Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

coindesk.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

901–910 of 1001 posts

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#901

Post by chrismcb »

sharkweek wrote: post #618
alx__ wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Christ on a skateboard!? All the temporarily displaced billionaires in this thread are something else. If you require more than 100M in net worth to be "motivated" to work. There's a larger problem with you. Being a CEO/leader doesn't require some skill set that's given to you from some mythical watery being just because you're special.

I'm a big fan of 100% taxation on anything above 999M, but my continuation here is that anyone that earns more than that gets a trophy for every additional 1B they earn put on display in a big museum in a city of their choice (Museums selectively scattered around the US).

You mean any annual income over 990M or wealth? The problem with taxing wealth at 100% means either they have to pay to continue earning or they lose a portion of their business and eventually the ability to earn more.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#902

Post by chrismcb »

Johnny555 wrote: post #785
imdsm wrote: post #665

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. Let's say I earn over the threshold, and I can now either choose to continue to try and innovate and add value to society, or retire to a private island and just become a carbon contributor, I mean, why work myself into the ground if I can no longer benefit? Most people have assets not liquidity too, so it's like saying, if you own too much, you have to stop. Well, what if Elon stopped and we reverted bac…

I mean, why work myself into the ground if I can no longer benefit? That's a good question for the current situation -- why does Bezos still go to work? Once you have $100B, what tangible benefit do you get from more? Surely he's not doing it for the money, another $1B, or even $100B isn't going to change his lifestyle.

I'm pretty sure bezos stopped going to work.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#903

Post by FabHK »

Aarostotle wrote: post #321
FabHK wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am fairly sure inequality is more extreme than that (top 10% hold 70%) at the moment, and it was less bad in the second half of the 20th century. The top US marginal income tax rate was 90% in the 1960s, and 70% in the 1970s, and it did not seem to discourage GDP growth or innovation. https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/statistics/historical-highes...

We live in the most equal time in human history. The actual standard of living of the average person in most developed countries rivals that of royal families from just a couple of centuries ago. Don't confuse monetary inequality with wealth inequality. Measure by the standard of living, not monetary units. What are the actual differences between the life of the average American worker and Jeff Bezos? It's not that b…

> We live in the most equal time in human history. [...] Measure by the standard of living, not monetary units.

Well, then, surely it doesn't matter if we tax away 90% of Bezo's wealth, right? His living standard will be same.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#904

Post by kamaal »

valar_m wrote: post #179
Grustaf wrote: post #104

How can they even have 1100 employees? That's more than the East India Company needed to run a whole subcontinent, probably.

East India Company employed 260,000 soldiers alone, not even counting the entire rest of the company. That took 20 seconds to find. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company

Nearly all of those soldiers were natives.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#905

Post by Fargoan »

UncleMeat wrote: post #783
Aeolun wrote: post #649

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It feels weird I’d have to pay anyone just for owning something. Besides, how would you price private companies? Are those just going to be free?

It only feels weird because there is a concerted effort to make you feel that way. It is absolutely identical to property taxes on homes, but that doesn't make people feel icky in the same manner.

Property tax is bullshit

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#906

Post by okasaki »

14u2c wrote: post #893
quickthrower2 wrote: post #867

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not if people living in 'reasonable' properties are not taxed much at all. If a family lives in a 100sqm house, probably should be nothing additional. If they live in 2000sqm mansion, they probably can afford a decent sized tax. Of course size is not the only factor, which makes it complicated. Land or property value is probably a good proxy. If you house is >$1M it probably means you are wealthy. Now you get one of…

The problem with this logic is that real estate values are out of control. In my city not uncommon to see stories of families who have owned a home for generation or more being forced to sell it because the value of the land went from $200k to $800k in 10 years and is now taxed as such.

If the value of the land goes up with increased economic activity, but you're not economically active enough to continue living in the area, how is it unreasonable to be expected to sell?

The other side of every "family was forced to sell" is "another family was very happy to move in".

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#907

Post by evilsetg »

stevenjgarner wrote: post #604
Johnny555 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People keep pointing to Armstrong's $110M house like it's some sort of injustice. If you think billionaires should exist at all, then that's one of the least-bad injustices imaginable Ok, I'll admit it, billionaires should not exist at all, there should be a heavy wealth tax that makes it hard to become a billionaire. Will a CEO work less hard if he (and his peers) can only ever gain $100M in net worth before a wealt…

A wealth tax implies a tax on unrealized appreciated assets, which is beyond bizarre IMHO. So you buy a house for $500k somewhere. It surges in value to $1.2 million. You therefore have an unrealized capital gain of $700k. You are NEVER going to get that money until you sell it, and when you do you are going to pay a whopping amount of capital gain tax. But a wealth tax implies you pay that capital gain tax now. Okay…

How about an exemption for one house/apartment? If you use a house for personal purposes, e.g. to live there then your point stands but in case of commercial purposes the tax is something that should just enter your business calculation.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#908

Post by [deleted] »

kurisufag wrote: post #836
UncleMeat wrote: post #783

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It only feels weird because there is a concerted effort to make you feel that way. It is absolutely identical to property taxes on homes, but that doesn't make people feel icky in the same manner.

> but that doesn't make people feel icky in the same manner. speak for yourself! a property tax makes sense in theory: you're contributing to the entity that ensures your land is safe in the first place, but basing it on valuations instead of something like flat rates based on sqft is preposterous. I'd go so far as to say that the degree to which the knowledge of such a tax affects your decisions relating to the prop…

[deleted]

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#909

Post by bildung »

kortilla wrote: post #566
munificent wrote: post #557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What happens when USA taxes billionaires out of existence? This is a really good question. I believe the answer is that the USA will be better able to outcompete those countries that do have them. History has shown time and again that massive inequality is a huge barrier to maximizing the productivity of all of a society's members. It leads to cynism and corruption and breaks down cooperation. It forces a society t…

> believe the answer is that the USA will be better able to outcompete those countries that do have them Based on what? The US already outcompetes these other countries in business success and average citizen income. What countries don’t have billionaires that are competitive? > History has shown time and again that massive inequality is a huge barrier to maximizing the productivity of all of a society's members. His…

> History has literally never shown this.

Empirically, this is actually beyond doubt by now. Piketty et al. were in the news 10 years ago with this very topic, showing that inequality is detrimental to growth, for many countries and over very large periods of time. And there has been a bunch of additional studies after that publication that support these findings.

Re: Coinbase lays off around 1,100 employees

#910

Post by Ekaros »

hintymad wrote: post #20

Why they need these many people for an exchange is puzzling. I’m sure there are many things to do, but shouldn’t they grow their headcount organically and slowly?

Spend lot of money trying to come up with something else to justify the price and growth...
Post reply on HN