re: #440 Aceofwhat?

The best answer is that a surprisingly large percentage of those who are currently “poor” do not expect to be in the same economic stratum in the future.

An addendum to that answer is that a surprisingly large percentage of those who are currently “poor” are not always convinced that they require ever more assistance from their wealthier citizens.

Combined, you find a subgroup of “poor” who are voting not to take more money from the wealthier through a combination of optimism and sense of fair play.

That is why the question is not a paradox. Your inability to discover these answers did not mean they didn’t exist. This isn’t Schrodinger’s Politik.

I see what your point is, but that wasn’t the question. What is the motivation for a poor person to vote to help a rich person? It CAN be answered in ideological terms. It can be argued that the poor person is a fan of the trickle down theory and that eventually he will see a benefit from helping a rich person. But from my perspective, that’s quite a bank shot. I think it’s more likely that the poor person will choose to help the rich person because of other reasons. For social or ideological reasons. That’s the ONLY reason I can think of for people voting against their own interests.