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Wealth is the abundance of valuable resources or material possessions. The word wealth is derived from the old English weal, which is from an Indo-European word stem.^[1] An individual, community, region or country that possesses an abundance of such possessions or resources is known as wealthy.

The concept of wealth is of significance in all areas of economics, and clearly so for growth economics and development economics. Yet the meaning of wealth is context-dependent and there is no universally agreed upon definition. At the most general level, economists may define wealth as "anything of value" which captures both the subjective nature of the idea and the idea that it is not a fixed or static concept. Various definitions and concepts of wealth have been asserted by various individuals and in different contexts.^[2] Defining wealth can be a normative process with various ethical implications, since often wealth maximization is seen as a goal or is thought to be a normative principle of its own.^[3][4]

Although precise data are not available, the total household wealth in the world has been estimated at $125 trillion (USD 125 x10¹²) in year 2000.^[5]

About 90% of global wealth is distributed in North America, Europe, and "rich Asia-Pacific" countries (not including India),^[6] and 1% of adults are estimated to hold 40% of world wealth, a number which falls to 32% when adjusted for purchasing power parity.^[7]

Definition[link]

For definitions of "wealth," see also The Wealth of Nations and Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.

Adam Smith, in his seminal work The Wealth of Nations, described wealth as "the annual produce of the land and labour of the society". This "produce" is, at its simplest, that which satisfies human needs and wants of utility. In popular usage, wealth can be described as an abundance of items of economic value, or the state of controlling or possessing such items, usually in the form of money, real estate and personal property. An individual who is considered wealthy, affluent, or rich is someone who has accumulated substantial wealth relative to others in their society or reference group. In economics, net wealth refers to the value of assets owned minus the value of liabilities owed at a point in time.^{[citation needed]} Wealth can be categorized into three principal categories: personal property, including homes or automobiles; monetary savings, such as the accumulation of past income; and the capital wealth of income producing assets, including real estate, stocks, bonds, and businesses.^{[citation needed]} All these delineations make wealth an especially important part of social stratification. Wealth provides a type of social safety net of protection against an unforeseen decline in one’s living standard in the event of job loss or other emergency and can be transformed into home ownership, business ownership, or even a college education.^{[8][not in citation given]}

'Wealth' refers to some accumulation of resources (net asset value), whether abundant or not. 'Richness' refers to an abundance of such resources (income or flow). A wealthy individual, community, or nation thus has more accumulated resources (capital) than a poor one. The opposite of wealth is destitution. The opposite of richness is poverty.

The term implies a social contract on establishing and maintaining ownership in relation to such items which can be invoked with little or no effort and expense on the part of the owner. The concept of wealth is relative and not only varies between societies, but varies between different sections or regions in the same society. A personal net worth of US $10,000 in most parts of the United States would certainly not place a person among the wealthiest citizens of that locale. However, such an amount would constitute an extraordinary amount of wealth in impoverished developing countries.

Concepts of wealth also vary across time. Modern labor-saving inventions and the development of the sciences have enabled the poorest sectors of today's society to enjoy a standard of living equivalent if not superior to the wealthy of the not-too-distant past. This comparative wealth across time is also applicable to the future; given this trend((cn)) of human advancement, it is likely that the standard of living that the wealthiest enjoy today will be considered impoverished by future generations.

Industrialization emphasized the role of technology. Many jobs were automated. Machines replaced some workers while other workers became more specialized. Labour specialization became critical to economic success. However, physical capital, as it came to be known, consisting of both the natural capital and the infrastructural capital, became the focus of the analysis of wealth.^{[citation needed]}

Adam Smith saw wealth creation as the combination of materials, labour, land, and technology in such a way as to capture a profit (excess above the cost of production).^[9] The theories of David Ricardo, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, in the 18th century and 19th century built on these views of wealth that we now call classical economics.

Marxian economics (see labor theory of value) distinguishes in the Grundrisse between material wealth and human wealth, defining human wealth as "wealth in human relations"; land and labour were the source of all material wealth.

Buckminster Fuller defines wealth in the following manner: “Wealth is our organized capability to cope effectively with the environment in sustaining our healthy regeneration and decreasing both the physical and metaphysical restrictions of the forward days of our lives.” ^[10]

Economic analysis[link]

In economics, wealth in a commonly applied accounting sense is the net worth of a person, household, or nation, that is, the value of all assets owned net of all liabilities owed at a point in time. For national wealth as measured in the national accounts, the net liabilities are those owed to the rest of the world.^[11] The term may also be used more broadly as referring to the productive capacity of a society or as a contrast to poverty.^[12] Analytical emphasis may be on its determinants or distribution.^[13]

Economic terminology distinguishes between two types of variables: stock and flow. Wealth, as measurable at a date in time, is a stock, like the value of an orchard on December 31 minus debt owed on the orchard. For a given amount of wealth, say at the beginning of the year, income from that wealth, as measurable over say a year is a flow. What marks the income as a flow is its measurement per unit of time, like the value of apples yielded from the orchard per year.

