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Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

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Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#331

Post by WalterBright »

greghatch wrote: post #107
mjfl wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a little hyperbolic. In feudalism the balance of power is enforced by violence, whereas Jeff Bezos got rich because you gave him money in exchange for products. Like, "Hey, here's this cool electronic device called the Amazon Echo for $50." is a markedly different from "Farm here or I'll decapitate you." The fact that you harbor a resentment as if the former is anything like the latter is slightly terr…

The negatives need not be so similar for the two to occupy the same space of vast property ownership concerns - namely that a single person has what many consider to be a troubling amount of wealth and power. EDIT: sentence structure change

> a troubling amount of wealth and power

Any rookie cop can force you to pull over in your car, and confiscate any cash you have with you. Bezos can do none of that.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#332

Post by tashi »

habosa wrote: post #143
mjfl wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's a little hyperbolic. In feudalism the balance of power is enforced by violence, whereas Jeff Bezos got rich because you gave him money in exchange for products. Like, "Hey, here's this cool electronic device called the Amazon Echo for $50." is a markedly different from "Farm here or I'll decapitate you." The fact that you harbor a resentment as if the former is anything like the latter is slightly terr…

This reminds me of Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain example, which I will quote here: > Nozick's famous Wilt Chamberlain argument is an attempt to show that patterned principles of just distribution are incompatible with liberty. He asks us to assume that the original distribution in society, D1, is ordered by our choice of patterned principle, for instance Rawls's Difference Principle. Wilt Chamberlain is an extremely popu…

This is an argument I haven't seen before, and I've been trying to follow the tree of wikipedia links, but I'm not understanding terminology like "patterned principle." Is it a fixed distribution of wealth, or opportunity, or some other thing? Would Wilt spending all his excess income bring things back into balance, or do extra possessions also violate the principle? What if he spent the money on experiences?

Or better yet, can someone translate it into plain old equations for me? Words get very slippery, especially since this is a proof by contradiction and it's hard to make sure you've eliminated all the possibilities without enumerating them.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#333

Post by WalterBright »

8note wrote: post #251
mjfl wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's not the important part. The violence is the important part. Feudalism wasn't unjust because the kings had a lot of money, it was unjust because they got a lot of money through force and not through productive economic activity. Also, I think it is extremely problematic to compare any system with large disparities of outcome with an essentially violent system like feudalism (or just defining "inequality = v…

each system is as violent as the people running it. An ideal king is just the land owner collecting rents from the people on their land, and lending rights to people they think can make more wealth from it. Capitalism is perfectly happy with slavery; it didn't end because it wasn't profitable. There's still some rather violent things in today's capitalism like "give me all your money or die from cancer" which when th…

> it didn't end because it wasn't profitable.

Actually, it ended because it could not compete with free labor. It was dying around 1800 because of that, and then the cotton gin revived it. It was dying again in the 1850s, and a big driver of the Civil War was the slave states trying to protect their economy from free labor competition.

I don't think it's a coincidence that social justice has tended to follow what works best economically.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#334

Post by guskel »

archagon wrote: post #285
adventured wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which funneled it to a single individual. You mean, which funneled a small fraction of it to a single individual. Bezos individually got more of it than anybody else, however to pretend that he got all of it, is silly. Total non-stock compensation paid by the business. Total stock compensation paid. Total investor return since inception. Total benefit to all consumers in convenience and savings. Total benefit to th…

And yet he's now one of the richest people in the world. As an employee, is Bezos really a million times more valuable than a typical Amazon engineer? That seems almost self-evidently unfair to me. I think in a truly just society, the multiplier on the amount that a single individual could be compensated compared to his or her peers would have a hard cap. It would solve so many societal problems and also incentivize…

It's the reward for past work, not current.

Imagine kid A studies really hard during his youth and doesn't get to have any fun because he's working so hard. Kid B likes to slack off and party and do drugs. If Kid A grows up and makes it big, why does kid B deserve half? Why should he deserve any portion? You could tax kid A's wealth but you can't tax kid B's youth and pleasure. Why put a cap on on kid A's wealth if you are not putting a cap on kid B's leisure time? We put no such caps on anything else whether it be beauty, intelligence, number of friends, popularity even though all of these things cause disparity.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#335

Post by WalterBright »

lukifer wrote: post #298
milesrout wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism is inherently violent whether you like it or not. The police violently repress anyone seeking what they have a natural right to: their fair share of the wealth.

