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A few years later, the fisherman gets an expensive, debilitating disease and dies penniless and destitute and alone. But at least he had fun before that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The idea that the archetypical businessman in this story is ultimately necessary to provide for government spending is a pretty unique take.
There was a statistic saying that top 10% of income earners pay something like 80% of all income taxes (not exact numbers but you get the gist).
In a society where few people earned more than Nx the lowest (pick your own N), this distribution of tax origin would look very different.
Think of it a different way: suppose a government explicitly targets being able to spend 23% of GDP on government (i.e. publically) chosen goals. How does it collect 23% of GDP? Well, if everyone earned precisely the same, it would collect it equally from each person. On the other hand, if one person earned 99% of GDP and everyone else combined collectively earned the remaining 1%, then obviously the super rich person will be be paying almost all of the tax revenue themselves.
The current situation in the US is obviously not this extreme, but the thought experiment shows why it works the way it does.
Also important is the concept of marginal utility of income, which describes how each additional currency-unit of income becomes less and less significant as your total income grows.
In short, 10%-pay-80% reflects the other decisions that have been made about how the US economy works (or doesn't work), and don't have much to do with taxation in general, or the provision of public services.
I'm starting a business. No, it's not a startup. It is just a business to take care of my wife and me. This is why. This story is what I tell people when they say I should make it a startup.
I considered investment and growth, but having been down that path a couple of times, instead decided to just set modest goals and work hard to achieve them.
I feel better already.
People love to take this story apart. I always took the message as “stop when you have enough”. It’s a lesson about contentment. I have enough, and I turned my entrepreneurial spirit towards public good instead of revenue. I take days off when it’s sunny, and reintroduced play into my work. I am back to Paul Graham’s “do things that don’t scale”. I am dismayed by the amount of greed among people far wealthier than me…
'But those who are determined to be rich fall into temptation and a snare and many senseless and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin
For the love of money is a root of all sorts of injurious things, and by reaching out for this love some have stabbed themselves all over with many pains'
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There was a statistic saying that top 10% of income earners pay something like 80% of all income taxes (not exact numbers but you get the gist).
Which is a reflection of an intensely unequal distribution of income. In a society where few people earned more than Nx the lowest (pick your own N), this distribution of tax origin would look very different. Think of it a different way: suppose a government explicitly targets being able to spend 23% of GDP on government (i.e. publically) chosen goals. How does it collect 23% of GDP? Well, if everyone earned precisel…
I'd like an extended version of the story where the businessman realizes he's wrong, invites all his friends to give up their lives in the business-world and revert to subsistence living that provides freedom. Then society collapses because if everyone is doing the bare minimum, there isn't anything left over for basic government services.
A few years later, the fisherman gets an expensive, debilitating disease and dies penniless and destitute and alone. But at least he had fun before that.
People love to take this story apart. I always took the message as “stop when you have enough”. It’s a lesson about contentment. I have enough, and I turned my entrepreneurial spirit towards public good instead of revenue. I take days off when it’s sunny, and reintroduced play into my work. I am back to Paul Graham’s “do things that don’t scale”. I am dismayed by the amount of greed among people far wealthier than me…
Only way to know when is enough is if you make a pact with yourself that you;d end your life when it becomes miserable and you are no longer independent.
If you are rich, you can enjoy the beach. You can’t do the same if you are poor and have a family to feed.
Although I was worth less than nothing (i.e. negative money from CC/student loans), these are among my happiest days. Once I found employment as a nanny/driver I was allowed to sleep in the servant's quarters — and eventually built my own room in an unused garage.
Definitely having a family to feed, in addition to one's self, would make this kind of lifestyle impossible — but I fear as wealth inequality increases, and more people are living in multi-generational living arrangements: family entrapment (both caring for children and parents) will increasingly be how destitute get by [taking care of them].
I will never be homeless again. Just an awful existence.