In macroeconomic theory the 'wealth effect' may refer to the increase in aggregate consumption from an increase in national wealth. One measure of it is the wealth elasticity of demand. It is the percentage change in the amount demanded of consumption for each one-percent change in wealth.

Wealth may be measured in nominal or real values, that is in money value as of a given date or adjusted to net out price changes. The assets include those that are tangible (land and capital) and financial (money, bonds, etc.). Measurable wealth typically excludes intangible or nonmarketable assets such as human capital and social capital. In economics, 'wealth' corresponds to the accounting term 'net worth'. But analysis may adapt typical accounting conventions for economic purposes in social accounting (such as in national accounts). An example of the latter is generational accounting of social security systems to include the present value projected future outlays considered as liabilities.^[14] Macroeconomic questions include whether the issuance of government bonds affects investment and consumption through the wealth effect.^[15]

Environmental assets are not usually counted in measuring wealth, in part due to the difficulty of valuation for a non-market good. Environmental or green accounting is a method of social accounting for formulating and deriving such measures on the argument that an educated valuation is superior to a value of zero (as the implied valuation of environmental assets).^[16]

Sociological treatments[link]

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"Wealth provides an important mechanism in the intergenerational transmission of inequality."^[8] Less than 10% of the wealthiest people in America inherited family fortunes.^{[citation needed]} But the effect of inherited wealth can also be seen on a more modest level. For example, a couple who buy a house with financial help from their parents or a student who has his or her college education paid for; in both scenarios the participants are benefiting directly from the accumulated wealth of previous generations.^[8]

Wealth and social class[link]

Social class is not identical to wealth, but the two concepts are related (particularly in Marxist theory), leading to the combined concept of Socioeconomic status.

Partly as a result of different economic conditions of life, members of different social classes often have different value systems and view the world in different ways. As such, there exist different "conceptions of social reality, different aspirations and hopes and fears, different conceptions of the desirable."^[17] The way the various social classes in society view wealth vary and these diverse characteristics are a fundamental dividing line among the classes. According to Richard H Ropers, the concentration of wealth in the United States is inequitably distributed.^[18] In 1996, the United States federal government reported that the net worth of the top 1 percent of people in the United States was approximately equal to that of the bottom 90 percent.^[8]

The upper class[link]

Upper class values include higher education, and the wealthiest people the accumulation and maintenance of wealth, the maintenance of social networks and the power that accompanies such networks. Children of the upper class are typically schooled on how to manage this power and channel this privilege in different forms. It is in large part by accessing various edifices of information^{[clarification needed]}, associates, procedures and auspices that the upper class are able to maintain their wealth and pass it to future generations.^[19]

The middle class[link]

The middle class places a greater emphasis on income. The middle class views wealth as something for emergencies and it is seen as more of a cushion. This class comprises people that were raised with families that typically owned their own home, planned ahead and stressed the importance of education and achievement. They earn a significant amount of income and also have significant amounts of consumption. However there is very limited savings (deferred consumption) or investments, besides retirement pensions and homeownership. They have been socialized to accumulate wealth through structured, institutionalized arrangements. Without this set structure, asset accumulation would likely not occur.^[19]

The lower class[link]

Those with the least amount of wealth are the welfare poor. (see underclass) Wealth accumulation for this class is to some extent prohibited. People that receive AFDC transfers cannot own more than a trivial amount of assets, in order to be eligible and remain qualified for income transfers. Most of the institutions that the welfare poor encounter discourage any accumulation of assets.^[19]

Distribution[link]

Wealth in the form of land[link]

In the western tradition, the concepts of owning land and accumulating wealth in the form of land were engendered in the rise of the first state, for a primary service and power of government was, and is to this day, the awarding and adjudication of land use rights.

Land ownership was also justified according to John Locke. He claimed that because we mix^{[clarification needed]} our labour with the land, we thereby deserve the right to control the use of the land and benefit from the product of that land (but subject to his Lockean proviso of "at least where there is enough, and as good left in common for others.").

Additionally, in developed countries post-agrarian society (industrial society) this argument has many critics (including those influenced by Georgist and geolibertarian ideas) who argue that since land, by definition, is not a product of human labor, any claim of private property in it is a form of theft; as David Lloyd George observed, "to prove a legal title to land one must trace it back to the man who stole it."

Many older ideas have resurfaced in the modern notions of ecological stewardship, bioregionalism, natural capital, and ecological economics.

Anthropological views[link]

Anthropology characterizes societies, in part, based on a society's concept of wealth, and the institutional structures and power used to protect this wealth.^{[citation needed]} Several types are defined below. They can be viewed as an evolutionary progression. Many young adolescents have become wealthy from the inheritance of their families.

