Ray Dalio, billionaire founder of Bridgewater Associates, said Americans leaving big cities like New York and Chicago increases the risk of “civil war” by exacerbating an “ideological gap” between different regions in the United States.
“I think that it’s reasonably probable that no side will accept losing,” Dalio said when asked about “the likelihood of a civil war in the United States” as a panelist on a group discussion hosted by the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and published on Tuesday.
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He continued:
What is that probability [of civil war]? I don’t know. Maybe it’s 50 percent. Maybe it’s even more than that. I don’t know. I think it’s probable — or there’s uncomfortably high probability — that directions from the central government — rule of law and the Constitution — won’t be [or] may not be followed. Supreme Court rulings may not be followed, because individual states say that, “I’m not going to do that.”
It’s like sanctuary cities. They say, “I will not follow.” I think what’s happening now, is that there is a movement from one state to another due to changing values that’s producing a hollowing out in some states, and when that happens, because the rich move someplace, or the ideologies are the same, it produces a hollowing out in other locations.
You’re seeing that in New York and Chicago, San Francisco, and other places. That exacerbates the gap. It exacerbates not only the wealth gap, but it exacerbates the ideological gap, and then when you get to that — rule of law and respect and compromise don’t exist — then you deal with power, and it becomes a power decision.
It becomes more and more that kind of conflict, so that becomes a power thing. I think that’s developing, in that kind of a movement, in that direction.
He concluded, “That’s a very scary thing, because when you don’t have rule of law or you start to have fighting, it’s a different world.”