71–80 of 373 posts
On the other, why hoard so much? Could he have been at least slightly more generous all along? Wouldn't that, done earlier, create a positive sooner? A positive that could have been compiling social compound interest (if you will)?
I under the rules of the game (i.e., capitalism). That doesn't mean you have to buy all in to those rules. There are (personal) alternatives.
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The testing center had their own car? Is this standard in Spain/Europe? I had to pay an instructor with a car to drive me to the testing center and let me use his car for the test while he waited around.
This is the standard in Spain. It is so because the learning car has a double set of pedals so the instructor can operate them if the student messes up: https://img.milanuncios.com/fg/2560/05/256005093_7.jpg In Spain you usually enroll in a driving school where you have theoretical lessons (there's a theoretical exam that you must pass) and then they give you driving lessons with their adapted car. When you're ready…
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Avoidance, not evasion. If you're a very frugal person, it seems pretty normal to hate taxes. No point in saving on everything, yet then throwing x% away in taxes (yes, I am aware taxes fund a lot of good things, but at the same time a lot of money is wasted -- I'm sure Kamprad thought he could better manage and deploy that money)
Oh nice, if he thought he could use the money better, then sure, please carry on not paying taxes. Can I do the same? Or is that a privilege reserved for the mega-rich? Or let's call a spade a spade, and let's call tax evasion tax evasion.
On one, this is honorable and impressive. On the other, why hoard so much? Could he have been at least slightly more generous all along? Wouldn't that, done earlier, create a positive sooner? A positive that could have been compiling social compound interest (if you will)? I under the rules of the game (i.e., capitalism). That doesn't mean you have to buy all in to those rules. There are (personal) alternatives.
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He didn't really care about money personally, or at least not the material things money can buy. At least that's the image he worked very hard to portray by driving an old Volvo, living in a modest house and wearing clothes bought in a second hand store etc. He obviously cared a lot about his companies making as much money as possible. Although if you asked him he'd probably say that all that tax avoidance was just h…
Ok. But when why not donate the tax savings to an org that can use it? I just can't see "I don't care" resulting in hoarding (so much money). Maybe "Money doesn't motivate me" would be more accurate?
Technically the IKEA Foundation (www.ikeafoundation.org) is that charitable organisation. And technically they do donate a bunch of money each year to various causes. Of course they're not the most transparent of organizations so it's hard to really judge their philanthropic efforts.
Maybe "Money doesn't motivate me" would be more accurate?
At the risk of trying to psychoanalyses a man know very little about,I'd say that "personal wealth doesn't motivate me" is probably the most correct statement. He obviously cared very much about his businesses and making them as successful as possible, and as such probably cared deeply about money to the extent that they're the 'points' used to judge who's winning that game.
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The Swedish flags predates the Swedish welfare state by several hundred years (and IKEA predates it by a couple of decades).
It still seems an hypocrisy to me. In any case, they use the flag as a marketing tool, something which, from my point of view, doesn't show much respect for the flag.
What you're proposing basically amounts to the welfare state and its needs owning the Swedish nation, rather than the other way around.
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Avoidance, not evasion. If you're a very frugal person, it seems pretty normal to hate taxes. No point in saving on everything, yet then throwing x% away in taxes (yes, I am aware taxes fund a lot of good things, but at the same time a lot of money is wasted -- I'm sure Kamprad thought he could better manage and deploy that money)
Please cut the ’avoidance, not evasion’ bullshit. This scheme is outright evasion, legalized by lobbying in Brussels against national law. You know that otherwise you wouldn’t care to point out this nuisance.
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The Swedish flags predates the Swedish welfare state by several hundred years (and IKEA predates it by a couple of decades).
It still seems an hypocrisy to me. In any case, they use the flag as a marketing tool, something which, from my point of view, doesn't show much respect for the flag.
On one, this is honorable and impressive. On the other, why hoard so much? Could he have been at least slightly more generous all along? Wouldn't that, done earlier, create a positive sooner? A positive that could have been compiling social compound interest (if you will)? I under the rules of the game (i.e., capitalism). That doesn't mean you have to buy all in to those rules. There are (personal) alternatives.
Nothing was hoarded. IKEA is a private company, and the founder likely held a lot of that ownership. He didn't simply grab people's cash and hide it in a box. To turn that ownership value into cash so he would not "hoard so much" would be to turn ownership (and hence direction) of IKEA over to others.
To sell ownership would mean others would turn cash into ownership, so there's really no net gain/loss in terms of "hoarding," only a change in assets.
He decided to keep IKEA independent. His value represents the value IKEA provides to others and is not taking away from society.
"Great are the stars, and man is of no account to them. But man is a fair spirit, whom a star conceived and a star kills. He is greater than those bright blind companies. For though in them there is incalculable potentiality, in him there is achievement, small, but actual. Too soon, seemingly, he comes to his end. But when he is done he will not be nothing, not as though he had never been; for he is eternally a beaut…