Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2016 January 11

= January 11 =

Infamous Presidental Medal of Freedom Winners?
So, I saw someone asking if Bill Cosby's Presidential Medal of Freedom should be revoked, given his current legal woes. Apparently, the White House responded that they were not interested in setting a precedent.

So I thought, there have been a lot of past winners. Surely one of them did something bad after winning the medal, right?

So that's my question. Has any winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom subsequently committed a serious crime, had a major public scandal, or done anything similar that might have caused the revocation of their medal in the past? (Other, obviously, than Bill Cosby.)

I've been spot-checking List_of_Presidential_Medal_of_Freedom_recipients, but there are too many for me to go through. gnfnrf (talk) 03:56, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * At least that's better than the Nobel Peace Prize, which can apparently be given to people already guilty of terrorism, in the case of Yasser Arafat. StuRat (talk) 04:14, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * And Henry Kissinger. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:00, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Who is this supposed to be going after ? The link between Hitchens and Geriatric nursing ? --Askedonty (talk) 07:26, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Not sure what you mean, but I recall Tom Lehrer saying that satire and reality had merged when Kissinger won the Peace Prize. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 07:29, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I think I didn't even need the telly to come by myself to that same conclusion. Swap satire with "gore". --Askedonty (talk) 07:37, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * You forgot Nelson Mandela. Nil Einne (talk)
 * Looking through that list, I can think of a number of them who were controversial for one reason another, but nothing jumps out at me as being anywhere near the personal scandal that has surrounded Cosby. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:18, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * In France, the Légion d'honneur is so widely abused by the process of corruption, that many recipients who could easily be proud of it, choose to refuse it because they don't want to be perceived as corrupted as too many recipients. See Wikipedia "Category:Légion d'honneur refusals". Akseli9 (talk) 05:43, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Here's a convenience link for you: Category:Légion d'honneur refusals. You're welcome. Dismas |(talk) 15:34, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Hmm that category has 21 enteries. Only 10 of them were alive after 1968; Léo Ferré, Thomas Piketty, Jacques Prévert, Jean-Paul Sartre, Philippe Séguin, Brigitte Bardot, Simone de Beauvoir, Jacques Bouveresse, Georges Brassens, Bernard Clavel. It may very well be that "many recipients who could easily be proud of it, choose to refuse it because they don't want to be perceived as corrupted as too many recipients", but the category doesn't seem to be a good demonstration of it. Nil Einne (talk) 15:28, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * You're right, and it might lack a lot of names too. I mentioned it just so to say "the reputation of Legion d'Honneur is so corrupted, there even is a wikipedia category for its refusals". Akseli9 (talk) 21:51, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Officially, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld are war criminals, convicted of torture and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment. But not American officially. The former Governor of Minnesota wants Cheney prosecuted in the US for murder, too. Never going to happen. Shooting your friend in the face while trying to kill innocent quail for fun isn't is only sort of illegal, but scandalous enough for a Wikipedia article. InedibleHulk (talk) 21:38, January 12, 2016 (UTC)


 * Cheney's hunting buddy: "Those woods sure look dark and ominous, are you sure we should go in ?"
 * Cheney's frosty response: "The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep ... --  Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  21:42, 13 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Dick Cheney: "What are you complaining about ? I'm the one who'll have to walk out of there all alone." StuRat (talk) 04:59, 13 January 2016 (UTC)