The interpersonal concept[link]

Early hominids seem to have started with incipient ideas of wealth^{[citation needed]}, similar to that of the great apes. But as tools, clothing, and other mobile infrastructural capital became important to survival (especially in hostile biomes), ideas such as the inheritance of wealth, political positions, leadership, and ability to control group movements (to perhaps reinforce such power) emerged. Neandertal societies had pooled funerary rites and cave painting which implies at least a notion of shared assets that could be spent for social purposes, or preserved for social purposes. Wealth may have been collective.

Accumulation of non-necessities[link]

Humans back to and including the Cro-Magnons seem to have had clearly defined rulers and status hierarchies. Digs in Russia have revealed elaborate funeral clothing on a pair of children buried there over 35,000 years ago.^{[citation needed]} This indicates a considerable accumulation of wealth by some individuals or families. The high artisan skill also suggest the capacity to direct specialized labor to tasks that are not of any obvious utility to the group's survival.

Control of arable land[link]

The rise of irrigation and urbanization, especially in ancient Sumer and later Egypt, unified the ideas of wealth and control of land and agriculture. To feed a large stable population, it was possible and necessary to achieve universal cultivation and city-state protection. The notion of the state and the notion of war are said to have emerged at this time. Tribal cultures were formalized into what we would call feudal systems, and many rights and obligations were assumed by the monarchy and related aristocracy. Protection of infrastructural capital built up over generations became critical: city walls, irrigation systems, sewage systems, aqueducts, buildings, all impossible to replace within a single generation, and thus a matter of social survival to maintain. The social capital of entire societies was often defined in terms of its relation to infrastructural capital (e.g. castles or forts or an allied monastery, cathedral or temple), and natural capital, (i.e. the land that supplied locally grown food). Agricultural economics continues these traditions in the analyses of modern agricultural policy and related ideas of wealth, e.g. the ark of taste model of agricultural wealth.

The role of technology[link]

Industrialization emphasized the role of technology. Many jobs were automated. Machines replaced some workers while other workers became more specialized. Labour specialization became critical to economic success. However, physical capital, as it came to be known, consisting of both the natural capital (raw materials from nature) and the infrastructural capital (facilitating technology), became the focus of the analysis of wealth. Adam Smith saw wealth creation as the combination of materials, labour, land, and technology in such a way as to capture a profit (excess above the cost of production).^[20]

References[link]

This article may be unbalanced towards certain viewpoints. Please improve the article by adding information on neglected viewpoints, or discuss the issue on the talk page. (January 2011)

George Gilder
Born	(1939-11-29) November 29, 1939 (age 72) New York City, U.S.
Education	Phillips Exeter Academy Harvard University
Occupation	author Editor in Chief,  Gilder Technology Report Chairman, Gilder Publishing LLC Senior Fellow Discovery Institute
Spouse	Nini (4 children)

George F. Gilder (born November 29, 1939, in New York City) is an American writer, techno-utopian intellectual, Republican Party activist, and co-founder of the Discovery Institute. His 1981 bestseller Wealth and Poverty advanced a practical and moral case for capitalism during the early months of the Reagan Administration.

In the 1970s Gilder established himself as a critic of feminism and government welfare policies; he argued they eroded the "sexual constitution" that socialized men as fathers and providers. In the 1990s he became an enthusiastic evangelist of technology and the Internet through several books and his newsletter the Gilder Technology Report.

Early years[link]

Gilder was born in New York City and raised in New York and Massachusetts. His father, Richard Gilder, was killed flying in the Army Air Force in World War II when Gilder was three. He spent most of his childhood with his mother and his stepfather, Gilder Palmer, on a dairy farm in Tyringham, Massachusetts. David Rockefeller, a college roommate of his father, was deeply involved with his upbringing.^[1]

Education[link]

Gilder attended Hamilton School in New York City, Phillips Exeter Academy, and Harvard University, graduating in 1962.^[2] He later returned to Harvard as a fellow at the Kennedy Institute of Politics and edited the Ripon Forum, the newspaper of a liberal Republican Ripon Society.

United States Marine Corps[link]

Gilder served in the United States Marine Corps.^[3]

Career[link]

Speechwriting[link]

In the 1960s Gilder served as a speechwriter for several prominent officials and candidates, including Nelson Rockefeller, George Romney, and Richard Nixon. He worked as a spokesman for the liberal Republican Senator Charles Mathias as anti-war protesters surrounded the capital, some eventually scaring Gilder out of his apartment. Gilder moved to Harvard Square the following year and became a writer, modeling himself after Joan Didion.

With his college roommate Bruce Chapman, he wrote an attack on the anti-intellectual policies of the 1964 Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater titled The Party That Lost Its Head (1966).

On Women and Feminism[link]

Gilder states that men are superior to women in the workplace and in creative ventures outside the home, due to inborn, biologically determined differences between men and women.

