Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person • Hacker News Board

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

#441

Post by pikzen » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 12:55 PM UTC

terryf wrote: post #384

dragonwriter wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you reject all inheritance, you reject much of the incentives of capitalism. I reject the idea that inheritance is a matter of right, and particularly that there is any moral right in extending the will of the dead past their death. I don't, OTOH, disagree that some inheritance may even socially useful and worth permitting, with appropriate conditions and limitations, on that basis. In fact, I said so explicitly…

So where's the line? I was born and grew up under an actual communist rule. It was terrible. Also, it didn't really work due to fundamental human nature. What human nature you ask? Well, mine for example. I'm working my ass of so that I can have more than you have. So that I can leave my wealth to my children (three so far) so that they can continue from a better position than where I started from (almost nothing, ex…

No, I only want to take 75% of that option from you if it didn't return into the economy during your lifetime.

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

#442

Post by efaref » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 12:56 PM UTC

averagewall wrote: post #430

efaref wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem isn't that Bezos has 1,000x my net worth. He has 1,000,000x my (approximate) net worth. One millionth of my net worth is seven cents, so Bezos:me is me:$0.07. The graph isn't logarithmic. It's shaped like this: | | | ____________|

Norway has a $900 billion sovereign wealth fund. Is that a problem too? If you never heard about Bezos's wealth, would you suffer any troubles because of it? I think it's fine.

I don't understand your point. Norway is 5 million people, so that's only 180k per capita.

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

#443

Post by laughingman2 » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 12:58 PM UTC

rohit89 wrote: post #369

archagon wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I'm not necessarily suggesting that wealth be distributed equally throughout all society. But maybe we would be better off if wealth and ownership operated on a more human scale. Even in a massive company like Amazon, no matter how hard A works or how much B goes on Reddit, A will never be one million times more valuable than B. That sort of piece-of-every-pie money is an absurdity. In my fantasy economy, A cou…

If you put an upper limit, you'll have people stop once they hit that limit. Why would you go after that billion dollar idea when you are hard capped at millions? Nobody would ever go after moonshots. If we're talking about fantasy economies, IMO we should move to a system where we don't need money at all. Money is basically a way to partition access to limited resources among people. Except, outside of this planet,…

>If you put an upper limit, you'll have people stop once they hit that limit.

By that logic most scientists, philosophers and mathematicians from ancient times till now wouldn't have had the incentive to do anything.

Einstein didn't discover relativity because he thought he would become a billionaire. Isn't that a "moonshot".

But the people whose contribution is fractional compared to intellectual giants think their ability to sell, market etc should be awarded with insane amount of wealth.

The rampant egotism is forgetting that we stand on shoulders of giants, on the contribution of entire society from the discovery of fire, invention of wheel, language etc till now. To ignore the casual chain of determinism, and claim "I" alone did it through my "efforts" is insane.

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

#444

Post by terryf » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:02 PM UTC

efaref wrote: post #440

terryf wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What difference is there between 1000x and 1,000,000x ? Should there be a cap somewhere? I just completely fail to see how this is anything other than being jealous of someone elses's success. Please do explain.

It's not about being jealous of a particular person's success, it's more about observing the problems with a world where a tiny fraction of the population capture and control over half of the wealth. If that were problem free, then fine. But it's not. Think of it as a symptom of an illness, and we should work to get the fever down.

ok, so what exactly has Jeff done wrong or what he should do differently?

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

#445

Post by terryf » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:11 PM UTC

pikzen wrote: post #441

terryf wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So where's the line? I was born and grew up under an actual communist rule. It was terrible. Also, it didn't really work due to fundamental human nature. What human nature you ask? Well, mine for example. I'm working my ass of so that I can have more than you have. So that I can leave my wealth to my children (three so far) so that they can continue from a better position than where I started from (almost nothing, ex…

No, I only want to take 75% of that option from you if it didn't return into the economy during your lifetime.

Good luck trying, you're not getting it :)

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

#446

Post by pikzen » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:22 PM UTC

terryf wrote: post #445

pikzen wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I only want to take 75% of that option from you if it didn't return into the economy during your lifetime.

Good luck trying, you're not getting it :)

Unfortunately for you, that is not up to you to decide, but to society as a whole. And society has those pretty fun tools like police forces, etc.

But don't worry, there are much bigger fish to fry than you. You probably won't even be impacted, given the amount of wealth that can be recuperated from the leeches at the top, we can probably already make a much more egalitarian society.

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

#447

Post by laughingman2 » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:23 PM UTC

orbifold wrote: post #353

hamilyon2 wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that without those pople up there we lose quote a bit of efficiency as a sosiety. Game theory does not work out without owners.

Such arguments are such nonsense, that you should probably not make them without going into much more detail. It is common knowledge that almost all macro economic models we currently have are very crude approximations, so you are in no position to deduce anything with the certainty and "it's game theory" attitude that you seem to have. In other words: Economics is not physics, there you say something like "Well, ene…

Yeah, the people the very people who will snigger at someone selling "quantum healing" defend economic theories which have no scientific rigor. And the worse part is the dominant theories operate in a manner that they are self fulfilling.

Capitalism promotes monetary profits as the incentive because humans are self interested.

is one among them, but is it the other way around? Is the system manufacturing behaviors that it takes for as a cause?

I was reading Debt : The 5000 years, where the author, an anthropologists makes the case of how capitalism destroyed the communal behavior of tribes in different parts of the world.

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

#448

Post by aljungberg » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:30 PM UTC

appleflaxen wrote: post #232

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…

Interesting. the solution should be to just to tax Wilt Chamberlain at a rate high enough that the astronomical net worths become merely "stratospheric".

That's just another way of saying people shouldn't be allowed to give their shares freely. You give your shares to Wilt, the government gives them back to you (assuming the government has no overhead).

So the original argument stands: forced wealth redistribution is incompatible with free will and liberty. The word "force" itself means the removal of freedom.

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

#449

Post by terryf » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:32 PM UTC

pikzen wrote: post #446

terryf wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good luck trying, you're not getting it :)

Unfortunately for you, that is not up to you to decide, but to society as a whole. And society has those pretty fun tools like police forces, etc. But don't worry, there are much bigger fish to fry than you. You probably won't even be impacted, given the amount of wealth that can be recuperated from the leeches at the top, we can probably already make a much more egalitarian society.

I can vote, just as everyone else :)

So, the problem here is that I don't understand why you think Jeff Bezos is a "leech" exactly. The guy built a business and became very successful. What the heck is wrong with that?

I'm building a house for me and my family. I mean literally building it myself, not hiring people to build it for me. It's fun - sometimes. Other times it's hard and frustrating.

I've also been involved in building three companies so far. That has been fun - sometimes. Other times it's hard and frustrating.

If one of those companies is/was successful, would I also be a "leech" by your definition?

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

#450

Post by baursak » Thu, Mar 30, 2017, 1:36 PM UTC

mjfl wrote: post #240

baursak wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if I kill you and take your house, and somehow escape justice before dying myself and passing said house to my son, your son forfeits any claim to the house? Correct?

I think the general consensus is that if you can identify a specific property that has been stolen from you in an estate, you can reclaim it (from the estate). But claims against someone who purchased the stolen goods unknowingly, or general claims from one group to another, like a common English person against the Queen, a colored person against a random white man, or a Palestinian against an Israelite, those are no…

So if I unknowingly buy a stolen bike off Craigslist, I get to keep it? If the owner later identifies it with proof and requests me to return it, do I get to say "sorry, no" to him?