 * So far as I see, the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission is not a body of the UN or of Malaysia; it is just some people who got together for the purpose of calling these people war criminals. Contrary to rumor, there were no outstanding warrants for them as of 2014.  Sure, I'd like to see them tried for their crimes, but I see no use playing make-believe.  Doctors Without Borders hospitals are some of the choicest military targets on Earth, one of the architects of the Biafra famine was eulogized by leaders from all over the world at the UN, and the kind of security madness that Bush represents has long since spread in most other countries even as direct actions like the Bundy occupation and smuggling illegal aliens to get them privileged status seem like they have the force of law behind them.  In previous years people would say that if you don't vote, you have no right to complain; in future years people will probably speak in the same way of terrorism.  People who don't commit terrorism will probably be viewed the way draft-dodgers were in the Vietnam era... Wnt (talk) 01:28, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Long Italian book title
Is there a preferred way to shorten titles of long Italian Renaissance books for the body text of an article (Bembo)? I ask since in 1524, the calligrapher Giovanni Antonio Tagliente published a book that I understand has the splendid title Lo presente libro insegna la vera arte de lo excellente scriuere de diuerse varie sorti de litere le quali se fano per geometrica ragione & con la presente opera ognuno le potra stampare e impochi giorni per lo amaistramento, ragione, & essempli, come qui sequente vederai. Bit of a mouthful, I think you'll agree. I've used Lo Presente... but I'm not sure this is best. Of course the full title (and indeed a pdf scan of the books involved) is linked in the references. I don't speak Italian so I don't know what a sensible shortening of the title would be. I'd welcome input on capitalisation too. (For anyone wondering what this is for, the book's font was used as a model for a book font that's now very common, especially in British printing.)

Same for his rival Ludovico Vicentino degli Arrighi's book which I think is titled La operina di Ludouico Vicentino, da imparare di scriuere littera cancellarescha. There I'm a bit confused since I've seen the title in several places but there seems on the title page to be an extra word between scriuere and littera (re?) that I'm not sure about. Input or direct edits to the article (Bembo) welcomed! Blythwood (talk) 05:14, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Translation of the first title would be roughly:
 * The present book teaches the true art of excellent writing of several various sorts of letters which one uses for geometric reason and with the present work everyone will be able to print them and in a few days for mastery, reason, and examples, as here following you shall see.
 * If you can pick out a phrase from that mess to use as a short title, well, bravo for you.
 * I suppose if I really had to I would go with The True Art of Excellent Writing, but that seems to sort of misrepresent the contents, given that it's apparently about typography rather than composition. --Trovatore (talk) 08:03, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Update: I tried Googling "the true art of excellent writing", and the first hit was for Tagliente, so it looks like I'm not the only one to single that out as the key phrase. --Trovatore (talk) 08:11, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. Added that now. It's apparently a manual of calligraphy even though it's printed. Blythwood (talk) 16:11, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * On the title page of the Ludovico Vicentino degli Arrighi book, there's not an "extra word"—it's just that scriuere is hyphenated after the first e, so that "scriue=" appears on one line and "re" on the next. With regard to short titles, I'd just call it his Operina (unless he wrote another book with that word in the title). Deor (talk) 16:47, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

The Waters of Mar{s|ch}
There's a Doctor Who episode called The Waters of Mars, not an incredibly memorable episode as the series goes, but an episode. There's also a very lovely song, translated from Portuguese into many languages, whose English title is "The Waters of March".

In French, the two titles would be the same, Les eaux de Mars, and you should do yourself a favor and listen to Stacey Kent's version.