Gilder also describes women as "a very physiological consciousness," and asserts that women—due to inborn, biologically determined differences from men—must give up "choice" or else the family will be destroyed. Referring to women, Gilder asserted in 1994:

In the early 1970s Gilder wrote an article in the Ripon Forum defending President Richard Nixon's veto of a day-care bill sponsored by Senator Walter Mondale (D-MN) and Senator Jacob Javits (R-NY). He was promptly fired as editor of the Forum.^[6]

Gilder enjoyed the controversy, appearing on Firing Line to defend himself and discovered he'd found "a way to arouse the passionate interest of women ... it was clear I had reached pay dirt." He decided to make himself into "America's number-one antifeminist".^[7]

Gilder moved to New Orleans and worked in the mornings for Ben C. Toledano, Republican candidate for the United States Senate in 1972. The rest of the time he wrote Sexual Suicide (1973, revised and reissued as Men and Marriage (1986)). He argued that welfare and feminism broke the "sexual constitution" that had weaned men off their predatory instinct for sex, war, and the hunt and had subordinated them to women as fathers and providers. The book achieved a succès de scandale and Time made Gilder "Male Chauvinist Pig of the Year".^[8]

He also stated that divorce "does spread poverty, and bitterness, and feminism, and other problems."^[9]

Race and Welfare[link]

Gilder also wrote Visible Man: A True Story of Post-Racist America (1978, reissued in 1995), which The New York Times described in 1981 as "the account of a talented young black spoiled by the too-ready indolence of America's welfare system."^[10]

On "Corruption" and "Suicide" of Native American and African Cultures[link]

Gilder has asserted that the culture of Native Americans was "corrupt and unsuccessful", and consequently Native American culture "failed". He describes both African and Native American cultures as "destructive cultures", "tragic failures" and "virtual social suicide", and upholding Native American or African cultures is a "terrible perversion."

On Christianity, Satanism, and Secular Education[link]

Gilder has stated:

Supply-side economics[link]

Supply-side economics was formulated in the mid-1970s by Jude Wanniski and Robert L. Bartley at the Wall Street Journal as a counterweight to the reigning "demand-side" Keynesian economics. At the center of the concept was the Laffer Curve, the notion that high tax rates can reduce government revenue. The opponents of supply-side economics often refer to it as "trickle-down economics."

Inspired by Wanniski and by the works of free-market economists like Milton Friedman and F.A. Hayek and novelist Ayn Rand,^[13] Gilder wrote a book extending the ideas of his Visible Man (1978) into the realm of economics, to balance his theory of poverty with a theory of wealth.^[14] The book, published as the best-selling Wealth and Poverty in 1981, communicated the ideas of supply-side economics to a wide audience in the United States and the world.^[15]

Gilder also contributed to the development of supply-side economics when he served as Chairman of the Lehrman Institute's Economic Roundtable, as Program Director for the Manhattan Institute, and as a frequent contributor to Arthur Laffer's economic reports and the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal.^[16]

Immigration[link]

Gilder has praised mass immigration as an economic boon for America and Israel. Although Gilder's support for mass immigration is admittedly framed by high tech hubs such as Silicon Valley's need for computer programmers, he sees recent American immigration policy as being vital to American prosperity overall going so far as to write in the Wall Street Journal that,

Steve Sailer, a fan of Gilder's books on feminism and race, in an 2002 column wrote that this "guess about the net aggregate benefits of immigration to native-born Americans was not only offered without any support evidence whatever, but it actually contradicts a significant economic literature that finds the benefits to be nugatory." Despite Gilder's defense of mass immigration in the Wall Street Journal, it is unclear whether or not Gilder would object to cuts in low-skilled, mostly third world immigration to the United States as emphasized by skeptics of recent American immigration policies such as Pat Buchanan. Former National Review and Forbes writer and VDARE.com founder, Peter Brimelow wrote in 2002,

Technology[link]

The first mention of the word "Digerati" on USENET occurred in 1992, and referred to an article by George Gilder in Upside magazine. His other books include Life After Television, a 1990 book that predicted microchip "telecomputers" connected by fiberoptic cable would make broadcast-model television obsolete. The book was also notable for being published by the Federal Express company and featuring full-page advertisements for that company on every fifth page.^[19]

Gilder wrote the books Microcosm, about Carver Mead and the CMOS microchip revolution; Telecosm, about the promise of fiber optics; and his latest, The Silicon Eye, about the Foveon X3 sensor, a digital camera imager chip.

American Spectator[link]

Gilder bought the conservative political monthly magazine The American Spectator from its founder R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. in summer 2000, and switched the magazine's focus from politics to technology.^[20]

Experiencing his own financial problems in 2002 almost two years later^[21] Gilder sold the Spectator back to Tyrrell.^[22]

Regular contributor[link]

He makes regular contributions to Forbes as a contributing editor. He also contributes to The Wall Street Journal, Wired and National Review.

