If Steem were a country, it would be the most unequal society in the world

in steem •  last year

Steem and its distribution of equality

In this post we examine the state of Steem Power distribution in the Steem ecosystem. We use the Gini Coefficient in this post as the choice metric. Gini Coefficient is commonly measured to measure nation state income equality, but now we use it on a blockchain. If this is interesting to you, every month we will be taking a snapshot of the Steem blockchain and bringing an update. A few questions naturally arise such as: is Steem closer to authoritarianism or pure democracy?; is Steem becoming more or less distributed over time?

We shall see.

If you are interested in accessing the data used in this article please reach out to contact@quantalys.us, Tweet at @CryptoQuantalys, or chat in the Telegram channel.

Alright let's dig in.

The Gini Coefficient

Imagine a society where wealth was shared equally among all of its citizens. If there were 100 citizens and the wealth was measured as $100. Each participant would own$1. We all know that modern societies display different levels of equality, but how can we measure this? There is a metric that measure the equality of a society called the Gini Coefficient.

The Gini Coefficient ranges between 0 and 1. Some publications show it as 0 to 100. When the Gini Coefficient is equal to zero then society is said to be perfectly even. When the Gini Coefficient is equal to one then society is maximally unequal.

We cannot discuss the Gini Coefficient without discussing the Line of Equality and the Lorenz Curve. Here's a look at the two.

The red line in the chart above is the Line of Equality. In the example of the Equal 100 Citizens above you would chart the red line. The X-axis is the cumulative percentage of the population and the Y-axis is the cumulative percentage of wealth. This post will deal specifically with the distribution of the Steem blockchain.

The orange line represents the Lorenz Curve. This is the actual cumulative percentages of the population and wealth. With these two lines we can calculate the Gini Coefficient. The area between the Line of Equality (red) and Lorenz Curve (orange) is labeled "A". The area below the Lorenz Curve is labeled "B". With these two areas, we can now calculate the Gini Coefficient. The formula is:

$\mathrm {Gini Coefficient} = \dfrac{A}{A+B}$

Social Implications

Countries with a high Gini Coefficient (approaching 1) are more likely to suffer instability. These nations face unrest with a large swath of the population living in poverty on the verge of acting upon their frustrations. Revolutions occur in this way.

If we go back into history here are a few estimates of different historical eras:

Source: https://data.oecd.org/inequality/income-inequality.htm

Casual Observations

Before diving into the Gini Coefficient of Steem let's take a look at the data. the figures below are based on Net Steem Power, not liquid Steem. Net Steem Power is Non-Delegated Steem Power subtracting out Delegated Steem Power and adding in Received Delegated Steem Power.

Net Steem Power

=

Non-Delegated Steem Power

- Delegated Steem Power

Steem Power represents a "locked-in" investment into the platform since users have an elongated withdrawal window. Users with a balance of 0.0 Steem Power were also included unless otherwise stated.

Snapshot Taken: May 1st, 2018

Sample size: 961,875 accounts on Steemit sampled

Economic Steem Power: 188.273 Million Steem Power

Top 20 Steem Power Owners: Combined holdings of Top 20 Steemians represent 45.2% of Steem Power (85.07M Steem Power).

The 1%: To be in the 1% of the Steem community you need at least 500 Steem Power.

Quick Stats:

• Steem Power Millionaires (owning 1M+ Steem): 24
• Average / Mean:
• 195 SP per account
• 199 SP per account (excluding 0 balance accounts)
• 153 SP per account (excluding 0 balance accounts and Steemit account)
• Median:
• 15 SP per account
• 15 SP per account (excluding 0 balance accounts)
• 15 SP per account (excluding 0 balance accounts and Steemit account)

A Snapshot of the Top 20

 Account MSteemPower % Type steemit 44.22 23.5% Team misterdelegation 5.40 2.9% Unknown utopian-io 3.63 1.9% Bot postpromoter 2.84 1.5% Bot minnowbooster 2.32 1.2% Bot mottler 2.27 1.2% Unknown blocktrades 2.14 1.1% Exchange smartsteem 2.13 1.1% Bot dtube 2.08 1.1% App dlive 2.07 1.1% App ned 1.89 1.0% Team buildawhale 1.84 1.0% Bot databass 1.72 0.9% Unknown appreciator 1.70 0.9% Bot steemcleaners 1.56 0.8% Plagiarism Fighter michael-b 1.51 0.8% Unknown val-b 1.50 0.8% Unknown upme 1.50 0.8% Bot rocky1 1.48 0.8% Bot hendrikdegrote 1.28 0.7% Individual Top 20 85.07 45.2%

