today financial firms offer various products that fit perfectly for this purpose. The way I see it, one can either complain to the government for more equality or else slowly work towards the top by buying capital. If I want more equality I prefer joining the rich than the poor and a way of doing that is by starting to act on it now.