541–550 of 660 posts
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Wealth caps of 15M is certainly not communism > Ambition and envy are basic human traits No they are not
Yes, they are. If they weren't you wouldn't care if someone made more than $15M.
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It seems likely that the only way to become a billionaire is through worker exploitation, collusion, cheating the system through tax evation and asset laundering, etc. I think politico-economic interference is the crux of the problem. For example, someone with $10 million are trying to maintain their lifestyle, they want to know what stocks, bonds, and certificates, and real estate to invest in. Someone with $100 mil…
> It seems likely that the only way to become a billionaire is through worker exploitation, collusion, cheating the system through tax evation and asset laundering, etc. What workers did J.K. Rowling exploit to become a billionaire? Did Stephen King only cheat half as much to arrive at his half-billion net worth? They produced something that people wanted to buy that previously did not exist, and everyone in the chai…
To some people what I wrote will be a truism and to others it will beg the question.
I see what side that fell on for you and that's good, I'm not citing anything, so definitely question my reasoning. But don't think for a second that producing a handful of books people ended up wanting can generate that amount of value.
In the case of Rowling, she was also executive producer of several Harry Potter films and was no doubt a benificiary of motion picture accounting to a greater or lesser degree. She controls charities and who knows how many shell companies and trusts to hide and manipulate wealth. That's what you have access to at that scale of rich.
Furthermore, if she wasn't cooking the books, hiding and differentiating wealth for tax benefit, placing herself in position to extract more wealth, then she would be the stupid one among her rich peer group and would quickly find herself like one of those lottery winners who are back to being poor and none the wiser 5 years later.
Another truism is that it sounds fun to be rich, but it probably isn't very.
Another truism is that I'm sure we'd all rather suffer being rich than be poor.
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Wealth caps of 15M is certainly not communism > Ambition and envy are basic human traits No they are not
As someone who has worked extremely hard to acquire assets great than 15 million, who do you suggest has the authority to come and take some of it away from me. And what will they do with the resources they confiscate?
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I suspect it is not someone that came and gave it for free. So I would say they should belong to the keeper right now. And if it was a gift, it would still be a property transfer. So still his.
> I suspect it is not someone that came and gave it for free. I suspect that whatever price was charged was a bargain compared to what it's actually worth - and thus the transfer was at the expense of the rest of society. > And if it was a gift, it would still be a property transfer. So still his. And if that "gift" was stolen from someone else beforehand?
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You did just imply that peeing in bottles is fairly reasonable for certain hectic environments. Perhaps so, but you'd need another explanation for why it's reasonable for a workplace like Amazon's warehouses to embody that. I think there should at least be heavy scrutiny towards that premise.
It's not the horrible thing it's made out to be. Some people may even find it preferable to unsanitary, unsafe restrooms. Heck, during the recent pandemic, all the public restrooms were locked closed. What do you think people do when they go hiking?
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The US also used to have no income tax. Lots of people survived then too.
Many fewer, actually. People lived significantly shorter, harder lives; many more died young.
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Being able to quit a terrible workplace doesn't imply that one has achieved a reasonable standard of living and is just making more money. Indeed, if people continue working at a workplace where they're subjected to conditions they think are terrible, they probably don't do it just to make more money.
It doesn't mean it's zero sum, either.
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No there isn't. What practical difference is there in your life now that Musk is worth 200B versus when he had 100B or 0B? Probably your life is actually better because there is now Starlink and Tesla and you have more options. Let's say we can push a button and grow the economy 10% in real terms, but some rich guy like Bill Gates gets his wealth not increased 10%, but 10x. Do we press it? Next time we press it, some…
If there was such a button that had no side effects, perhaps it would be best to press it infinitely, as you say. But clearly "economic growth" doesn't lift everyone up equally. Somehow, there are still many poor people even in the US. Or take the average person in the entire world. Are they better off because of Starlink. Can Starlink solve world hunger? Cancer? What world changing breakthrough does it accomplish th…
That’s right there in my premise! So what? It lifts up everyone a little bit; most people a lot; and one or two get boosted to orbit for a generation or so.
Your arguments against Starlink are so silly I struggle to believe someone typed them into this site. Don’t you think one more internet option for most of the globe is a good thing? And yes, it directly addresses both hunger and cancer through better internet, more research, a bigger economy, connected tractors. It’sneven helping Ukraine defend itself against another totalitarian state right now.
None of which is relevant. It’s another internet option and therefore a good thing in and of itself. You don’t even have to like it or use it for it to make your life better.
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Why do we have to overwork people anywhere? But certainly it shouldn't happen at Amazon, seeing as Bezos makes so much money. If not that alone, then maybe the fact that Amazon has used many unethical business practices. Unbridled capitalism and propping up the super rich (who, if they are so impressive, surely wouldn't be handicapped by having to play fair) isn't good for society as a whole.
I'm not saying we have to overwork anyone or that overworking is good. I'm pointing out that Amazon isn't where they are due to overworking people. And capitalism as it exists today isn't even close to being "unbridled". In fact many have good arguments that it's far too bridled in terms of tariffs and import quotas and price controls and so on and so forth.
I don't know enough to weigh in on if this was a thing in past Amazon, but if Amazon isn't willing to lose, say, 5% profit to ensure that people aren't overworked, that seems to be done in bad faith. And the lost profit certainly doesn't have to come out of the manual workers' paychecks.
> And capitalism as it exists today isn't even close to being "unbridled". In fact many have good arguments that it's far too bridled in terms of tariffs and import quotas and price controls and so on and so forth.
I think it's unbridled enough if we have companies outsourcing to other countries or hiring illegal immigrants so they can pay workers a pittance, exorbitant sums spent on lobbying to preserve the environment-negative status quo and whatnot, anti-competitive behavior leading to monopolies/oligopolies, and Boeing planes having fatal malfunctions because executives know how to build planes, I guess? (Hint: they clearly don't.) Oh, but the bottom line will be harmed. My bad, I guess we should continue overpaying executives and heaping negative externalities onto consumers and broader society.
Maybe that isn't all what you personally think, but clearly a "profit at all costs" model has huge ramifications. You pretty much have to abandon your morals to become a person who comes out on top of the system.
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Also, your question sort of implicitly requires ignoring all the attempts to do "something like what Bezos did" that failed. A bunch of resources went into those efforts that came to nothing. This is not a zero cost to society. There was always going to be someone who succeeded at this, so noting that Bezos did so is relatively information free. The bigger question is whether the way this happened - let a bunch of mo…
It's worked far better than any other system. It isn't even close.