Distribution of Steem Power

 SP Group Users % of Users 0 SP 19,854 2.10% 1 SP 30,382 3.20% 1 - 10 SP 64,317 6.70% 10 - 100 SP 825,658 85.80% 100-500 SP 12,200 1.30% 500-1K SP 3,458 0.40% 1K-10K SP 4,870 0.50% 10K-100K SP 973 0.10% 100K - 1M SP 139 0.00% 1M+ SP 24 0.00% Users 961,875 100.00%

Gini Coefficient of Steem

If we include all accounts the Gini Coefficient is 0.93. Now that's high unequality! Remember, this includes the Steemit account which owns 23.5% and Witnesses who have received Delegated Steem Power.

Removing the @steemit account the Gini Coeficient is 0.914. Still highly unequal.

Removing the Witnesses and @steemit we get to 0.911.

If we remove Ned Scott (@ned), Witnesses and @steemit we get 0.910.

If we remove the Bots on steembottracker, @ned, Witnesses, and @steemit we get to 0.893.

If we remove Apps (Dtube, Dlive, Busy.org, DSound), bots, @ned, Witnesses, and @steemit we don't move the need at all. Still 0.888.

If we remove mined accounts, Dtube, Dlive, bots, @ned, Witnesses, and @steemit we arrive at 0.870.

This is more unequal than North Korea.

If we remove all accounts with 10,000 SP and more we get to 0.616.

So how do we get below 0.50. To get there based on the sample data set used, we have to eliminate all accounts with over 3,037 Steem Power. That's not just removing bots, Witnesses, and popular fee charging Steem interfaces such as DLive and Dtube, it's also removing modest sized accounts.

In future posts I hope to incorporate feedback from the Steem community. Another approach of looking at the data would be to eliminate accounts with zero posts as presumably they are just plain old inactive accounts. I'll also hunt down more bots and apps as well to get a clearer picture of the data. Maybe there's something there to swing the numbers.

So where do we go from here?

With all that said, I still love Steemit. It's given me a platform to bring content to the masses for free while receiving rewards. However, the data above clearly shows the current distribution of Steem is far from perfect. Countries with high Gini Coefficients undergo revolutions. If Steem were a country, it too might face the barbarians at the gate. I welcome your suggestions on how to improve the distribution of content.

Thank you for coming to the site. Quantalysus publishes blockchain research and analysis for the crypto community. Please follow on Twitter, Steem (please follow and upvote if you can – thanks!), Telegram channel (New!), and Medium to stay up to date.

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If you learned something:

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Sort Order:
·  last year

I don't see a revolutional situation from steem inequality. You don't risk die of starvation by having too little steem of your wallet.

Aalso yo should exclude inactive accounts as many were created for spam of for fun and almost every single one of them has 15 sp.

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·  last year

Indeed, you can't compare the world with a platform... those things doesn't the same way

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Agreed. A few commenters have made the same comment as well. In next month's edition I plan to remove "inactive" accounts. Appreciate the feedback.

·  last year

There is a saying "He who holds the Gold are making the rules". The whales contribution is buying up the steem and they invested their time to accumulate that wealth. Good point of view of bringing this Gini coeffiecient in our attention @quantalysus

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·  last year

Still no whale or even coalition of whales won't dare to open conflict with steemit.inc.
So steemit.inc making the rules.

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·  last year

Thanks for reading. There are quite a few accounts working on growing the overall ecosystem. Distributing Steem Power is just one hypothesis in doing so.

·  last year

One major difference is the trend. Today in countries like the US the rich are getting richer, holding a larger share of the wealth. The distribution in Steem is such that it is spreading out, it is already vastly better than it was a year ago or two years ago. It might be slow by crypto standards, but crypto has an absurdly fast pace of change. Compared to countries, we are rapidly de-concentrating wealth.

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·  last year

I joined Steem last month so my commentary is reserved to this snapshot. From what I've read around the platform, Steem is becoming more distributed. I'd love for the distribution to break down over the next 1 or 2 years. The rate of change should be noticeable.