Speaking engagements[link]

For nearly thirty years, George Gilder has lectured internationally on economics, technology, education, and social theory. He has addressed audiences from Washington DC to the Vatican, and has appeared at numerous conferences, public policy events, and media outlets. Demonstrating his interest in the future of innovation-driven education models, in 2009 Gilder delivered the opening keynote address at the annual EduComm Conference, a nationwide gathering of higher education leaders pursuing breakthrough technologies with the potential to transform the college experience. His annual Telecosm Conference, which he hosts with Steve Forbes, draws technology leaders, entrepreneurs, investors, engineers, and inventors from across the globe. Today his lectures often concern his 2009 book The Israel Test, which deals with the relationship between entrepreneurship, innovation, and geo-political stability.^{[citation needed]}

Wealth and poverty[link]

After completing Visible Man in the late 1970s Gilder began writing "The Pursuit of Poverty." In early 1981 Basic Books published the result as Wealth and Poverty. It was an analysis of the roots of economic growth. Reviewing it within a month of the inauguration of the Reagan Administration the New York Times reviewer called it "A Guide to Capitalism". It offered, he wrote, "a creed for capitalism worthy of intelligent people."^[23] The book was a New York Times bestseller^[24] and eventually sold over a million copies.^[25]

In Wealth and Poverty Gilder extended the sociological and anthropological analysis of his early books in which he had advocated for the socialization of men into service to women through work and marriage. He wove these sociological themes into the economic policy prescriptions of supply-side economics. The breakup of the nuclear family and the policies of demand-side economics led to poverty. Family and supply-side policies led to wealth.

In reviewing the problems of the immediate past—the inflation, recession, and urban problems of the 1970s—and proposing his supply-side solutions, Gilder argued not just the practical but the moral superiority of supply-side capitalism over the alternatives. "Capitalism begins with giving," he asserted, while New Deal liberalism created moral hazard. It was work, family, and faith that created wealth out of poverty. "It is this supply-side moral vision that underlies all the economic arguments of Wealth and Poverty," he wrote.^[26]

In 1994 Gilder asserted that America has no poverty problem, that the real problem is the "moral decay" of the "so-called poor", and that their real need is "Christian teaching from the churches." He calls the poor in America "the so-called poor" who have been "ruined by the overflow of American prosperity", and asserts they have more purchasing power than the middle class in Japan in the 1990s.

The Israel Test[link]

Gilder's 2009 book The Israel Test is partly described as follows:

—Amazon book description.

Founder of Neoconservatism, Irving Kristol, says about the book: "Everyone talks about 'free enterprise' but no one understands the entrepeneurial basics of growth better than George Gilder." While conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh says: "My friends, it would behoove you to study everything you can get your hands on by George Gilder, a true American genius."^[28]

In an interview for National Review about the book, Gilder says the book is about "the cosmic law between success and envy". He further states Israel's role as:

—George Gilder, National Review interview July 2009: "Choosing the Chosen People - Anti-Semitism is essentially hatred of capitalism and excellence."^[29]

Intelligent design[link]

He helped found the Discovery Institute with Bruce Chapman. The organization started as a moderate group which aimed to privatize and modernize Seattle's transit systems^{[citation needed]} but it later became the leading think tank of the intelligent design movement, with Gilder writing many articles in favor of ID and opposing the theory of evolution.^[30] He, like others at the institute, denies that the Shannon information measure alone provides a good measure for biological information, because that measure ignores the actual function or meaning in the code, but Gilder claims that Shannon information theory actually shows that evolution cannot be explained by unintelligent physical causes, because it focuses on "the medium, not the message" (Shannon information is actually a measure of bandwidth, and it is calculated to exclude physical effects so that it measures the amount of abstract meaning that can be carried).^[31]

Bibliography (partial)[link]

• (with Bruce Chapman) The Party That Lost Its Head Alfred A. Knopf; 1st edition (1966)
• Sexual Suicide (1973)
• Naked Nomads: Unmarried Men in America (1974)
• Visible Man: A True Story of Post-Racist America (1978)
• Wealth and Poverty (1981)
• Men and Marriage (1986)
• Life After Television (1990)
• Microcosm: The Quantum Revolution In Economics And Technology (1989)
• Recapturing the Spirit of Enterprise
• Telecosm: The World After Bandwidth Abundance (2000)
• The Meaning of the Microcosm
• The Silicon Eye: How a Silicon Valley Company Aims to Make All Current Computers, Cameras, and Cell Phones Obsolete (2005)
• The Silicon Eye: Microchip Swashbucklers and the Future of High-Tech Innovation (2006)
• The Israel Test (2009)
• Foreword to The Theology of Welfare

• Gilder, George F. (Summer 2009), "Silicon Israel - How market capitalism saved the Jewish state", City Journal, http://www.city-journal.org/2009/19_3_jewish-capitalism.html 

• Gilder, George F. (July 1973), "The suicide of the sexes", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1973/07/0021760 

• Gilder, George F. (July 1975), "Erect in utopia", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1975/07/0077240 

