<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; ">Yes, but why do they? The returns to the "hard work" of the rich can be broken down (analytically, if not empirically) into:<DIV>*interest: what the rich could earn from their accumulated capital as rentiers</DIV><DIV>*rent: what the rich earn due to ability to exploit deviations from the mythical market</DIV><DIV>*pure profit: the residual - a sort of entrepreneurial wage</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>I don't think there's any reason to believe that "pure profit" is a large fraction of the total. I wouldn't want to have to try to live off of "pure profit" - what I could earn with a price-taking business capitalized entirely through loans in a competitive market. That leaves two possible explanations (that I can see - maybe there are more):</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>(1) Weber was right: the rich work compulsively in a post-Calvinist iron cage. </DIV><DIV>(2) The real money is in rent. It takes a lot of work to identify and take advantage of rents, so the rich work hard, event though the social product of that labor could be negative.</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>What do you think?</DIV><DIV><BR class="khtml-block-placeholder"></DIV><DIV>Michael McIntyre</DIV><DIV><A href="mailto:mcintyremichael@mac.com">mcintyremichael@mac.com</A></DIV><DIV><A href="http://morbidsymptoms.blogspot.com">http://morbidsymptoms.blogspot.com</A></DIV><DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Feb 9, 2007, at 2:14 PM, <A href="mailto:lbo-talk-request@lbo-talk.org">lbo-talk-request@lbo-talk.org</A> wrote:</DIV><BR class="Apple-interchange-newline"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">In fact, the love of The Market is grounded in the antithesis of <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">hard work</FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">and diligence - it is the shortcut from rags to riches, the <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">quintessence of</FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">the American Dream that bypasses the drudgery of education, the <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">toil of hard</FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">work, the burden of moral obligations, and the pomposity of high <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 10.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">culture.</FONT></P> </BLOCKQUOTE><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; min-height: 14.0px"><BR></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">Though hard work is very often not rewarded, most rich people today <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">work hard. The rentier is mostly a thing of the past. The ideal for <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">the rich today is to work; even our socialites have a little handbag <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">business on the side.</FONT></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px Helvetica; min-height: 14.0px"><BR></P> <P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px"><FONT face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: 12.0px Helvetica">Doug</FONT></P> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>