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Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

forbes.com

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Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#361

Post by nicoburns »

pyronik19 wrote: post #287
tasty_freeze wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two reasons to support a hefty inheritance tax on wealth over $X million. First, it raises revenue to help fill the deficit. More importantly, it is friction against generational wealth. Bill Gates (and his father) have for decades supported inheritance tax and gave this as the explicit reason.

In a "free" society, what basis does society have a right to say how much stuff you can amass? That or we stop pretending we live in a free society. I want society out of my business... if I want to give it away that's my choice.. if I want my kids to live like kings that's also my choice.

Society is the only thing enforcing the private property laws that allow you to amass stuff in the first place. If society wasn't involved there would be nothing to stop anyone simply taking your stuff. Society enforces such rules because they are conducive to a good society for everyone. It has every right to stop enforcing them at the point at which that ceases to be the case.

> That or we stop pretending we live in a free society.

This is exactly what we should do. There is no such thing as complete freedom. All freedoms come at the price of restricting some other freedom.

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#363

Post by iav »

Shivetya wrote: post #248
smattiso wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Namely something after yourself is tacky. But what should buildings be named after? Famous scientists? Planets? Feeney seems like an awesome guy but sadly in 100 years nobody will know his name!

politicians do it all the time and sometimes they don't even wait till who they name it after has passed. I would much rather someone have something named for them who donated their own wealth than a political party go around stamping their members names everywhere. I would much rather have the naming of government buildings to be never named for any politician.

There is a Donald J Trump State Park in New York...

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#364

Post by throwaway0a5e »

aidenn0 wrote: post #194
Baeocystin wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the person you asked, but I think Singapore does a good job of things. Their civil servant class is exceptionally skilled.

I don't know much about Singapore, but it tops the Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom, which implies it has a fairly low tax burden. [edit] The top individual income tax rate is 22 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 17 percent. The overall tax burden equals 14.1 percent of total domestic income[1]. 1: https://www.heritage.org/index/country/singapore

Those sorts of comparisons are always a three way tug of war between the letter of the law (what you can do on paper), enforcement (what you can do in reality) and taxes (the cut the .gov takes).

Depending on how much you value each one depends on the answer you get.

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#365

Post by jackcosgrove »

For a long time I dreamed of being wealthy. But a few experiences being a small-time investor have convinced me that being wealthy (and trying to be wealthy) is a lot of work, and it's work I don't particularly enjoy (too much paperwork).

I'd much rather work as an individual contributor and earn an upper middle class salary for my entire career, with enough to retire comfortably. Growing up I always heard stories about how happiness is not correlated with income above a certain (commonly achievable) level, and I can now corroborate those stories!

You don't have to be rich to give. You can not make the money in the first place, and instead make the world a better place by tending to your own happiness and doing something you enjoy. And if you are lucky like Chuck you can give it away. Or if you are lucky like Jonas Salk you can dedicate your talents to good causes.

Congratulations to Chuck for being happy.

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#366

Post by thinkharderdev »

raz32dust wrote: post #140
yboris wrote: post #76

I humbly encourage everyone to make giving a larger part of your life. Consider giving at least 10% of your income to cost-effective charities -- because cost-effective charities can do thousands of times more good than merely regular charities. So your $1,000 donation can do as much good as $1 million, if given well. Join others: https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/

I think thinking in terms of percentage of income doesn't work, because the lower your income, the lower a percentage you can afford to give away. I have found it better to think of it as a percentage of your non-essential expenses. e.g, if you spend $500 per month on non-essential things (eating out, movies, netflix, amazon impulse buys etc.), then you can afford giving away 10% of it ($50 per month) to charity.

On the other hand, it's easy to "cook the books" by classifying expenses as essential in your own mind. Or rather, most people (especially the sorts of relatively affluent people who could realistically give 10% of their income to charity) don't really budget that concretely. They just sort of have a lump of money left after paying basic expenses and then spend it on whatever strikes their fancy.

Making a commitment up front to donate 10% just creates a situation in which its not any sort of conscious decision to give $X to charity. You just operate as if your taxes were 10% higher or your income is 10% lower and go from there.

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#367

Post by scrozier »

I've had an idea for a while: some body (could be the government) maintains a list of useful/important infrastructure projects--bridges, hospitals, schools, etc. If you die with more than $x million, we take all the excess (like today's estate tax), but you get to pick what gets built, and have your name on it (or not, if you're like Feeney).

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#368

Post by maximente »

jacquesm wrote: post #300
SeanLuke wrote: post #284

I vaguely recall that there are classic levels in Jewish philosophy regarding philanthropy, and among the highest is to give with no expectation of any return whatsoever: that means not only giving where it matters, but to do so anonymously, to organizations that don't benefit you (no opera companies), and to people with no ties to you. In this respect Chuck Feeney has been incredible. This is not to dismiss the like…

That's a good point. And 'broke' isn't 100% broke just yet, he's not going to have to sleep under a bridge. But he's broke enough that the wrong accident can put him on the far side of the line easily enough. Obviously this goes for many people but they tend to end up in that situation by accident, not by design and as an example to other billionaires he's pretty impressive. Try imagining Larry Ellison doing this.

it's really hard to imagine someone at age 89, with 2 social security incomes and $2M, who is apparently more frugal than most technology workers, being one "wrong accident" away from "the far side of the line easily enough".

an 80% loss of that $2M cash leaves him with a paltry $400K which, assuming a rate of return == inflation, is 10 years of $40K/yr spending, to say nothing of 2x SS income.

people's idea of "being broke" is just ridiculous.

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#369

Post by volkse »

settrans wrote: post #261
bedhead wrote: post #240

I’ve long argued for massive estate tax rates on large estates in order to incentivize behavior like this. I have no problem at all with Bezos being worth $200 billion (or whatever it is now), but it’s this dynastic wealth that I find borderline sickening. Why in the hell should the Rockefeller’s of today be billionaires??? Also, these giant charitable foundations/family offices are similarly off-putting, as they are…

An Open Letter from Economists on the Estate Tax To whom it may concern: Spend your money on riotous living – no tax; leave your money to your children – the tax collector gets paid first. That is the message sent by the estate tax. It is a bad message and the estate tax is a bad tax. The basic argument against the estate tax is moral. It taxes virtue – living frugally and accumulating wealth. It discourages saving a…

> The encouragement of spending reduces national wealth and thereby the flow of aggregate taxable income. These indirect effects mean that eliminating the tax is likely to increase rather than decrease the net revenue yield to the federal government.

Very arguable claims there - more “trickle down” economics I guess. The main argument against the estate tax made by this letter is not “moral” as it claims, it is that few actually pay the estate tax - so how about we close those loopholes?

Re: Chuck Feeney Is Now Officially Broke

#370

Post by gringoDan »

SeanLuke wrote: post #284

I vaguely recall that there are classic levels in Jewish philosophy regarding philanthropy, and among the highest is to give with no expectation of any return whatsoever: that means not only giving where it matters, but to do so anonymously, to organizations that don't benefit you (no opera companies), and to people with no ties to you. In this respect Chuck Feeney has been incredible. This is not to dismiss the like…

> we must remind ourselves that this is unimpressive compared to the poor person who donates $25 to others while starving herself

Is it? This is a very Christian way of looking at donations: personal sacrifice / self-deprivation is what matters. [1]

However, utilitarians – notably Effective Altruists [2] – would make the opposite argument: what matters is the impact that you make with the dollars you donate (both in amount and allocation).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesson_of_the_widow%27s_mite

[2] https://www.effectivealtruism.org/

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