• Gilder, George F. (September 1978), "Prometheus bound", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1978/09/0023931 

• Gilder, George F. (November 1979), "The make-work economy", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1979/11/0024218 

• Luttwak, Edward; Phillips, Kevin P.; Marin, Peter; Chace, James; FitzGerald, Frances; Gilder, George F.; Kennedy, Paul M. (April 1985), "What are the consequences of Vietnam?", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1985/04/0009983 

• Luttwak, Edward; Reich, Robert B.; Blackwell, Ronald; Dunlap, Albert J. (Albert John); Gilder, George F. (May 1996), "Does America still work?", Harper's, http://www.harpers.org/archive/1996/05/0073802 

Footnotes[link]

References[link]

Constructs such as ibid., loc. cit. and idem are discouraged by Wikipedia's style guide for footnotes, as they are easily broken. Please improve this article by replacing them with named references (quick guide), or an abbreviated title. (July 2010)

• Faludi, Susan (1991), Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women, Crown, pp. 283–290, ISBN 0-517-57698-8 

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: George Gilder

	Biography portal
	United States Marine Corps portal

• George Gilder's Gilder Technology Report
• Gilder Publishing, LLC
• A film clip "The Open Mind - A Theology for Capitalism (1981)" is available for free download at the Internet Archive [more]

Interviews[link]

• Booknotes interview with Gilder on Microcosm: The Quantum Revolution in Economics and Technology, September 24, 1989.
• Audio interview with Larry Magid at IT Conversations

Chris Rock
Rock at the 2012 premiere of What to Expect When You're Expecting
Birth name	Christopher Julius Rock III
Born	(1965-02-07) February 7, 1965 (age 47) Andrews, South Carolina, U.S.
Medium	comedy, television, film
Nationality	American
Years active	1984–present
Genres	Black humor, musical comedy, observational comedy, political satire, satire
Subject(s)	African-American culture, American politics, current events, human sexuality, marriage, pop culture, race relations, racism
Influences	Bill Cosby, Redd Foxx, Dick Gregory, Flip Wilson, Richard Pryor, Steve Martin, Pigmeat Markham, Woody Allen, Eddie Murphy,[1] Sam Kinison, George Carlin, Mort Sahl,[2] Rodney Dangerfield,[3] Bill Hicks
Influenced	Dave Chappelle,[2] Christian Finnegan,[4] George Lopez[5]
Spouse	Malaak Compton-Rock (November 23, 1996 – present; 2 children)
Website	ChrisRock.com
Emmy Awards
Outstanding Writing for a Variety or Music Program 1997 Chris Rock: Bring the Pain 1999 The Chris Rock Show Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Special 1997 Chris Rock: Bring the Pain Outstanding Writing For Variety, Music or Comedy Special 2009 Chris Rock: Kill the Messenger
Grammy Awards
Best Spoken Comedy Album 1998 Roll with the New 2000 Bigger & Blacker Best Comedy Album 2006 Never Scared
American Comedy Awards
Funniest Male Performer in a TV Special 2000 Chris Rock: Bigger & Blacker

Christopher Julius "Chris" Rock III^[6] (born February 7, 1965)^[7][8] is an American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer, and director.

After working as a standup comic and appearing in small film roles, Rock came to wider prominence as as a cast member of Saturday Night Live in the early 1990s. He went on to more prominent film roles, and a series of acclaimed comedy specials for HBO.

He was voted in the US as the 5th greatest stand-up comedian of all time by Comedy Central.^[9] He was also voted in the UK as the 9th greatest stand-up comic on Channel 4's 100 Greatest Stand-Ups in 2007, and again in the updated 2010 list as the 8th greatest stand-up comic.

Early life[link]

Rock was born in Andrews, South Carolina. Shortly after his birth, his parents moved to Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York. A few years later, they relocated and settled in the working-class area of Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.^[6] His mother, Rosalie (née Tingman), was a teacher and social worker for the mentally handicapped; his father, Julius Rock, was a former truck driver and newspaper deliveryman.^[10] Julius died in 1988 after ulcer surgery.^[11] His younger brothers Tony, Kenny^[12] and Jordan^[13] are also in the entertainment business. His older half-brother, Charles, died in 2006 after a long struggle with alcoholism.^[14][15] Rock has said that he was influenced by the performing style of his paternal grandfather, Allen Rock, a preacher.^[6][16]

Rock was bused to schools in predominately white neighborhoods of Brooklyn, where he endured bullying and beatings from white students.^[17][18][19] As he got older, the bullying became worse and Rock's parents pulled him out of James Madison High School.^[19] He decided to drop out of high school altogether and later received a GED. Rock worked menial jobs at various fast-food restaurants.^[17][18]

Career[link]

Early career[link]

Rock began doing stand-up comedy in 1984 in New York City's Catch a Rising Star.^[6][17] He slowly rose up the ranks of the comedy circuit in addition to earning bit roles in the film I'm Gonna Git You Sucka and the TV series Miami Vice. Upon seeing his act at a nightclub, Eddie Murphy befriended and mentored the aspiring comic. Murphy gave Rock his first film role in Beverly Hills Cop II.

