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Billionaire entrepreneur and financier Ray Dalio says there are two very different economic realities in the United States right now. That divide is threatening the nation's stability, the Bridgewater Associates founder says, and it's only going to get worse as technology replaces workers. "[T]here are two economies. We talk of 'the economy.' Recognize that you can't talk about the economy ... there are two economies," says Dalio, speaking to Recode executive editor Kara Swisher on her podcast, Recode Decode, published Monday. There's the "top 40 percent" and "the bottom 60 percent," says Dalio. And for those at the bottom, life is hard without a lot of hope. "If you look at the economy of the bottom 60 percent, it is a miserable economy. Not only hasn't it had growth and economic movement and so on, it has the highest rising death rates, it is the only place in the world where death rates are rising because of a combination of opiates, other drugs and suicides," Dalio says. (Indeed, Princeton Professors Anne Case and Angus Deaton found that drugs, alcohol and suicide are a major reason behind rising death rates among non-Hispanic whites in the U.S. with a high school diploma or less.)

"The real problem, in my view, is — this has been — the prosperity has been unbelievable for the extremely rich people," Buffett told PBS Newshour. "If you go to 1982, when Forbes put on their first 400 list, those people had [a total of] $93 billion. They now have $2.4 trillion, [a multiple of] 25 for one," Buffett said on PBS Newshour in June. "This has been a prosperity that's been disproportionately rewarding to the people on top. To improve the situation in the United States, Dalio says there needs to be honest conversation from both political parties and productive, "thoughtful disagreement." Leaders need to be able to disagree, consider each other's ideas and then collectively come up with the best path forward. The notion of finding the best way forward though honest conversation and collective intelligence is at the heart of Dalio's new book, "Principles: Life and Work." In the book, Dalio outlines the strategy he became famous for ruthlessly implementing in his wildly successful hedge fund, currently with $160 billion under management. At Bridgewater, Dalio says the best ideas rule, irrespective of where they came from. He calls the management philosophy an "idea-meritocracy."