Capitalism is absolutely violent, and just as concerned with with-holding value as providing it (the primary means of price negotiation is the threat of walking away). Look at how much food a grocery store throws away, or how many houses are unoccupied, all in the interests of accounting and bargaining leverage. However: I take umbrage with "natural right" (the only right nature guarantees is entropy and death), and…

Grocery stores throw a lot of food away due to regulation and liability issues, not for bargaining leverage.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#336

Post by mhermher »

no-state-needed wrote: post #270
mhermher wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property is violence. If I try to take something that "isn't my property", the state will intervene with violence (e.g. forced imprisonment, etc.) on behalf of the person deemed to be the "lawful owner".

I'm curious to understand how you've decided that your desire to take someone else's property makes it a trivial truth that only violence prevents you from having the natural right to take it.

I never suggested such a thing. Natural rights don't exist. That's just something some people make up. So what prevents me from taking someone else's stuff, if I really wanted it?

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#337

Post by mhermher »

malandrew wrote: post #286
mhermher wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property is violence. If I try to take something that "isn't my property", the state will intervene with violence (e.g. forced imprisonment, etc.) on behalf of the person deemed to be the "lawful owner".

Can you propose any alternative system that doesn't involve the concept of property that manages to avoid violence? Broadly speaking, demand is unlimited and supply is limited. With these two as a given, violence is essentially inevitable. Property near as I can tell, is a cultural tool that minimizes violence and maximizes supply. Only when there is abundance outstripping demand of a population, is violence avoidabl…

Yeah, I generally agree with everything you've said. And no, I can't propose any alternative system with those requirements. I'm not even sure if it's possible by definition.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#338

Post by petre »

_m8fo wrote: post #84

Everytime I see these types of articles I wonder if we're still in feudalism. Should we really be celebrating that a single individual is worth more than hundreds of millions of people[1]? I dunno, it seems dystopian , like we're enslaved to the system. [1] https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2017-01-16/...

Stop worrying about inequality. It fixes itself.

http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/apocalypse-is-the-only-path...

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#339

Post by sithadmin »

tashi wrote: post #332
habosa wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain example, which I will quote here: > Nozick's famous Wilt Chamberlain argument is an attempt to show that patterned principles of just distribution are incompatible with liberty. He asks us to assume that the original distribution in society, D1, is ordered by our choice of patterned principle, for instance Rawls's Difference Principle. Wilt Chamberlain is an extremely popu…

This is an argument I haven't seen before, and I've been trying to follow the tree of wikipedia links, but I'm not understanding terminology like "patterned principle." Is it a fixed distribution of wealth, or opportunity, or some other thing? Would Wilt spending all his excess income bring things back into balance, or do extra possessions also violate the principle? What if he spent the money on experiences? Or bett…

> I'm not understanding terminology like "patterned principle."

See here: https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/34r4vg/endst...

This awkward terminology is something that infuriates me about Nozick.

Re: Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person

#340

Post by sithadmin »

tashi wrote: post #332
habosa wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain example, which I will quote here: > Nozick's famous Wilt Chamberlain argument is an attempt to show that patterned principles of just distribution are incompatible with liberty. He asks us to assume that the original distribution in society, D1, is ordered by our choice of patterned principle, for instance Rawls's Difference Principle. Wilt Chamberlain is an extremely popu…

This is an argument I haven't seen before, and I've been trying to follow the tree of wikipedia links, but I'm not understanding terminology like "patterned principle." Is it a fixed distribution of wealth, or opportunity, or some other thing? Would Wilt spending all his excess income bring things back into balance, or do extra possessions also violate the principle? What if he spent the money on experiences? Or bett…

> I'm not understanding terminology like "patterned principle."

See here: https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/34r4vg/endst...

This awkward terminology is something that infuriates me about Nozick.

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