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·  last year

I love this response. I was told a story of how some people were earning 40k per post here before which was later addressed by linear equality. Steemit team is really working and I agreee with the fact that here is always subject to change and fastly so.

@eurogee

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I keep hearing this but I'm not so sure. Yes the smaller accounts are growing, but who really owns them?

I know of at least 2 witnesses sock puppeting the hell out of their combined 2m SP. And stats I did a few months back seemed to show other obvious feeder setups.

The dapps and utopian are helping though, it would be nice to see earners here hold on to SP and make it to the thin middle class layer.

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It's undoubtedly true. In order for the stake distribution not to be widening, whales would need to be taking a proportion of the reward pool greater than their existing stake share as a whole. Since whales own 90% of the stake, they'd need to be self-extracting 90% of the rewards, which they aren't.

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Do you know if anyone is detailing this data?

I might have to look into the tables...

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There used to be a chart showing distribution by account on steemdata.com but it's gone a little while.

You'd only need to collate accounts that are not whale sockpuppets/meatpuppets getting 10% of the recent reward pool collectively to disprove the idea that whales on the whole are increasing their stake.

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Argghh, too hard!

The need to factor in a bot vote, which is likely break-even for the author, and going 70/80% to the delegators (could be a whale or a minnow) and the rest to the bot owner has blown my mind.

Maybe I need to look at it the another way - i'll go to the beach and ponder :)

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Whale accounts own 240GV together, or 61%. If you add the other known sockpuppets together and count them as 'whales', it will be a few GV more. (Actually the fact that it has dropped so low is evidence the stake is getting wider distributed).

To prove that the stake is being spread out, you only need to show that at least (100 - WhaleStake%) are going to non-whale (or whale sockpuppet) accounts. You can choose to eliminate those getting upvotes from bidbots from this if you want (I don't think that will make it much harder).

At least at the last time I checked it was clear the vast majority of rewards were still being spread out to ordinary accounts. The rent seeking is getting bad, but it's certainly far from the majority or rewards today and less than the % required for stake concentration to be increasing.

·  last year

You cannot change the amount that people have but going forward you can make it easier for newer and smaller accounts to make it.

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·  last year

There should be a beginner boost or something like that to encourage new peoples post to be see more then these huge accounts!

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·  last year

I like this idea

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·  last year

Or some sort of 7 day average, rewarding currently active users.

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·  last year

Thats a good idea too...rewards based on consistent good articles which recieve a certain amount of votes.
These bots i feel throw alot of the true numbers off

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·  last year

This is exactly what I feel about Steem. There ought to be a form of incentives for beginners like us. We scarcely knows how to find our posts rewarded or even seen by the community. Steem apparently is less democratic in my views.

·  last year

Steemit is no different than real life. Richest 10% of people are richer than other 90%...

·  last year

actually unfortunately thats's right, rich is getting more richer.. same as real life

·  last year

If Steemit was a country.

The rich had all the power and the poor were doing the hard work for them.

Just like real countries and real life do right now

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·  last year

Especially in third world countries. But still, here u can buy SP and feel yourself quite comfortable. Like me, lol :)

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·  last year

That's a cynic's view. But maybe you're right. Damn.

·  last year

Cool analysis, this puts me in the top 0.5% which is a big surprise to me actually.
But as i understand you included all acounts and to me if you would compare this to a country would be like adding all dead people that ever lived in that country to the living population.
There are a whole lot of dead accounts here.... the steem cemitary

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·  last year

What a morbid thought, but true.

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·  last year

the word steem-etery just pop up in my mind, lol

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·  last year

yep, the place where accounts go to die

·  last year

I always know that Steem Power distribution was poor but when you see the actual numbers....that's an eye opener.

·  last year

🤯

·  last year

this is an interesting point of view. it is similar to the currenteconomic climate of the world. this seems to be how things end up if left to their own devices. The whales make up less than .01% of users yet they rule this realm hmm sounds like steemit has it own Illuminati!

I'll be keeping an eye on these updates as this data is quite intriguing and can show the changes on dynamics on the platform over time.

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·  last year

Thanks for reading. I'm making a few adjustments to the filters I use. I'll also publish the data for transparency purposes.

·  last year

For me it looks like a society we are living in right now

·  last year

fear not dans making a competitor

·  last year

Hopefully this changes over time.