George Carlin was probably the biggest influence for him.^[3] Other major influences have been Sam Kinison, with whom he managed to hang out with,^[3] Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy.^[3][1] Other influences have been Mort Sahl,^[2] Rodney Dangerfield,^[3] Bill Cosby, Woody Allen, Bill Hicks, Redd Foxx, Dick Gregory, Flip Wilson, Steve Martin and Pigmeat Markham. Among the contemporaries, in 2008 he said he enjoys Chris Tucker and Adam Sandler.^[3]

[edit] Saturday Night Live

Rock became a cast member of the popular sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live in 1990. He and other new cast members Chris Farley, Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider and David Spade became known as the Bad Boys of SNL. In 1991, he released his first comedy album Born Suspect and won acclaim for his dramatic role as a crack addict in the film New Jack City. His tenure on SNL gave Rock national exposure.

Standup success[link]

A frustrated Rock left Saturday Night Live in 1993, appearing instead as a "special guest" star on the predominantly African American sketch show In Living Color. The show, however, was canceled months later. Rock then decided to concentrate on a film career. He wrote and starred in the mockumentary CB4 but the film was not a success. Acting jobs became scarce, and Rock abandoned Hollywood to concentrate on stand-up comedy.^[16]

Rock starred in his first HBO comedy special in 1994 titled Big Ass Jokes. But it was his second stand-up special, 1996's Bring the Pain, that reinvented Rock as one of the best comedians in the industry.^[20][21] For it Rock won two Emmy Awards and gained large critical acclaim.^[22] The segment on race in America, in which Rock used the "N word" extensively was most talked about.^[22] Adding to his popularity was his much-publicized role as a commentator for Comedy Central's Politically Incorrect during the 1996 Presidential elections^[20] which earned him another Emmy nomination.^[23] Rock also was the voice for the "Lil Penny" puppet who was the alter ego to basketball star Penny Hardaway in a series of Nike shoe commercials from 1994–1998,^[20] and hosted the '97 MTV Video Music Awards.

Rock later had two more HBO comedy specials: Bigger & Blacker in 1999, and Never Scared in 2004. Articles relating to both specials called Rock "the funniest man in America" in Time^[24] and Entertainment Weekly.^[2] HBO also aired his talk show, The Chris Rock Show, which gained critical acclaim for Rock's interviews with celebrities and politicians. The show won an Emmy for writing. His television work has won him a total of three Emmy Awards and 15 nominations.^[23] By the end of the decade, Rock was established as one of the preeminent stand-up comedians and comic minds of his generation.

During this time, Rock also translated his comedy into print form in the book Rock This! and released the Grammy Award-winning comedy albums, Roll with the New, Bigger & Blacker and Never Scared.

Rock's fifth HBO special, Kill the Messenger, premiered on September 27, 2008, and won him another Emmy for outstanding writing for a variety or music program.^[25]

Film and television[link]

Rock at the Israeli premiere of Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, on November 22, 2008.

It was not until the success of his stand-up act in the late 1990s that Rock began receiving major parts in films. These include roles in Dogma, Beverly Hills Ninja, Lethal Weapon 4, Nurse Betty, The Longest Yard, Bad Company, and a starring role in Down to Earth. Rock has also increasingly worked behind the camera, both as a writer and director of Head of State and I Think I Love My Wife. In the fall of 2005, the UPN television network premiered a comedy series called Everybody Hates Chris, based on Rock's school days, of which he is the executive producer and narrator. The show has garnered both critical and ratings success.^[26] The series was nominated for a 2006 Golden Globe for Best TV Series (Musical or Comedy), a 2006 People's Choice Award for Favorite New Television Comedy, and two 2006 Emmy Awards for costuming and cinematography.^[27]

Following the release of his first documentary, 2009's Good Hair, Rock is working on a documentary about debt called Credit Is the Devil.^[28]

Academy Awards[link]

In early 2005, Rock hosted the 77th Academy Awards ceremony. The decision to have Rock host the awards was seen by some as a chance to bring an "edge" to the ceremony, and to make it more relevant or appealing to younger audiences. Jokingly, Rock opened by saying "Welcome to the 77th and LAST Academy Awards!" During one segment Rock asked, "Who is this guy?" in reference to actor Jude Law seemingly appearing in every movie Rock had seen that year and implied Law was a low-rent Tom Cruise (he made a joke about filmmakers rushing production when unable to get the actors they want: "If you want Tom Cruise and all you can get is Jude Law, wait [to make the film]!"). Subsequently, a defensive Sean Penn took the stage to present and said, "In answer to our host's question, Jude Law is one of our finest young actors." (At the time, Penn and Law were shooting All the King's Men.) Law was not the only actor that Rock poked fun at that evening, however—he turned the joke on himself at one point, saying, "If you want Denzel [Washington] and all you can get is me, wait!" Older Oscar officials were reportedly displeased with Rock's performance, which did not elevate ratings for the ceremony.^[29] Rock was also criticized for referring to the Oscars as "idiotic", and asserting that heterosexual men do not watch them, in an interview prior to Oscar night.^[30][31]

Music videos[link]

Rock's first music video was for his song "Your Mother's Got a Big Head" from his album Born Suspect. Rock also made videos for his songs "Champagne" from Roll With the New and "No Sex (In the Champagne Room)" from Bigger & Blacker. Chris Rock also directed and appeared in the music video for the Red Hot Chili Peppers song "Hump de Bump".

