His fellow poker players, unfortunately, have lost all their money, so not only do they have less money to spend in the general economy for the next week, but they forgo their beer and sandwiches at their local bars and go directly home. Thus all nine of the bar owners don't make any money on their regulars for that night.
Although Slick feels a little guilty at scamming his fellow players, greed gets the better of him, and he uses the same technique at their next game and rakes in another $900 as the Chumps lose all their money. Once again, Slick goes to the upscale bar after the game, drops a C-note, and stashes another $800 under his mattress when he gets home. And once again the Chumps spend less money in the general economy and skip their weekly beer and sandwiches at their local bars.
The third week produces the same outcome. By this time, the Chumps are pissed off and tapped out. Moreover, they can't believe Slick is so lucky that he has won all their money three weeks in a row. When they accuse him of somehow rigging the game, Slick feigns innocence and says they are just poor sports.
Now let's freeze frame it here for a moment. In real life, the Chumps would either stop playing poker with Slick or beat the hell out of him and take their money back.
But this is a hypothetical situation and a metaphor for where we are right now in our economy. If you haven't already guessed, Slick represents the upper one percent of the population that controls Wall Street and Corporate America. The Chumps represent the middle class, and the bar owners represent the general economy.
So, throughout the years, when all the players at the poker game were either winning or losing a little, the wealth was spread around and everyone prospered. But once Slick rigged the game in his favor, everyone else--with the exception of the upscale bar owner--lost out.
In addition, since Slick won cash and stashed the money under his mattress, he paid no tax on his winnings; plus he took his three weeks' worth of winnings ($2,400) out of circulation in the general economy.
This represents how the super rich and large corporations in our country today stash their cash in places like the
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