Does anyone think this is a coincidence? I assume that it is not. The Doctor Who episode could have come up with many other titles for that episode. But I haven't found any explicit confirmation. --Trovatore (talk) 07:32, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm afraid that unless you ask the producers, you're not going to get an answer to this. The title seems very obvious though. I mean, it's set on Mars and water plays an important role. Also, IMHO, the episode was one of the best of Tennants best, but I digress.... Fgf10 (talk) 08:14, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Sounds like a pretty obvious play on words, especially as the month and the planet are both named for the same Roman god. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 12:46, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * This kind of play on words in media is pretty common in English. Consider the items Murder, He Says (1945), Murder, She Said (1961) and Murder, She Wrote (1984-1996). Also, the songs "Yakety Yak", "Yakety Sax" and "Yakety Axe". ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 12:56, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * In fact, "Yakety Sax" was based on the sax break in "Yakety Yak", and "Yakety Axe" was a guitar version of "Yakety Sax". So, not quite the same thing.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 21:15, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Just one small precision: in French, the titles would be slightly different, "Les eaux de mars" for the month and "Les eaux de Mars" (capital M) for the planet. --Xuxl (talk) 13:11, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Indeed. Note French uses lowercase (lowercases? minuscul(iz)es?) for the months of the year on the grounds that they are (derived from Latin) adjectives. But it also uses lowercase for the days of the week for no good reason at all. Planets are indeed capitalized. But "le soleil", "la lune", "la terre" are not. Go figure. French seems to just like to be unpredictable, or if not, lowercase. Contact  Basemetal   here  13:51, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * La Furia Francese, Mon Ami. The preceptors of the French decided probably they needed to have most of their active symbols "cooled" down a little bit. I always supposed it was to make sure they would not get contaminated by exactly the same enthusiasm than their neighbors. Not by the Swiss at any rate - not at the rate of the Swiss franc. --Askedonty (talk) 14:33, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * In addition to what Fgf10 has said, whether there is water on Mars or not has been a popular subject in the news for the last several years. So, it's not surprising that water would be on the mind of someone writing an episode that is set on Mars. Dismas |(talk) 15:32, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Spiders from the waters of Mars would probably not be real spiders. Unless they came to Earth in their exploratory oxygen pods. InedibleHulk (talk) 18:49, January 11, 2016 (UTC)


 * "Ou est les araignées?" Sheesh. You are a disgrace to Canada. Contact Basemetal   here  20:47, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "Où étaient les araignées?" InedibleHulk (talk) 21:05, January 11, 2016 (UTC)

What is the percentage of males that work in the traditionally female profession of elementary school teacher?
Are there statistics for the percentage of males versus females that work as elementary school teachers in the USA? Also, same question for kindergarten teachers. Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 09:45, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * For the first question, see  which I found within 20 seconds of reading this question with a search for 'teacher sex distribution us' Nil Einne (talk) 11:15, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Likewise for the second question, 'kindergarten teacher sex distribution us' will likely find which links to  and  for public school teachers in 1993. Also  which on page 10 (25 of the PDF) for both public and private in 1998. Finally approaching from a slightly different way but  has figures for 2014 (it only has women and I'm not certain whether the figures are a complete binary but it's unlikely to be significant). I'm not sure if from the same source, but there's also . Both the later also have figures for elementary and middle school. I'm sure a more careful look at the results or sources will find more figures if any of these are unsuitable. Nil Einne (talk) 11:39, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Wouldn't you consider nursing to also be a traditionally female profession? US, US again, UK, and of course the WP article Men in nursing Contact Basemetal   here  13:28, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Yes, nursing is a traditionally female profession. I was only concerned with the teaching profession, however.   Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:12, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. So, in a nutshell, the answers are: elementary school teachers are 85% female and 15% male; kindergarten teachers are 98% female and 2% male. Wow. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:14, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, all. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 05:21, 15 January 2016 (UTC)

