So I guess my question to Marc is: how many of your portfolio companies pair their morally correct level of corporation tax?
It’s Time to Build
261–270 of 1001 posts
Re: It’s Time to Build
#262I'm in the process of reading _Why Nation Fails_. The central thesis is that the rich and poor countries are separated by inclusive vs extractive institutions. The extractive institutions are characterised by elites that attempt to defend their own wealth and status by maintaining the status quo and resisting the creative destruction that may threaten that position. It seems to resonate a bit here, when Marc speaks o…
"Why Nation Fails" is a phenomenal book. I'm sorry, but I have a hard time to think of US institutions as reasonable examples of how the author portraits creative destruction and extractive institutions. I understand there might be some broken things in your nation's systems. Still, the fact you're able to discuss them here or work towards changing them through legal methods, shows the US is far off on the right trac…
Any recent example of a societal issue affecting American lives got fixed in American system?
Re: It’s Time to Build
#263this article shows why closing down hacker news would benefit the world. this dude refuses to actually look at the issue of politics & advertising as giving people ways to grift others to their own benefit and the detriment of the world at large. there are clear examples of government-run health care being better than the US system; public housing being worthwhile; public education working fine if you just don't cut and cut all the funding.
but none of that fits with the idea of randian personal profit.
this is garbage, anyone that praised it has garbage brain, ban my account and I'll holler backwards into hell
Re: It’s Time to Build
#264I'm in the process of reading _Why Nation Fails_. The central thesis is that the rich and poor countries are separated by inclusive vs extractive institutions. The extractive institutions are characterised by elites that attempt to defend their own wealth and status by maintaining the status quo and resisting the creative destruction that may threaten that position. It seems to resonate a bit here, when Marc speaks o…
Getting an answer from a court (is X legal?) takes a long time: at least a few years and several hundred thousand dollars. Far too long to wait before building a business around X. Asking people to build the business first and then find out if it's legal isn't how a society of laws is supposed to work. Fast courts would be a huge benefit to society.
This is exactly how two of the biggest startups of the past 15 years - Airbnb and Uber - were built.
Airbnb and Uber built products that were in a legal gray area. Lawmakers are still catching up to them.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#265Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you're actually set on the ideas laid out there, don't join a pre-existing company . Find a domain you're passionate about advancing, learn what you need to validate your hypothesis on improvement, then do what you need to do to advance it. If you don't have any passion about whatever you'd be doing, there's not really any point; the world doesn't advance because of people who don't care about what they're doing.…
Put more simply: Quit your job, learn to be an expert in a new field, raise capital, start a company, change the world. Simple.
You don't need to be an expert in a field to raise capital or start a company. Most of the most valuable companies in the world weren't started by experts, and most of the most influential ones as well. Venture capitalists will throw money at just about anything.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#266I'm in the process of reading _Why Nation Fails_. The central thesis is that the rich and poor countries are separated by inclusive vs extractive institutions. The extractive institutions are characterised by elites that attempt to defend their own wealth and status by maintaining the status quo and resisting the creative destruction that may threaten that position. It seems to resonate a bit here, when Marc speaks o…
Point being, why not write simpler laws and regulations and leave it to the courts to interpret what adheres to the spirit of it? With the barriers of entry gone, I think we'd see a renewed vitality to many ossified sectors.
I agree with your overall point, but you have the regulatory differences between the US and Europe exactly backwards. Europe (excluding England somewhat) has a statutory legal system. Things are either legal or illegal according to laws that have largely been written down ahead of time that anyone can go read and figure out.
In the US we have a common law system where much of our law is written by the courts in response to specific cases where judges interpret the general principles described in the "simpler laws" you speak of.
In practice this means that, under many circumstances, things move a lot slower in the US because of the time and expense of litigation (and even the threat of litigation). This is one of the reasons that it's harder to build things in the US. Our public transportation systems (trains, subways, etc) cost on the order of 5-10x more than similar ones in Europe. Our different legal systems is one of the big reasons why.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#267I don't know why soaring skyscrapers should be viewed as some sort of penultimate view for the future. With remote work tech, we can rid ourselves of the need for dense urban cores, and we can decentralize our population centers more appropriately.
Great idea. Decentralizing would be a very effective way to combat disease like this. It would also make society more resilient to other kinds of disasters.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#268Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you're actually set on the ideas laid out there, don't join a pre-existing company . Find a domain you're passionate about advancing, learn what you need to validate your hypothesis on improvement, then do what you need to do to advance it. If you don't have any passion about whatever you'd be doing, there's not really any point; the world doesn't advance because of people who don't care about what they're doing.…
This answer is a shame though. It would be more efficient for a lot of passionate people to join companies with an existing head start instead of starting a bunch of small efforts. More wood behind fewer arrows. A big part of this problem is that our society glorifies entrepreneurship more so than coming together in large cohesive groups to collectively do something big. For example, much of what this article discuss…
The answer is a shame, but until collective ownership becomes more common, it's the right one.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#269Earlier quoted context omitted.
Minor nit: > Tax individual income at a higher rate. We should instead move the tax burden to land, since holding land is completely unproductive, and as opposed to working for an income, which is productive.
Holding land isn't unproductive. Existing is a pre-requisite to working for an income. Having shelter is a pre-requisite to existing. Shelter is extremely productive in fact and is necessary. That's like pretending that the factory roof isn't productive because all it does is provide shelter from the elements, so it's unnecessary. It can make a lot of sense to be a land owner, which is why people seek it out so stron…
> Having shelter is a pre-requisite to existing.
That's why I said land instead of property. Land can't be created or destroyed, so there's no need to provide incentives for it, or worry about disincentivizing it.
> Taxing people that own $10m houses in SF at the same elevated rate as a homeowner in a poor rural region would be economic assassination.
I'm not sure this would be a problem. Increasing the land tax brings down the property value, since the value reflects some multiple of the rents you can extract from it, and so the tax would naturally be corrected. Of course, all this depends on having a good system to assess land.
I'm in agreement about healthcare; too much time is spent on discussing single payer vs private etc., and not enough on bringing down the costs, that would be there regardless of the system we use.
Re: It’s Time to Build
#270"I expect this essay to be the target of criticism. " With good reason: in the midst of a global crisis, Andreessen launches himself into the billionaire-splaining hall of fame by enumerating a litany of critical projects he thinks others ought be taking seriously, while notably refusing to commit any of his own wealth and influence toward these causes, nor interrogating how his investing record over the last 20 year…
Just go to /r/Futurology for plenty of comments like this essay.