·  last year

If we all just went out and bought Steem we could probably turn this around. There's a good amount of Steem floating around on the exchanges... we can reclaim that and bring it here to increase our Steempower as the little guys.

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·  last year

Ooooh good point. I should try to find out what the addresses of these hot wallets are and exclude them.

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·  last year

Buying more steem wont make a difference...unless you have $1000's of dollars to throw around you wont make a dent in these figures! · · · last year If we all buy$100 as a collective we can make a slight difference. The only challenge is getting the large holders to sell.

·  last year

I'm in the 1%... first time in my life, but I've made it. Woot woot. This does feel pretty great... highly suggest getting over 500 SP just to be up here with us lol. Would have never imagined that I was in the elite on this platform. All of a sudden my voting power feels sooo powerful.

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Bottle service on you bud!

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lol. Once it's only us 2 my account may be able to cover the bill

·  last year

just like in real life - the ones with power tell everyone else what to think and say

·  last year

Very interesting and informative article, thanks for putting this together

·  last year

Nice analysis. There would certainly be a revolution based on unequal distribution of power, if a revolution was possible.

In practice the result is most newbies just quit

·  last year

very informative and effective article related on steemiy.I alos love steemit like you.

·  last year

I think this is a great post. I think the Gini Coeficient can go a long way to help us understand inequality. However, the Gini Coeficient is typically used to measure income inequality and you are using it to measure wealth inequality. This gets us into a little bit of trouble when comparing to other countries, as wealth inequality in those nations is typically greater than income inequality. I hope you to a follow up on the Gini Coeficient for the rewards pool payouts. Keep up the great work!

·  last year

Very interesting post. However comparing to countries is not an apples to apples comparison. Its fairer to compare to other tech enterprises and other social media platforms.

The thing is that early founders of successful tech enterprises (such as Facebook and Google) always have a very large share even compared to people who BUY in later.
People who don't buy in and are just users of Facebook and Google have ZERO ownership of the platform - in fact their economic share is negative because they are the product.

·  last year

I had no idea only 1,30% of users have between 100 and 500SP!

I expected the number to be way higher, considering everyone starts with 15SP. Means most give up before reaching 100SP. That's literally a vote vorth 0.02. Is it really so?

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I have to keep digging but I honestly have two accounts I started two years ago but I lost the private key. Basically those accounts never went anywhere. I should filter by "active" accounts or correlate based on # of posts.

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Number of posts and age of accounts should be a factor.

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·  last year

Everyone starts at 15, but most go inactive in a short amount of time. Also, most of that 15 is delegated and withdrawn at some time in the future. Lots of new accounts were dummy accounts and part of botnets that were used to vote and then power down. The market has spoken, the bad distribution scares away intelligent investors and social media users, and there is a very, very bad perception of steemit in the outside world.

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·  last year

Just started. Accounts aren't given 15 SP, they're delegated 14.9 SP and start with .1. From what I can tell someone would have to either win the favor of someone with a lot more SP to gather more or invest and start buying up bots otherwise no one sees their articles.

·  last year

lol much is true here....

·  last year

I think you bring up the fundamental issue with decentralization and the aspect that everyone is trying to figure out. How do you completely decentralize something that will in part bring itself back to a centralized circuit. Yes this is decentralized but runs into issues with speed at the cost of keeping this on a blockchain. When someone has the ability to own a large portion of the maket the decentralization becomes skewed in their favor giving them a proportionate more say than their counterparts whether what they're saying is right or wrong. The problem with this is that eventually those with the most say get the most weight and thus create the order that continues in a decentralized network. Just look at miners. If you own all the miners you begin to have final say. It's no surprise that those who started on steem are making a lot more money and have a powerful influence in this. Still love you Steem kiss kiss

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·  last year

Exactly! The freedom of a decentralized economic system lends itself to oligarchy as there is no higher authority to break up concentrations of wealth and power.

I suppose here though there is the company and development team who can simply change the system's rules so it's not set in stone. . . but then again it's not truly decentralized.

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·  last year

That's where governance protocols come in to "elect" change. The only problem I have with Steem is that other teams are likely eyeing what is happening on Steem and considering how to make an altogether different platform.

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·  last year

I suppose that's what the "witnesses" are for? I still have no idea how that all works. Pretty damn new.