Rock appeared in the Big Daddy Kane music video "Smooth Operator" as a guy getting his hair cut.

He also appeared in Johnny Cash's "God's Gonna Cut You Down", one of the many celebrities seen lip-synching the song.

Stage plays[link]

In 2011, Rock appeared on Broadway in Stephen Adly Guirgis' play The Motherfucker with the Hat^[32] with Bobby Cannavale and Annabella Sciorra.^[32] Rock was nominated for a Drama League Award.

Comedic style and views[link]

Rock's subject matter typically involves family, politics, romance, music, class relationships, and race relations in the United States. Though not strictly autobiographical, much of his comic standpoint seem rooted in his teenage experience; his strict parents, concerned about the inadequacies of the local school system, arranged to have the adolescent Rock bused to a nearly all-white high school in Bensonhurst (an Italian-ethnic neighborhood of Brooklyn known at the time for poor race relations). In his memoir Rock This, the comedian recalls, "My parents assumed I'd get a better education in a better neighborhood. What I actually got was a worse education in a worse neighborhood. And a whole bunch of ass-whippings."^[33]

The comedian has also expressed discomfort with the notion that success in standup comedy—or, indeed, in any aspect of the entertainment industry—should oblige him to serve as a role model. In this position, he finds himself directly at odds with one of his comic idols, Bill Cosby. Cosby has reprimanded Rock both explicitly—for his famous/notorious Niggas vs. Black People track—and implicitly, for heavy use of the word "nigger."^[34] Rock has not wavered from a position explored in his 1996 Roll With The New show, and reiterated in his 1997 memoir: "Why does the public expect entertainers to behave better than everybody else? It's ridiculous...Of course, this is just for black entertainers. You don't see anyone telling Jerry Seinfeld he's a good role model. Because everyone expects whites to behave themselves...Nowadays, you've got to be an entertainer and a leader. It's too much."^[35] Often the subject of tabloids, when asked about paparazzi and the other negative aspects of fame, Rock says he accepts the bad with the good: "You can't be happy that fire cooks your food and be mad it burns your fingertips."^[36]

At the London Live Earth concert on July 7, 2007, which was broadcast live on the BBC, before introducing the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Rock called the crowd "motherfuckers" and "shit" after a brief sigh when he said he was joking. Due to the broadcast being at 5:45 pm Rock was immediately cut off, and the BBC made several apologies for his use of the word "motherfucker".^[37]

Personal life[link]

Rock has been married to Malaak Compton-Rock since November 23, 1996.^[38] She is the founder and executive director of StyleWorks, a non-profit, full-service salon that provides free services for women leaving welfare and entering the workforce.^[38] They have two daughters together, Lola Simone (born June 28, 2002) and Zahra Savannah (born May 22, 2004).^[39]

In November 2006, the entertainment news website TMZ.com reported that Rock was filing for divorce after nearly ten years of marriage to Malaak.^[40] Two weeks later, however, TMZ reported that Rock had not filed divorce papers, and that it appeared that the couple had been able to work out their differences and stay together.^[41] In response to the reports, the Rocks released a statement to the press denouncing them as "untrue rumors and lies".^[38]

In 2007, freelance journalist and former actress Kali Bowyer filed a paternity suit against Chris Rock, claiming he was the father of her son, and in need of hospitalization.^[42] DNA testing proved that Rock was not the child's father.^{[43][dead link]}

Rock resides in Alpine, New Jersey.^[44]

In 2008, Rock's family history was profiled on the PBS series African American Lives 2. A DNA test showed that he is descended from the Udeme people of northern Cameroon.^[45] Rock's great-great-grandfather, Julius Caesar Tingman, was a slave for 21 years before serving as part of the United States Colored Troops until 1866; Tingman fought in the American Civil War. During the 1940s, Rock's paternal grandfather moved from South Carolina to New York City to become a taxicab driver and preacher.^[46]

Work[link]

Filmography[link]

Discography[link]

Television[link]

Books[link]

• Rock This! (Hyperion Books, 1997) – ISBN 0-7868-6289-0

Notes[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Chris Rock

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Chris Rock

• Official website
• Chris Rock at the Internet Movie Database
• Chris Rock on Charlie Rose