111–120 of 280 posts
I think it's awesome to make critics about how capitalism is bad by using Qatar where basically no freedom exists and everything is controlled by the state. Not even mentioning actual slavery.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Slaves have frequently been among the most high-status, most powerful people in their society. The slave who manages an important man's affairs is himself an important man. Concubines frequently wield power through their well-placed lovers. At the historical extreme, Wu Zetian was a concubine who worked her way up to being formally crowned emperor. The Mamluk Turks were slaves. This didn't stop them from taking contr…
These are, IMO, exceptions. Most slaves probably got worked half to death, beaten, and generally abused. Certainly history tells us that many slaves simply died en route from where they were captured. I can't prove this, but it's much more likely than the fate of high-status slaves.
No, this is uncommon, for the same reason beasts of burden were generally not worked half to death, beaten, and generally abused. They are valuable.
On some level, this is basically "capitalism 101." If I don't need my resources now, I can put them to work so that I can later benefit from them. This leads to me having productive assets, which pay me some return. If I could not acquire productive assets, there would be much less reason to save. And it's unclear how one would save, as banks would likely not exist either. You can solve this problem somewhat by havin…
The benefit of productive assets is that people who otherwise would not be able to produce high value outputs are stuck making lower value ones. By working with another's assets an individual can create more value than alone, and somehow split the difference with the asset owner. Workers maybe need to start to fight for a better split, but that is beyond the scope of this article.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
These are, IMO, exceptions. Most slaves probably got worked half to death, beaten, and generally abused. Certainly history tells us that many slaves simply died en route from where they were captured. I can't prove this, but it's much more likely than the fate of high-status slaves.
> Most slaves probably got worked half to death, beaten, and generally abused. No, this is uncommon, for the same reason beasts of burden were generally not worked half to death, beaten, and generally abused. They are valuable.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are mixing together business owners and rentiers (property owners). Very different things. Property owners don't need to work 60-hour weeks unless they are the sole handyman for 100+ houses.
A lot of work goes into property ownership. There is an entire industry that exists to relieve property owners of that burden: property management companies. The tradeoff is that if you use a property management company, most of the profit from your properties flows to them, because they don't work for free. There is also a non-negligible risk involved in moving your control of your assets over to a barely-interested…
A lot of work goes into property ownership. It's just not very expensive.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Let's look at Person A vs Person B. Person A is a football player and makes $1 million in salary per year. This is all taxed progressively, meaning that Uncle Sam takes off 39.6% of most of his income. As a result, he pays close to $400k in taxes. Person B is an investor. He invests in Applied Materials, and they have a very good year. His stock is now worth $1 million more than it was at the beginning of the year. S…
It's even worse than you describe. For the part he doesn't sell, no taxes are owed on the capital gains. Only when capital gains are realised, are taxes owed. If he holds onto that stock forever he can keep compounding forever, without every being taxed.
And you could, you know, lose money in the stock market.
Gosh. OP made me sad with his thesis. "1. For owners, work is optional." ... As an owner I wish this were true. For me and most owners I know work is mandatory, and its 60 hour weeks and a lot of sleepless nights. There is no safety net. There is no unemployment. I get no workman's compensation. I have no employment law protections. Its, as one HN comment said some time ago, "a suffering contest" a lot of the time. "…
Did you read the whole article? You totally whooshed on the meaning of owner .
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are mixing together business owners and rentiers (property owners). Very different things. Property owners don't need to work 60-hour weeks unless they are the sole handyman for 100+ houses.
A lot of work goes into property ownership. There is an entire industry that exists to relieve property owners of that burden: property management companies. The tradeoff is that if you use a property management company, most of the profit from your properties flows to them, because they don't work for free. There is also a non-negligible risk involved in moving your control of your assets over to a barely-interested…
Sure, but the $/hour return is much higher that the average job. 'A lot' isn't a good quantifier. I bet the same people who live in the house he rents work a lot more for a lot less money.
>Very few people are Scrooge McDucks with all the time in the world to swim around in a vault full of gold coins
True, but there are a lot more people who comfortably live off money their investments and properties make. This isn't about the 1%.
>The key takeaway here is that everyone has got their problems and concerns, and in this competitive world, it is naive to assume that anyone can maintain their position without significant effort.
Key takeaway from where? The author point still stands. The takeway from the article is that people don't get paid according to their hardwork, rather it is a lot of luck.
It is naive to assume anyone can maintain their position without significant effort, sure. But it is also naive to declare that without knowing for certain. I personally know people who work less than hour a week and make as much as the average software engineer in the US.
Sidenote:
This whole thread is sad to read. Most comments take a single part of the article then start to bash the author or question the validity of his thesis. Many on here didn't even bother to read the article properly, which I assume the topmost parent of this comment chain is also a part of.
Life isn't fair, and many people have trouble with coping with that fact. I just didn't think HN would have trouble with that too.
Gosh. OP made me sad with his thesis. "1. For owners, work is optional." ... As an owner I wish this were true. For me and most owners I know work is mandatory, and its 60 hour weeks and a lot of sleepless nights. There is no safety net. There is no unemployment. I get no workman's compensation. I have no employment law protections. Its, as one HN comment said some time ago, "a suffering contest" a lot of the time. "…
For the companies that comprise most of the economy (less than half of U.S. GDP is attributable to small businesses), ownership and operatorship are distinct roles. The CEO of GE is not the company's owner; the shareholders who own GE don't face the travails of operating it.
Gosh. OP made me sad with his thesis. "1. For owners, work is optional." ... As an owner I wish this were true. For me and most owners I know work is mandatory, and its 60 hour weeks and a lot of sleepless nights. There is no safety net. There is no unemployment. I get no workman's compensation. I have no employment law protections. Its, as one HN comment said some time ago, "a suffering contest" a lot of the time. "…
You are mixing together business owners and rentiers (property owners). Very different things. Property owners don't need to work 60-hour weeks unless they are the sole handyman for 100+ houses.