The concerns expressed in and by the Occupy Wall Street movement on behalf of the 99 percent didn’t begin in 2011. They can be traced back at least to 1765.
Kara Masciangelo and Jame McAndrews, of the New York Fed, have unearthed a 1765 letter to the editor of the New-York Gazette. It reads in part:
Some Individuals of our Countrymen, by the Smiles of Providence or some other Means, are enabled to roll in their four–wheel’d Carriages, and can support the Expence of good Houses, rich Furniture, and Luxurious Living. But, is it equitable that 99, or rather 999 should suffer for the Extravagance or Grandeur of one? Especially when it is consider’d, that Men frequently owe their Wealth to the Impoverishment of their Neighbours; so that it would be most unjust to suppose a People generally to be rich because some wealthy Men live among them.
