Postcard from the Moscow Millionaire Fair
More and more we see evidence of Russia adopting the worst features of the USSR and the worst features of the monarchy that preceded it, ghastly unfairness in the distribution of wealth combined with shocking crackdowns on democracy. It's as if the country actually wants to fail, even to commit suicide, and has decided to do so in the most spectacular way possible, by repeating all the errors of the last century at the same time.
Reporting on the "Millionaire Fair" in Moscow at which the Nouveaux Riche in Russia oggle diamoned-encrusted cell phones like this one costing over $1 million, the New York Times reports that wealthy Russians have some unusual attitudes towards economics that clearly indicate Russia's future prospects:
- “A lot of rich people here don’t say how they earn their money,” said Karsten Jacob, a salesman for Bugatti sports cars at the fair. “They wear sports shoes and training suits, and they walk up to our 1.3 million euro car and say, ‘Where can I buy it?’"
- Such conspicuous consumption is reflected in a Russian joke making the rounds. It describes how one wealthy businessman tells a friend of buying a tie for $100. “You fool,” the other responds. “You can get the same tie for $200 just across the street.”
- Vyachislav Y. Nikishin, a client at the fair, said Russia’s recent history suggested wild spending was not so foolish, after all. “Spend while you can” is a motto that has come to shape behavior, given the sometimes short-lived prominence of entrepreneurs, business tycoons and other moneyed players in Russia’s pell-mell business environment.
- Saving money in a bank might also be seen as foolhardy, for banking crises have occurred frequently. “It doesn’t do any good to put it in a bank,” Mr. Nikishin said. “We have the bitter experience.”
The Times can't resist throwing in a dig at America along with its reporting on Russia:
Though a good deal of the oil money is trickling down to ordinary people, the elite class of Russian rich are definitely growing richer, according to Peter Westin, the chief economist at MDM Bank, a Russian bank in Moscow. He says that the gap between rich and poor is widening in Russia, though it is still not as extreme as in the United States, according to a statistical measure by the World Bank. Perhaps that’s because poverty is shrinking here and there are still fewer rich people than in America. But they are trying to make up for lost time.What's the Times talking about? Its neo-socialist editors have become infamous for their strident, fervent attacks on wealth disparity in the United States, and for their mischaracterization of data regarding it, so naturally they can't help putting the boot in whenever they get the chance, even when the topic is Russia. And here again they mischaracterize information. When the Times states "there are still fewer rich people" in Russia than in the U.S., that's the Mother of All Understatments. According to the Times, Russia "counts 25 billionaires, along with 88,000 millionaires." America has 8.9 million millionaires, 100 times more than Russia, but its population is only twice as large and its economy is only 20 times as large. So America has 50 times more millionaires than Russia per capita and five times more millionaires per dollar than Russia does. On the other hand, the average annual salary in the U.S. is over $36,000 while in Russia it is only $3,600. So the salary of an average American worker exceeds that of his Russian counterpart by a factor of twelve. In other words, an average Amerian earns in one month what an average Russian earns in one year. In other other words, virtually nobody is rich in Russia, virtually everybody is poor compared to the United States. The vast sea of poverty in Russia wipes out the very concept of "wealth." What's more, as La Russophobe has previously reported, Russia's data is even worse that it superficially appears because it fails to reflect the obscene concentration of wealth in the hands of Moscow. If Moscow were deleted from the average wage calculations, Russia's average would plummet still further and the number of wealthy people would virtually disappear.
How does the World Bank manage, then, to claim that there is a more extreme gap between rich and poor in the U.S. than in Russia? It doesn't. The Times gives the reader no specific information at all about the alleged World Bank data, and given the data set forth above, what could it possibly be? Only the America-bashing smoke and mirrors practiced by the New York Times can achieve that, by ignoring and twisting facts as is its wont. Naturally, if for all intents and purposes Russia doesn't have any rich people, then the gap between rich and poor in America is larger. If a person of average means in Russia is desperately poor by American standards, then what does it mean to say that there is a large gap between the poorest Americans, still very well off by average Russian standards, and the wealthiest Americans, who are the most successful people on the planet?
Labels:
economics,
neo-soviet failure,
russia
3 comments:
First define poor. The poor in America have a higher standard of living than most of the working class in Africa, China, India and SA and Russia. There is subsidized housing here which you don't have to share with another family, food stamps, Medicaid, free public clinics and schools, privately funded charity services, and, if you aren't lazy and do well in school, scholarships to college. Even in the worst urban ghettos lots of people have cars, appliances, tv's, cellphones, computers.
If there is homelessness, it's primarily mental illness, drugs and alcohol related - the usual suspects that reject permanent housing and live on the fringes.
70% of Americans are homeowners. HUD will help get you financing for a house if you are low income:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/18850/homeownership_american_dream_made_possible.html
The other thing about poverty, especially here is the America, is that it's a fluid, shifting situation in life. A lot of us were defined as poor at different times in our lives. I was poor in college and for awhile after. An immigrant just arriving here is poor, but, he's got opportunities to change that situation and most of them do.
It's not that big a stretch for middle class Americans to have a million dollars in assets when you factor in the value of your home, your pension, IRA's, and and compounded interest on savings and investments over time. Make that two pensions in a two income family.
We all know that the New York Times is one of the most socialist leaning, biased, agenda driven rags out there. My God, they have Paul Krugman as their economic editorialist, he's an idiot. Capitalism has a way of destroying idiots. The NYT's stock is a disaster, down 50% for the past three years, their circulation is declining, they've laid off staff.
Unlike Putin's lackey press, we kill off economically the idiots.
I wonder how much Putin and his cronies have in Swiss bank acounts by now? To bad they don't have a free press to sniff that out. Soon the internet will be censored too.
raccoons, Abramovich is a snake. Wow, we agree on something. The disasterous transistion of industries from state to private hands after communism fell which created the oligarchs was as much the result of not having a civil society in place first.
The sad irony is that the one oligarch who understood this and was transitioning his company into the capitalistic model of wealth creation for employees and shareholders is rotting in Siberia. Khordorkovsky, if Putin doesn't murder him, is probably the best person to lead Russia out of Putin's neo-Soviet backslide.
Civil society or strong nation. I favor later over former, because civil society is, to say bluntly, toy for rich countries. Poor counties cannot afford it.
I feel very sorry for you, raccoons, you have English skills and a computer, two assets that could, if you had any curiosity about the world and reasoning skills, free you from the rigid poverty of your mind.
I'm not going to respond to you any more. It's pointless. Life is too short.
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