·  last year

I like the phrase: " this is more unequal than North Korea because I was sure that NK was a hell

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I needed click bait line somewhere in here. That was it.

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lol thanks... I honestly needed a clickbait line somewhere in there. I didn't want to piss off anyone putting it in the title though.

·  last year

Great post!
How do you rise in ranks as an average person blogging without the collective help of those 2% of accounts???
Seems like a flawed system!
Hopefully people are working on a better system then the one thats in place or this platform will never be all that it could be!!
Upvoted Followed and Resteemed!

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·  last year

In a proof-of-stake election system the payouts are heavily influenced by having the "whales" vote for you. I personally use bots to get my content out there. I barely breakeven on my investment. There are large Steem holders who do care about the little guys so let's keep pressuring them with our voices. If not, we can just leave for greener pastures.

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·  last year

Curious what bots you use?

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·  last year

Sounds like a system where peoples opinions at the top are more important then the average person which isnt fair at all lol!
Hopefully something is in the works to fix this big issue!

·  last year

I didn't know that here could be such inequality.
This is well prepared article I have ever met. About statistics as a minnow I see it's better to close my mouth!

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I'm bullish on Steem. Minnows shouldn't worry about censorship or reputation slashing. You could always just move to another Steem competitor. Steem's success should be based on a high quality and productive community. I think distribution could help solve that, but maybe I'm wrong. Numbers are numbers but the most important thing is to figure out what is the real story.

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·  last year

I only want to highlight this part:

Numbers are numbers but the most important thing is to figure out what is the real story.

What you see in practice is always more valuable than the theories.

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You have done a much needed research about the prevailing inequalities on this platform. I think the holding of large SP is not so bad if it is not used for self voting or mutual voting. Problem lies with the reward distribution system. Some users are raping the reward pool. One such person is able to secure almost 2% of the whole reward pool for himself! Also, some others are busy in downvoting minnows and upvoting self posts and comments.
You rightly stated that if steem were a country it would be the most unequal society in the world. In this unequal society only bid-bots are real winner. They are paid for upvoting and they also receive curation reward. So, their owners are amassing a huge wealth for themselves and leaving other to feed on crumbs.
Developers will have to amend this system otherwise, this platform will not survive a long.

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·  last year

Appreciate your comments. I'd love for all of us to speak up and write about solutions to our Witnesses.

·  last year

Decentralization works well... maybe trying a concept of decentralizing Steem Power based on some democratic concept will help bring equality closer to the community.

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·  last year

I didn't offer any solutions in this post. Increasing the block reward to go to witnesses who have programs to highlight quality content is one approach. Removing the ability to upvote your own post is another. Not voting on anyone else's post with a slashing penalty (losing your funds) is another.

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·  last year

Everyday it's another article with more suggested fixes yet nothing gets fixed. But you see how fast they managed to remove number of views (someone said they heard it was broken and being fixed but...) they also speculated that the number of views wasn't corresponding with what those holding bots were saying could be achieved in views by using those bots....I'd rather believe that then it was broken. If it affects the big people's money it seems fixes are not a problem.

·  last year

As a person who just started using Steemit within the last week, and I'm only just now realizing how this thing works (Kind of)... Is there really any reason for me to try and create content here? It seems that if I don't boost my posts there will be no hope of being recognized... Am I wrong?

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·  last year

I wouldn't say there's no hope but my strategy is simple:

1. set a budget for promoting posts
2. write daily if I can
4. Focus on bringing the best possible comment

Best of luck to you!

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·  last year

Well this post surely has struck a nerve among the Steem users, and reading through the replies you're giving, you're definitely living what you preach by involving yourself in every comment....nicely done man!
I think it was a great post....would like to know how you dug out those stats though.

·  last year

Well since a large portion of them are bots and anyone and everyone can use the bots if they wish is it not an even playing field?

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·  last year

Definitely an interesting question to consider. If bots are equal access by way of competing via bids, then one could argue its a pay-for-performance based model. The ones who can pay the best, or who can host a bot, accrue the benefits once again. The fact that bots are part of the ecosystem is in itself interesting because it doesn't necessarily need to be based on pay to play. @originalworks is one such project fishing out original works.