Who owns the cameras at political rallies in the US?
Donald Trump keeps complaining at his rallies that, unless there's a heckler, "they" will not pan the cameras to show how big the crowds are. But I'm thinking: what's preventing him from hiring his own cameras that will show exactly what he tells them? Is there some tacit custom that you don't hire your own cameras and leave that job to "them", whoever they are? Contact Basemetal   here  15:36, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * In this case "they" are the news organizations covering the event. Without personally endorsing his view, Trump is commenting on the Media bias which holds that the news covering the politicians is "in cahoots" with those they are covering, to present them in a more positive light.  Again, not endorsing that statement, just explaining it.  -- Jayron 32 16:22, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Or in this case not. But my question remains: why doesn't he bring his own cameras then? Contact Basemetal   here  16:34, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Who will publish his videos if he records them himself? Recording a video is fine, but if CNN or whatever won't show it, what then?  Of course, if you want the real answer, you'll have to ask him directly.  No one here can speak for him.  -- Jayron 32 17:17, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * What then, indeed. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:27, January 11, 2016 (UTC)
 * This seems like a fine place to publish a Trump video. Here, too. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:30, January 11, 2016 (UTC)
 * I know, strictly speaking you're absolutely right, but I was wondering if there wasn't a more generic answer that would apply to all candidates, not only Trump. An answer such as that for example you just don't do stuff like that. That there was some kind of stigma against doing that. For example if it was considered a kind of "vanity" behavior, like self-publishing your own book. Something like that. I was hoping some "reliable source" may have commented on the issue.
 * Speculation. Even so I wouldn't be surprised if in the future (though probably not in this election cycle just yet) candidates chose the do-it-yourself approach. I was also wondering, even if it was the case that according to current mores this is not done, why Trump who is breaking the mold in so many ways had not tried to do it in this case. But maybe he likes in fact having one more reason to complain about the press. End speculation.
 * As to the practical aspect of such a choice, namely that if you record yourself who's gonna broadcast it, news organizations borrow footage from each other, so they could also use footage supplied by a candidate. Unless, that is, they would make it a point no to. But with the Web, YouTube, etc. you can bypass established news organizations and use your own footage in those media. And having your own cameras does not imply that you don't allow established news organizations to also have their own cameras at your rally. Simply that would allow a candidate to publish their own videos side by side with footage from established news organizations.
 * Contact Basemetal   here  17:54, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Running for President (or any popular office) is all about vanity and self-promotion. Every candidate has their multiple social media accounts, and every one of those is there to convince people the person in the pictures is the best person in America. If there were some rule against peacocking while mudslinging (even ruthlessly unethically), it would break the whole game. InedibleHulk (talk) 18:21, January 11, 2016 (UTC)
 * Hillary Clinton apparently not only wrote a book, but wrote the book on self-promotion. InedibleHulk (talk) 18:25, January 11, 2016 (UTC)
 * She's certainly not alone in that, though. InedibleHulk (talk) 21:21, January 11, 2016 (UTC)
 * Consider as well that Americans don't trust their big media. Someone who appears to share that distrust appears more trustworthy than someone who uses the same old reaction shot tricks, even if he easily could (and has). All part of the outsider gimmick. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:46, January 11, 2016 (UTC)


 * Biased press coverage is nothing new. At the last Black Lives Matter rally in Philly it was claimed that protesters had blocked Center City streets for blocks, but there were no overhead shots, the most people you could see in frame were about ten wide and three deep.  That looks like a lot, if you don't move the camera.  Also, for the perfect parodic illustration of this, see the "Iowa" episode of The Good Wife just aired this last Sunday, Jan. 10th. μηδείς (talk) 17:58, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Ecuadorian centavo coins
Is there any particular reason why Ecuador chose to use their own Ecuadorian centavo coins instead of simply using the US coins? They've already adopted the US currency and the US paper bills, so I really don't see the point of a separate set of equivalent value coins.

