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Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#61

Post by ivankirigin »

mrtron wrote: post #37
ivankirigin wrote: post #7

Build a space elevator and start mining the asteroids. This involves a robot army that would need to be built as well. No, I'm not joking

I would agree - and combine solar panels on the moon that is beamed back to earth. Ideally if you could figure out how to build a factory on the moon to mine and produce the first wave of robots/solar power too.

I would probably build a moon elevator first to get the materials to build the earth elevator. One of the most important things to mine is materials for power generation. Solar in some form or another, for sure.

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#62

Post by steveplace »

nostrademons wrote: post #20
potatolicious wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... Give $11,000 to each household making under $50,000, and you're in essence paying all of that towards households making over $50,000. Some people are poor because they're honestly down on their luck, and need a helping hand. The majority on the other hand are simply unemployable, or horrible with their finances. Give them a handout and the money will simply end up in richer people's hands. That's not helping them…

However, if you gave $11K in seed capital to anyone making under $50k who has a viable plan for a business with the promise of a few hundred K more if they started showing traction, then you might shake things up a bit. ...wait, isn't that YCombinator?

I don't think the yC model would scale up to 700B.

I think it would be a great experiment, though.

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#65

Post by jrockway »

potatolicious wrote: post #22
whacked_new wrote: post #12

Create an alternative, multi-tiered research funding organization and proceed to turn the education system upside down. In fact, $700b is more than enough to do this several times over, so the surplus will probably go to funding a century of other programs related to exploration, bioengineering, green technology, and other sustainable development projects. Seriously, what could it be other than this?

Agreed. I would establish an organization that will essentially usurp the position of the NSF. It will be non-partisan, be free from political influence, and non-ideologically driven. It will be available to all academics everywhere. My brother is a researcher in evolutionary biology. I have seen how the Bush administration has been sabotaging funding into this area over the last few years. Science should be a free f…

It will be non-partisan, be free from political influence, and non-ideologically driven.

How much of the $700b will be left over after you've developed the sentient robots needed to staff this place? ;)

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#66

Post by froo »

700B dollars... Well given the odds of me obtaining that amount of money is just shy of being pure fantasy, I figure the only real answer to this would be in the realm of fantasy too.

So, 700B - here's my shopping list.

  Create Jurassic Park
  Army of Super Oompa Loompas - perhaps with bionic implants
  Moon based Laser "Defense" system
  Universal Optional Breast Enhancement Surgery
  Giant Robot of Doom
  Another Giant Robot (so the first one never feels lonely)
  Build an even bigger supercollider, just to scare the bejeezus out of the irrational people
  Terraform Mars
  Create a religion based around the works of Bruce Campbell
I figure I'd get some change out of that list, so I'd buy a few people a couple beers.

Next stupid question please!

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#68

Post by alex_c »

bwag wrote: post #60

Build the world's largest super computer. Then ask it what the meaning of life is.

You should ask it:

"Will mankind one day without the net expenditure of energy be able to restore the sun to its full youthfulness even after it had died of old age?"

Long-term, that would be the most useful possible way to spend the money.

(Source: http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html)

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#69

Post by neilk »

It would be pretty easy to knock off all water-borne diseases. Distribute existing technology to clean water where it's needed, or use that newfangled thing that Dean Kamen has.

Bribe all genociding warmongers (e.g. in Sudan) into retirement. Pay for relocation and land redistribution of affected ethnic groups.

Immunize all children in the USA.

Then, with the other 600 billion, I guess you could throw an awesome party.

Re: Ask HN: What would you do with $700 Billion?

#70

Post by huherto »

boredguy8 wrote: post #57
rsheridan6 wrote: post #48

I'd buy a sovereign country and break it up into city-states, and allow them to compete with each other as an experiment to see which policies and forms of government are the most effective. It would be kind of like Pokemon for social science geeks. You could have libertaritopia, commietopia, fascistopia, etc, and you'd get to see what happens. For motivational purposes, after 50 years I would have barbarian hordes b…

Don't we already have a bunch of states competing with each other as an experiment to see what form is the most effective?

yes, we only need the barbaric hordes every 50 years
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