Summations Only

Get your salt shakers ready, because I'm no expert on economics either.But aren't there at least three different kinds of weathy people?
1. The entrepreneurs who are engaged in production and in investing in production. These would not necessarily be the more wealthy (excluding some investors), more the up-and-coming riche.2. The speculators who essentially make bets on how the market will go. They are not involved in production and, as we saw in the current economic problems, are not above hedging their bets nor engaging in swindles.3. Past investers and inheritors of wealth who derive their wealth from past investments. I added this category as an after-thought.The first type is involved in production and in trying to increase production, which involves growing companies and hence creating jobs. The 2nd and 3rd types are not involved in production and hence are not involved in creating jobs. Tax incentives to the first type could arguably have a trickle-down effect, whereas tax incentive to the other two types would have no trickle-down effect, or minimal effect at best.And, as it seems to me, the most wealthy are of the 2nd and 3rd types, whereas the first type would include most of the less wealthy, the ones still bulding their empires, so to speak. And the first type would also include middle-class entrepreneurs whose small businesses also provide jobs.FWIW.

Been done. Not the part about some conservative asserting it, but rather that a military operation got handed over to a contractor.The Great War -- they didn't have the foresight then to call it World War One, foolishly thinking that it would be the last one. In the naval operations against Turkey who had mined the Dardanelles (Battle of Gallipoli), the British had hired civilian minesweepers (my emphasis added):

quote:

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The French battleship Bouvet was sunk by a mine, causing it to capsize with its entire crew aboard. Minesweepers, manned by civilians and under constant fire of Ottoman shells, retreated leaving the minefields largely intact. HMS Irresistible and HMS Inflexible both sustained critical damage from mines, although there was confusion during the battle about the cause of the damagesome blamed torpedoes. HMS Ocean, sent to rescue the Irresistible, was itself struck by an explosion and both ships eventually sank. The French battleships Suffren and Gaulois were also damaged. All the ships had sailed through a new line of mines placed secretly by the Ottoman minelayer Nusret 10 days before.

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The losses prompted the Allies to cease any further attempts to force the straits by naval power alone. Losses had been anticipated during the planning of the campaign, so mainly obsolete battleships had been sent which were unfit to face the German fleet. However, many naval officersincluding de Robeck and Fisherdid not consider the losses acceptable. The defeat of the British fleet had also given the Ottomans a morale boost, although their gunners had almost run out of ammunition before the British fleet retreated. The reasons for the decision to turn back are unclear.

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Plus there was Haliburton in Iraq.