Re:The Money Farmers: How Oligarchs and Populists Milk the E.U.
by coldtea on Sunday November 03, 2019 @02:00PM
(#21435819)
>One, we’re talking about groups of people tied together by how they got wealthy. You are apparently lumping together Bezos and Zuckerberg in with railroad industrialists who have nothing in common other than they are “western business people.”
I'm not talking about Bezos and Zuckerberg. I'm talking about how industrialists on the west got their start in the "good ole times".
Point being that post-Communist countries elites used the same methods that early western capitalism used, to bootstrap themselves into capitalism...
>2) The oligarchs literally stole money from the State. The robber barons, although accused of using unscrupulous methods, did not.
The oligarchs didn't have to have "stole money from the state" (not directly at least). Rather, much like western capitalists of yore and of modern day, they benefited from having "friends" in the state, legislators in their pockets, etc, to secure rents and monopolies, special deals, thwart competition, etc.
I'm not talking about Bezos and Zuckerberg. I'm talking about how industrialists on the west got their start in the "good ole times".
Point being that post-Communist countries elites used the same methods that early western capitalism used, to bootstrap themselves into capitalism...
>2) The oligarchs literally stole money from the State. The robber barons, although accused of using unscrupulous methods, did not.
The oligarchs didn't have to have "stole money from the state" (not directly at least). Rather, much like western capitalists of yore and of modern day, they benefited from having "friends" in the state, legislators in their pockets, etc, to secure rents and monopolies, special deals, thwart competition, etc.