·  last year

A good look at it. But equality is a pipe dream. Entropy leads to vast differences in wealth and people that work harder deserve more. Yes some people that don't work for it get more as well but these are anomalies.
If you want something, work for it or take it. Don't protest for mythical equality.
I know I'm disagreeing with you but I do like your post

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·  last year

Hey that's okay, I don't need agreement. I need discourse. I'd prefer avoiding group think and the actions of a mob and move towards one of solutions with different opinions. Perhaps equality is an asymptote that can never be reached. I'd like to think we can get there.

·  last year

Ever since I joined steemit I've always viewed it as a country. Steemit is a network of communities with their own culture and way of life.

I'm not surprised with your findings. I always compare steemit to the Ancien regime of France.

This platform operates a pyramid social structure with whales at the top, dolphins in-between, and minnows at the bottom.

Like all societies steemit is undergoing change, it'll be nice to see how the social system evolves in the years to come.

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·  last year

I find these platforms highly fascinating due to the fact you can basically create economies from scratch. Steem has survived and thrived for two years. I'm sure it has changed a ton and will continue to do so.

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It definitely will.
We just have to watch it and see which path it'll take.

·  last year

You can address this inequality by a combination of several initiatives:
1.) Create a reward pool

2.) Daily ceiling limit to rewards
Setting a maximum limit to daily rewards per Steemian, reduces abuse of the daily rewards pool by way of unlimited postings. Whatever this limit is, it should be carefully calculated and should consider critical factors such as total mined Steem tokens per day, Steemian population, etc. and should also be reviewed and revised regularly.

3.) Distribute Authorship and Curation Rewards using a progressive system
A progressive system takes a larger percentage of rewards from high-income fishes than from low-income based on the concept of ability to earn. A progressive system might, for example, gives minnows and red fishes 90% authorship and 10% curation rewards, dolphins 80% and 20% and whales 70% and 30% rewards allocation.