My first instinct is that 1. coins are heavier than paper bills so it would save on the transportation costs of shipping them from the US and 2. minting your own coins contributes to the Ecuadorian economy. But it turns out that Canada and Mexico mints the coins for them, so both guesses are incorrect. 731Butai (talk) 15:58, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Also the Ecuadorian centavo coins articles says that US coins are legal tender in Ecuador, so there's obviously no legal problem with exporting US coins and using them inside Ecuador. 731Butai (talk) 16:01, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * This is more of an observation rather than an answer: it is not uncommon for issuing authorities for coins to be different to issuing authorities for notes. Coins tend to be issued by the government, while banknotes can be issued by independent banks: e.g. the Royal Mint makes British coins, but the Bank of England (and several other banks) issue the bank notes; the United States Mint makes US dollar coins, but the Federal Reserve issues US dollar bills; in Hong Kong, until the 21st century there were only private bank notes, whereas coins were government minted. Perhaps the Ecuadorian authorities similarly (or as a result) felt that minting coins is "more sovereign" so that they should at least have some home-grown coins (even if US coins are also legal tender). --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 21:08, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Indeed. In the Eurozone banknotes are identical through the whole zone and I assume are printed centrally whereas coins are minted by the member countries. Contact Basemetal   here  21:13, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * They are not printed centrally according to Euro_banknotes, although there is a central auditing system.--Denidi (talk) 21:55, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * But they are all issued by the ECB, which is different to the coins. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 22:21, 11 January 2016 (UTC) Sorry, I was going off the "ECB" printed on the notes themselves, the article says otherwise. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 22:23, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
 * I don't have an answer although it seems Panama does something similar, going as far as to use the US mint on occasion  . However the situation there is a little different since Panama does have their own currency the Panamanian balboa. Although tied to the US dollar since 1904, Panama could remove the peg and allow the value of anything denominated in balboa to change and start issueing banknotes as needed. This source  says it was historically been cheaper than buying coins from the US but this is a bit confusing. Of course it's true issuing your own coins will generally be cheaper than buying (if that's the right word) circulating denominated coins from somewhere else like the US, since the balbao is tied to the US dollar ultimately this still means you have to be able to pay the same amount in US dollars. In fact it seems worse since minting coins isn't be free, but denominated coins are normally sold at face value, the government or party involved in minting normally "pays for the cost" of minting. (Although "pays for the cost" is perhaps a little misleading for many fiat money coins.) It could be it still makes sense, i.e. even though theoretically 50 centésimos or centavos costs 50 US cents, practically it doesn't. It could also be that the US does impose restrictions on buying or exporting US coins. I had a bit of a search and other than the above, all I could find were things like for pride  or  transport reasons or similar reasons  (that one says costly an inefficient). One thing, I wouldn't completely dismiss transport reasons, it's not clear to me if Ecuador coins were always minted in Canada & Mexico. Nor do I think we can be sure it won't be cheaper to ship them from either place as shipping can be complicated. (Even more so for Panama given how long they've been doing it.) Notably during initial introduction it's likely Ecuador needed quite a lot of coins considering it was a fairly low value economy. And coins have a long circulation times so it seems there's a fair chance quite a few of those minted in 2000 are still circulating. And even if the US Federal Reserve were willing to provide however many coins they needed, whether they could in the time frame etc needed for circulation and shipping I don't think any of us know. (Note that although the US Mint mints the coins, per our article Coins of the United States dollar, the US Federal Reserve is still the party responsible for putting coins in to circulation and withdrawing them. So I presume Ecuador would need to deal with them for the coins.) And even with them minting their own coins they still had problems . (Although it could have been because they decided to mint their own coins.) BTW it seems US $1 coins, USD$2 notes and possibly a few other things are very popular in Ecuador       Nil Einne (talk) 14:14, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * That's strange because $2 bills are rare in the US and $1 coins are rare in much of the country. They still haven't exhausted the initial printing of $2 bills after decades. And I've actually used dollar coins only 50 miles from Manhattan and she looked at me like "Is this American?", scrutinized it, and then hit it on the counter to make sure it's even metal (!). Then I thought this is ridiculious and replaced the coins with bills and she looked relieved. (the new ones do look like casino tokens to be honest). Everyone knows what they are in the city though because the subway fare vending machines all dispense them. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 14:47, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * The standard story about 2-dollar bills is that they were associated with race tracks, and the general public developed an aversion to them. Maybe Ecuador has no such aversion. Or maybe their cash registers are designed with an extra drawer. Even rarer than the Jefferson 2-dollar bill is the Buchanan 3-dollar bill. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 03:14, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

If the rich suddenly gave it all away
I read that low cash makes low happiness, enough cash makes normal happiness, tons of cash doesn't make extra happiness. So, I got to thinking, doesn't that mean a billionaire is no happier while causing millions of people low happiness? Then I thought, maybe not.

