31–40 of 147 posts
The rich aren't the enemy, rent-seekers are. They may overlap, and Bezos may be both, but wealth and capital on their own are orthogonal to justice. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EHKZRLcW4AA1aju?format=jpg&name=...
Genuine question. Ia rent seeker being used as a metaphor here?
(there is debate about which activities qualify, but the gist is obvious)
I disagree on the the thrust of the argument - that people (including comparatively wealthy individuals like doctors and lawyers) oppose changes to tackle wealth inequality because they don’t understand the gulf of wealth between them and the ultra rich. In my experience it has nothing to do with that - rather these people know that they will ultimately end up as the main target for any such law, not these billionair…
This is absolutely it. Any taxes on just the ultra wealthy raise so little money for the rest of the population that any large scale money raising requires taxes on doctors, lawyers, engineers, small business owners, etc. Pro-government spending advocates don’t like to emphasize this because people become a lot less supportive of these things when they see members of their own community getting hit.
The USA cannot even properly finance the IRS to go after the super wealthy tax cheats. Their bought-and-paid-for politicians would rather the IRS stick it to the little guys, ffs.
I'm learning economic concepts so some of my notions and questions end up being naive. Would appreciate if someone could clarify/answer this. It's a fair guess that vast majority of Bezos's wealth is in Amazon equities. Which are valued as such by the participants in US equity market. A thought exercise, what would happen if he were to liquidate all of that $180+B in equities? Safe to say he will get less than $180B…
https://github.com/MKorostoff/1-pixel-wealth/blob/master/THE...
Bezos has been selling his shares for years.
The market is still betting that Amazon can exploit more people faster every year and earn money (i.e. profit) from them.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are many, many ways that wealth is realized without spending it. Once you get past a few hundred million you literally cannot spend the money as fast as it comes in. These billionaires aren't amassing wealth to spend it on things, they're gathering it for power, leverage, status, prestige, legacy reasons etc, and using it to influence and control the world to further their own agenda.
In Bezos's case, he built a company that literally didn't even exist 27 years ago. It's gotten so huge, because globalization has gotten so effective. That's true of all tech companies: they benefit disproportionately from globalization and network effects. As far as what to do about it? The only solution could be to break up Amazon, Google, Apple, etc. Taxation is not it. The Federal government and the Fed controls…
I'm learning economic concepts so some of my notions and questions end up being naive. Would appreciate if someone could clarify/answer this. It's a fair guess that vast majority of Bezos's wealth is in Amazon equities. Which are valued as such by the participants in US equity market. A thought exercise, what would happen if he were to liquidate all of that $180+B in equities? Safe to say he will get less than $180B…
That's not unique the the ultra rich, though. Many people have most of their wealth locked in a house. If they needed to sell at very short notice they would have to sell at a significant discount.
I'm learning economic concepts so some of my notions and questions end up being naive. Would appreciate if someone could clarify/answer this. It's a fair guess that vast majority of Bezos's wealth is in Amazon equities. Which are valued as such by the participants in US equity market. A thought exercise, what would happen if he were to liquidate all of that $180+B in equities? Safe to say he will get less than $180B…
I'm learning economic concepts so some of my notions and questions end up being naive. Would appreciate if someone could clarify/answer this. It's a fair guess that vast majority of Bezos's wealth is in Amazon equities. Which are valued as such by the participants in US equity market. A thought exercise, what would happen if he were to liquidate all of that $180+B in equities? Safe to say he will get less than $180B…
The bigger problem is what are you going to with that money? Obviously not consumption. You are not going to buy more tshirts and burgers.
You are going to invest in pet projects, like google glass or Bezos cockrocket [1]. Or finance some causes, like Gate's attack on malaria - good stuff.
The rich aren't the enemy, rent-seekers are. They may overlap, and Bezos may be both, but wealth and capital on their own are orthogonal to justice. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EHKZRLcW4AA1aju?format=jpg&name=...
Add to that that the legal framework (talking about the USA) is seriously skewed to favor employers and disadvantages workers and any attempts to unionize. This has to stop.
Missing: median US Black household wealth, $24,100; median US Hispanic household wealth, $36,100. Numbers as of 2019. https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/disp...
White: +$200,000 Black: -$751,000 Hispanic: -$588,000
Puts your numbers in perspective
Source: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BUDGET-2014-BUD/pdf/BUDG...
I'm learning economic concepts so some of my notions and questions end up being naive. Would appreciate if someone could clarify/answer this. It's a fair guess that vast majority of Bezos's wealth is in Amazon equities. Which are valued as such by the participants in US equity market. A thought exercise, what would happen if he were to liquidate all of that $180+B in equities? Safe to say he will get less than $180B…
I'm not sure that implies there should be a regime change in Amazonland, though. In some ways it implies the opposite. Annex Amazonland, overthrow King Bezos, and you're faced with the challenge of administering the damn thing yourself.