Since the covid-19 pandemic, the real economy has become very bad, and many people have tightened their belts and lived a budget, but in fact, not everyone has become poor.
According to a study by the American Institute for Policy Studies, in the eight months from the outbreak last March to the end of November, the wealth of the 650 richest people in the United States has increased by 33 percent. Combined, this wealth is twice as large as the wealth of the bottom 160 million people combined, and the gap is staggering. Why is that?
Some time ago, we invited the famous economist Professor Chen Zhiwu to do a live broadcast, the theme is "Post-epidemic Era: The Logic and Trend of Wealth Investment", in which he mentioned this issue, today, I will share the dry goods with you.
First, the growing wealth gap is a cold reality we must face.
There is a common indicator to measure the income gap of residents in the world, called the Gini coefficient, the larger its number, the greater the income gap, and a small number of people have too much wealth. How does the Gini coefficient change?
In 2017, 18 archaeologists jointly published a paper studying humanity's experience over the past 10,000 years. They used 63 archaeological sites around the world to calculate the size of the living area of the family houses in each site, and thus calculated the Gini coefficient. The results show that from primitive society to semi-agrarian society, to all-agrarian society, and finally to modern society, the Gini coefficient is getting bigger and bigger, that is, the wealth gap is getting bigger and bigger. Therefore, this phenomenon has existed since ancient times. But why has it been felt so much in recent years?
The reason for this is that the central bank monopolizes the right to issue money, printing as much money as it wants, and at the same time, governments generally implement active fiscal policies to stimulate the economy.
Where did the money go? At the top of the list is the financial market, which is why the real economy is poor and the stock market is rising. The rich hold more financial assets, the wealth will grow more, while ordinary people do not have so many financial assets, stocks and bonds and the like have not much to do with them, the wealth gap has widened.
The second reason is technological change. Why, you might ask, is technological change causing the wealth gap to widen, not become smaller?
On the one hand, the wealth that technological change makes everyone obtain more and more unrelated to physical strength and is more and more related to brain power. Primitive people need to hunt, big and strong, the best, modern people do not need these to get rich.
On the other hand, it has to do with whether you are willing to accept new things. In every 100 people in society, there are always some people who refuse to accept new things, and when the technological revolution comes, twenty or thirty out of these 100 people may be left behind. And those who are at the forefront seize the opportunity, whether through technological innovation or business model innovation, to grasp more wealth and leave others behind. Therefore, technological change will also widen the wealth gap.
The third reason is the scaled business model. For example, when Wal-Mart continued to expand, it squeezed out many husband and wife grocery stores in the United States, finished the American market, and went to Canada, to Asia and Europe, and constantly copied its business model. This is the case in many industries, through continuous annexation, and finally there are a few giants left, winner-take-all.
The fourth reason is globalization, which brings winner-take-all in every field.
For example, in the 1980s, in Professor Chen Zhiwu's hometown of Chaling County, Hunan Province, the best local singers held a concert, and many people were willing to pay money to see it. But then Hunan Tv invited the best singers in the province to the party, everyone watched TV, and no one was willing to spend money to see the singers in the county. Later, international singers also entered the Chinese market, and many domestic singers did not go to concerts. In the end, only a few of the top singers can afford a big concert.
Winners take all, relatively speaking, the richer the richer, the poorer the poorer. This also reminds us that when we make investments, we should concentrate on the industry leaders, follow the boss, and have meat to eat.