Another way of progressive rewards distribution could be based on the rewards value. A post that garnered a reward over $1,000 for example should be distributed using a 70% authorship and 30% curation ratio, >$500 using 80% and 20% and >$250 using 90% and 10%. 4.) Daily Limit to number of posts per Steemian category This is my least favorite solution but I see some merits to it hence I’ve included it here. The thought process behind this proposal is that as you grow from being a minnow to a whale, you’ve gotten better and better hence the quality of your posts should be much higher and more impactful to the community. The opposite is true for new Steemians since you’re just learning the knots and bolts of the ecosystem. It follows then that minnows and red fishes should be given a higher number of allowable daily posts vs a dolphin or a whale. A max of 15 posts per day for Red Fish and Minnows, 10 for Dolphin, 6 for Orca and 3 for Whales could be a good start. · · last year Hey these are really great ideas. Turn it into a post! · · · last year thanks @quantalysus. I did post these ideas - here. · last year Interesante post, a pesar de su contenido estadístico y/o matemático, pone en evidencia una realidad tangible. La desigualdad entre los usuarios de la plataforma, es algo que en mi opinión se evidencia día a día. Afecta mucho a la comunidad hispanoparlante, independientemente de la calidad de los articulos. Esto genera desanimo ya que en mi opinión la dedicación, el tiempo y cariño con que se generan los blogs la mayoría de las veces no es bien recompensado. Es reconfortante saber que existen usuarios como tu @quantalysus que se preocupan por esta problemática... muchas gracias por eso · · last year Muchas gracias para su buenos complementos. Lo siento pero hablo un poco español, inglés es mi idioma primaria. Espero que el steem plataforma aumente en igualdad · last year It should be noted and very strongly ... that steemit is NOT A COUNTRY. It is a business and if you were to look at any publicly traded business, I imagine you'd find the same kind of percentages. We do not have to live in the steemit world; we have choice. Ned is the CEO of steemit; he is not an elected official. He and Dan created an intellectual property and then saw fit to reward the users of said intellectual property. Truth, that has helped it grow. We 'buy' into steemit and/or are GIVEN steem power to get going and then we are rewarded for posting and reading; that is unlike any other social media site. Rather than comparing steemit Gini score with other countries ... how do we compare to other publicly traded companies. That is a like to like comparison. I do want to thank you. You have provided some transparency to the platform. My feel. With time, we will see steemit grow. People will form communities and networks and steem power and affluence will be more spread out. I know I spread my up-votes around. But if you want to make money here, invest if you can and work hard. Post and appreciate the work of others. · last year This is a really interesting analysis. I’d like to see the numbers based on steem power excluding delegations. You can always de-delegate your steem so it’s not like the current state of delegations is in any way permanent. · · last year I'll add this to the next edition. · last year But as every country has two options, improve or worsen everything depending on its inhabitants · last year Very nice post and especially very nice title...if steem we're country???? Good post. Thanks · last year Really good points and argumentation, I think it would also be good to think that hypothetical country would have its entire population with Internet connection and few possibilities of being physicaly harm. · last year Kudoz for you. What a research. I agree and that is why i'm a bit sceptic about Steemit. Without kissing asses, like i'm doing right now, you can't do jack on Steemit. · last year Yeah but guess what , its not a country. · last year That's life... everyone is taking advantage to each other. Anything in this world is contested. No such things as fair. · last year We will all get better with time. · last year This is some interesting insight about the stats! I think as long as those higher ups who hold more SP need to have some ‘obligation’ to make good use of their resources. If not, it will be revoked or something. Or else, once they reach that level, they will just sit tight and let it grow alone (doing nothing). This will hurt the whole community. · last year Congratulations! This post has been upvoted from the communal account, @minnowsupport, by quantalysus from the Minnow Support Project. It's a witness project run by aggroed, ausbitbank, teamsteem, theprophet0, someguy123, neoxian, followbtcnews, and netuoso. The goal is to help Steemit grow by supporting Minnows. Please find us at the Peace, Abundance, and Liberty Network (PALnet) Discord Channel. It's a completely public and open space to all members of the Steemit community who voluntarily choose to be there. If you would like to delegate to the Minnow Support Project you can do so by clicking on the following links: 50SP, 100SP, 250SP, 500SP, 1000SP, 5000SP. Be sure to leave at least 50SP undelegated on your account. · last year Detaylı bir şekilde anlatmışsınız çok iyi bilgilendiriyorsun. Teşekkkürler · last year Does good idea,i think You cannot change the amount that people have but going forward you can make it easier for newer and smaller accounts to make it. · last year Las espectativas es mejorar. Muy informativo tu post. · last year I see Steemit as a concrete example of where the politics of crypto could take us in the future. The platform attracts a lot of libertarian anarcho-capitalists because they have a fantasy of freedom without government, but with the uneven distribution we see that cryptospaces, in the end, just mimic real world conditions and empower a small monied elite. Its neofeudal neoliberalism, - can we say that Steemit is really just a ponzi scheme? Dan bailed to go create an even bigger scheme and Ned is just fiddling about with SMTs for like two years, meanwhile we see the rise of a criminal oligarch class like @haejin and many others who are just gaming the system .. like people do in the real world. So is Steemit just reflecting human nature then, "red in tooth and claw", is it Darwinian of the strong kill the weak? Is that all human nature is in the end? Somehow I'm left feeling the mantra of decentralization around crypto is a lie and a myth promoted by dreamers who long for some Silicon Valley technofix, but with your GINI model, we can see how the world would look if Silicon Valley took over .. so Steemit is a view of where we are going and it looks pretty grim ... · last year .....I can feel so much work that went into these analysis. We are not off track if we say only a few are getting a larger percentage of the rewards and it'll not be out of place to suggest that these small percentage give back to the community by hosting contests and random upvote with community based accounts all in the view of identifying and helping talents to thrive to a point of 'self sufficiency' from which they too can now begin the process again. It's a beautiful work you've done here. 🙌🙌🙌🙌 · last year Well detailed. This is awesome statistics. If I were steemit Inc, I would take address this inequality on the bases if the content of this post. @eurogee · last year If it's a country then you need to make the full comparison for it to be legitimate. It's also a place where anyone can come to and is given a few dollars to get them started. You can either go through the front door and provide your phone number and email, or pay a few dollars to come in anonymously. There are thus effectively no border restrictions and in fact the Ministry of Immigration actively advertise to convince more people to come here. No country in the world has unfettered immigration, so perhaps what we're looking at in terms of a country comparison is what a rich country would look like if they completely opened the borders and gave new arrivals a few dollars. You'd get a lot of poor people (or people who don't want to bring in their wealth to the currency of the country), and it's not surprising this would skew the stats left long tail. · last year Great one, the whole mystery is broken down. looking at it from an individual perspective, it is believed that there must be a time swing for every passionate individual to break through and reach their summit, but I feel there could be a way to leverage everyone and create a sort of balance. This was very interesting article. Opened my eyes we do have an advantage with having ownership of our profiles, which then means we can choose to do what we want with our accumulated wealth. I for would want help people and donate what I make if that is possible. · last year Well, heads will roll! We need a Revolution! ^^ · · last year viva la revolucion! · · last year Hahhaaha! I agree! · last year meh, it's a problem for countries when income inequality is too great only when people are literally starving, then those people guillotine those who are not. Here in America income inequality is great but those at the bottom are well fed and have flat screen tvs so they won't be revolting any time soon. Is there any way to remove all accounts that have not been active for the last month, that might clear out a lot of the inactive accounts at the bottom and give you a better picture of where actual active users are at. I suspect there are many accounts that people open and then don't do much with. · last year Very interesting perspectives, but I think that the wealth inequality on @steemit will gradually level off over time as more and more new users join. · last year I fully share the desire of all the good people of this community to make the rewards system here more representative of the quality, and not the longevity/cronyism of the poster. Ned's latest comments in Korea are very promising. However, the options for rewarding our contributors represent a continuum. At present we are at one end of the spectrum--rewarding longevity, and ignoring quality. Ned's "solution' (one person-one vote) represents the other end of that same spectrum. IMHO, it would be as unworkable as the current situation. Right now, with all the bots posting and these 3rd-world mail-order bride memberships, one-man/one-vote will STILL result in poor content being unfairly rewarded. What we need is a middle ground--a weighting system that (for example) gives 70+ reputation members 7 times the voting weight of a 10-rep member, 3.5 times that of a 20-rep...and so on. A 60+ reputation member would get 6 times the weight of a 10-rep, 3 times that of a 20-rep, etc. a 50+ rep member would get 5 times the weight of a 10, rep, 2.5 times the weight of a 20-rep, etc. I think you get the idea. This algorithm could, of course be made even more exacting, and the weighting is just an example. Still, it would be a vast improvement over the current system where someone like Haejin can post an article with average ( or even below average) content and get$500-1000 SBD, whereas an excellent article by a newbie might get nothing, or get his measly $.01 or$.02 "dusted."

