Doug's Dynamic Drivel

Please join with me in shedding a tear or two for the very wealthy. It seems as though the recent trials and tribulations of the economy have had a devastating effect on some of them, an effect many may never recover from.

Why can you imagine John McAfee, the founder of crappy McAfee software, has gone from an estimated $100M fortune to a mere pittance of $4M and now must sell off some large estates he owns just to pay his bills. Oh sob, I can hardly control these crocodile tears.

economists say — and data is beginning to show — that a significant change may in fact be under way. The rich, as a group, are no longer getting richer. Over the last two years, they have become poorer. And many may not return to their old levels of wealth and income anytime soon.

For every investment banker whose pay has recovered to its prerecession levels, there are several who have lost their jobs — as well as many wealthy investors who have lost millions. As a result, economists and other analysts say, a 30-year period in which the super-rich became both wealthier and more numerous may now be ending.

The relative struggles of the rich may elicit little sympathy from less well-off families who are dealing with the effects of the worst recession in a generation. But the change does raise several broader economic questions. Among them is whether harder times for the rich will ultimately benefit the middle class and the poor, given that the huge recent increase in top incomes coincided with slow income growth for almost every other group. In blunter terms, the question is whether the better metaphor for the economy is a rising tide that can lift all boats — or a zero-sum game.

Anyone who thinks that the economy is not a zero sum game is definitely missing a few marbles

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