Could someone please answer the following in the simplest possible terms?

I know that a tiny fraction of people have a huge percentage the money.

So, if they suddenly gave it all away so that everyone had an equal percentage increase in their wealth (someone with 1 suddenly had 2, someone with 1,000, suddenly had 2,000, for example), would they be able to buy two chickens instead of one, for example? Would a day's wage allow them to be better off? Wouldn't everything double in price, and they would be in exactly the same spot? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:20, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * I think you've got the right idea that prices would rise so that people will not benefit much in this scenario. Money represents ones ability to buy products and services. Because the transfer of money does not create any goods and services, the availability of those remains the same. The real effect of the super rich giving away all their money is that all the people who previously earned their money providing products and services to those rich people will lose their income and will need to find some other occupation. That in turn could of course influence the overall economy, but in what way is hard to predict. - Lindert (talk) 23:47, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * If the billionaires had previously been hoarding their cash, then theoretically in the medium-long term one should see prices rise to meet the new affluence once the wealth were redistributed, but in the short term there would be a boost to the economy, given that price increases would lag behind increased spending; in theory, this increased economic activity would create jobs buying and selling, which in turn would increase the circulation of money and boost the economy in the long term. (This is effectively what quantitative easing is, with national governments in the position of the billionaire). If the billionaires had previously had their money invested in businesses, the sudden withdrawal in order to redistribute it could actually make poor people worse off, as the economic shock of mass stock sales would drive down share prices (and hence pension income), and the lack of available venture capital would reduce the job market. This is a classic "depends which economist you listen to" scenario. &#8209; Iridescent 23:52, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Where do you draw the rich/everyone line? If somebody doubles their wealth and goes over that line, do they have to give it all away, too? Are the formerly rich allowed to keep any money, or do they simply freeze to death? Do people earn double afterward? That would complicate things (exactly how, I have no idea). InedibleHulk (talk) 00:00, January 12, 2016 (UTC)


 * But I do think you have the right idea that people at both ends of the spectrum tend not to be very happy. At the poor end even minor problems, like your car having a flat tire, can cause misery, as not being able to fix it means you can't get to work, lose your job, then are evicted and lose your kids.  And at the rich end they have to live in fear of their kids being snatched for ransom, people suing them, etc.  So, I'd just transfer some wealth from the rich to the poor, and leave the middle class alone.  Of course, actually giving the poor a heap of cash may not do them much good, as they tend to be really bad at money management.  Offering benefits like free education, job training, health care, child care, etc., may be more beneficial to the poor. StuRat (talk) 06:16, 12 January 2016 (UTC)


 * That's the theory for modern welfare states, where wealth transfer is supposed to be progressive, i.e. skewed towards the ends, with a focus on delivery of public goods. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 11:56, 12 January 2016 (UTC)


 * The term "welfare state" has a rather negative meaning in the US, where many take it to mean unemployed people "on the dole". I don't believe that is good for society or the individuals involved.  Instead, we should encourage them to work, say with a reverse income tax, supplementing the minimum wage jobs they can get with additional income. StuRat (talk) 21:22, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Okay, apologies for the confusion, I was not aware of that connotation. As I understand it, in many other countries the "welfare state" is a neutral, even slightly positive term, describing the kind of social welfare system that emerged in most developed countries during the 20th century that provides a safety net that guarantees a minimum standard of living, regardless of how a person's circumstances may change. Most contemporary welfare states make it quite difficult, if not impossible, to live on the dole without making a decent effort at finding a job or some contribution to society. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 12:57, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Interesting points all around. I was really focussing on the dilution of money in circulation. But now I see it is complicated by the fact that they don't just have it in a pile in the bank. It is all out there in the hands of borrowers, right? The super-rich don't actually have it, they just control it. Is this right? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:00, 12 January 2016 (UTC)