The reason the U.S.A. has been so successful (except for the past 40 years, or so) was because our government was a blending of the spectrum of possible leadership/reward structures. We chose the middle path (a republic) between the opposing tyrannies of monarchy and absolute democracy. The Steemit community must do the same.

Egalitarianism and meritocracy must be our watch words as we strive, rightly, to put the best content forward as possible.

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I think I came across first time -a sensible reward mechanism being suggested. I would like to one more dimension to it

1. Let us develop an AI based system that ranks Steemit content but that AI system should be trained on content that is trending on other platforms like Medium, reddit etc.
2. This content should be displayed under AI Trend - and then if people find it interesting they can upvote it further. This would enable discover new authors who otherwise may retire without being noticed and rewarded.
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I don't like this. I think Steemians should determine what is best content for this community. Not computers, and not other communities that are not necessarily reflective of our values, needs, aspirations, etc.

·  last year

Let me first state that this is one of the most brilliant articles I have read so far. And that is not only because I'm an economist. But also because it is one of the very few articles where one really learns something about metrics being used in the normal economy.

According to CMC the Steem supply is 254mln. You wrote 188mln is SP. Does this mean 66mln Steem is liquid?

There are only 24 Steem millionaires. But don't you think you should change that definition into millionaire in terms of money? So with a Steem price of \$4 one would need 250,000 Steem to be a millionaire.

I agree that you should exclude all inactive accounts. But the definition of inactive could be different then having 0 posts or comments. Cause I am quite sure there are a few accounts that don't have any posts, but do have some SP. They probably bought it or mined it. So perhaps you should go for a combination like having less then 50 SP plus inactive for at least 45 days?

Further I guess there is a really simple answer to the question why we will never see a revolution in Steemit. So you know why?

I don't think you can ever fix this for Steemit. The only solution I can think of is fix this inequality and start all over again.

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Interesting post.

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Haha! If steem is a country then the whales will be the Politicians and the minnows will be the minimum wage employees. It might seem sad to hear but it's what's happening. Well, it's not a sin to be rich I guess.

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I like this.

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Good food for thought. I think better distribution would be good.

Waaaw this good post