I’ve lived in a few countries. My take is:<p>An oligarchy where leaders frequently change based mostly on merit, with a social ladder accessible to anyone, is as close as you get to social harmony. As long as everyone has a shot, society is generally happy. (Note that a functioning economy is also needed for this.)<p>Democracy is mostly a safeguard to kick out the Napoleons before it’s too late.<p>Also, if you have strong local politics (like in the US, UK, or Australia), you might see more impact from your vote, as opposed to countries where you vote for a party and they pretty much do what they want for their term.
Not that oligarchy is good, but is democracy really good? Is it even really different? It is basically letting easily manipulated and uneducated people decide things. And they are manipulated by news media, which in turn is manipulated by the same powerful people this study claims are controlling policy. Today we have social media as well but most people think it’s bad - so how can they feel good about choices influenced by social media? Curious what hacker news users think, because I feel like my whole life democracy has only been talked about positively.
I forget where I read it, but no matter how popular a particular bill was with the general populace, it had a ~ 30% chance of passing whether it was universally reviled or loved. The probability was literally a flat line, indicating that voter sentiment had almost <i>no</i> impact on what was actually passed.<p>Now, what's interesting is when they plotted the same line vs corporate and special interest lobbyists. There was a near perfect correlation between the sentiment of <i>those with money</i> and the probability of the bill passing.<p>Americans are getting pretty frustrated with the fact that all of our political candidates are basically 'pre-approved' by the rich, and anger is redirecting to populist candidates. It's also contributing to the partisan divide as many Americans feel abandoned by the 'establishment'.<p>People think politicians like Trump are the problem, when really, they're the symptom of a system that serves corporate interests over that of it's citizens.
These days, in the US, you get 1 vote per each US Dollar in your portfolio.<p>>the wealthy few move policy, while the average American has little power.<p>This is fully true, especially since Citizens United.
Original study: <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/testing-theories-of-american-politics-elites-interest-groups-and-average-citizens/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B" rel="nofollow">https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...</a>
This journal article has been thoroughly debunked three separate times. TLDR if you dig into the data, the middle class agree with the rich most of the time and in the small cases where they disagree, it’s a wash between who gets their way. So yes they have outsized influence, but no the US does not appear to be an oligarchy. More here: <a href="https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-study" rel="nofollow">https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11502464/gilens-page-oligarchy-...</a>
Is this a surprise? Am I supposed to believe I have the same amount of influence over how Congress votes and what decisions the President makes as a billionaire has?<p>Is this even new? When America was founded, it was decided that "democracy" meant that only wealthy white men decide how things would be run. I assume everyone reading this is aware that in order to be a citizen and to vote you had to be:
- wealthy (own land)
- white (no people of color could vote)
- male (women could not vote)<p>This country's founding was based upon protecting the power of wealthy white men and that has never changed in our entire history. Not once. Nor will it ever change. The system is carefully designed to enable the wealthy to control the levers of power (e.g. electoral college and not majority vote; and no restrictions upon using money to control political power).