 * As I understand it, although I am not an economist, they don't own the cash, they own shares. If they sold the shares, they could get cash, but suddenly the price of the shares would drop. Demand doesn't change just because you are selling something, but suddenly supply goes up drastically, so the price must go down. But suppose they gave the shares away, rather than the cash. Then only the cash-strapped would sell, so it wouldn't matter as much. Then lots of people would have more cash, out of the needy. Suppose they all wanted fried chicken. Then the cost of fried chicken would rise. But then there would be more demand for land to raise chickens. The question is whether available land can be readily converted into chicken farms. If not, the cost of increasing the land available will be high, so there will not be many new fried chicken restaurants opening up, and the cost of fried chicken will rise. Otherwise, if you can easily increase the available land, there will just be more fried chicken restaurants, and less of something else (such as golf courses for the super rich). It's just about what eventually gets traded. I think. IBE (talk) 20:43, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Anna Frodesiak: One must understand that "We're living in a dark age of macroeconomics" (Paul Krugman. Basically, mainstream, textbook, academic economics & real world-policy has been going backwards for about 40 years, if not longer, covering up a conceptually and empirically defective & long-refuted structure with pseudomathematics, while discarding the intellectual and practical advances of the previous era. And what is even worse, popular understanding, particularly of money and finance has seriously decreased. Following this, most answers neglect that typically modern capitalist economies are demand-constrained, and use a neoclassical picture that would be valid only in a supply constrained, full employment economy, like war-time. So in your (rather vague) scenario, what one should expect to see is a quick & permanent rise in production, employment & wealth, without the directly proportional inflationary effects, probably not even serious inflation. There hasn't been any real demand-driven inflation in the USA since the end of WWII. "The money" would not be diluted, but would cause the creation of real wealth, in addition to the redistributed wealth. It would be a universal win-win, as most people usually measure things - but not the ones who manage today's societies. The major flattening in wealth and income during the New Deal & the second World War was roughly similar to your scenario & had roughly the effects I described.John Z (talk) 03:11, 13 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Anna, you might want to look at Marginalism. A real-world example might be that a billionaire might pay $100 for a limo ride to get to his destination in 15 minutes, rather than take the bus for $2, which will get him there in 20.  The poor kid, given the $100 will walk, and use the money to buy a videogame or a new pair of speakers, which will give the child much more happiness that the 5 minutes saved in travel buy the billionaire.  The sort of reasoning leads to economic utilitarianism.  The problem with the latter is that confiscating wealth to give it away interferes with the rich person's investments, that produce wealth, and end up being spent on luxury items by the recipients, rather than going to wise investments and savings for old age.


 * I was a specialist in an office during the internet boom, 80% of whose employees were young single mothers on public benefits. The government benefits got them no where, but the demand for internet service provided them with full healthcare (several people got gastric bypass surgery) and about a half of the staff moved to better neighborhoods and bought cars, and put their children in private schools.  All this based on the fact that rich people wanted higher connection speeds, and were willing to pay $180.00 extra for it. μηδείς (talk) 17:50, 13 January 2016 (UTC)


 * It seems like we would have different answers for different kinds of wealth. If a man has 1000 cows and gives one to each of 1000 people chosen at random, probably those people will take care of the cows less efficiently.  But if a man owns a fancy specialty piece of software used by 1000 people and gives it away, it can be used by millions of people, potentially to generate new wealth or improve efficiency of something they do.  But I would guess most wealth nowadays seems to have the angle of banning people from doing things - not using an industrial process or producing a medicine, not singing a song, not going on a tract of land held for speculation; I'm tempted to guess the latter case should predominate... Wnt (talk) 01:13, 18 January 2016 (UTC)