Carnegie was very philanthropic. He also ruthlessly exploited his workers.
The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
121–130 of 146 posts
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
US federal budget for 2018 is ~4 trillion. Bezos has just donated 2 million. If that’s really your concern then you should try to keep things in perspective.
> US federal budget for 2018 is ~4 trillion. Bezos has just donated 2 million. If that’s really your concern then you should try to keep things in perspective. I think you mean 2 billion .
Yes, of course, you're right.
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the definition of living wage is continually (and it seems to me, intentionally) slippery/non-specific That's a funny excuse not to engage with the point. Of course it's variable: different regions have different costs of living, and different social supports. Some countries or areas do have a specifically defined value for a living wage, my own definition for the purpose of this discussion is quite obviously: "eno…
> You said "at the expense of customers", sorry the wording in my reply was slightly different. I directly copied text from your post and replied to it. I even tried to make a good faith charitable interpretation of it. Are you accusing me of misquoting your own words to some end?
Apologies—I'm confusing commenters. I was originally replying Isinlor's post, not yours. That was the source of the "expense of customers" point.
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
The counter-argument is that, if these super-wealthy individuals didn't feel the need to extract the maximum wealth from the community (the notion that it's their fiduciary duty to pay the least in wages or find loopholes to minimise tax exposure is a myth), then communities in the round would be better off. Regardless of if you agree with his actions or not, it's pretty tone-deaf from a PR perspective - pretty much…
The economy isn’t a zero-sum game.
But keeping price high and salaries low when you are so rich that you can give away 2 billion is a zero sum game. Every dollar you pull out of customer's pocket and put in yours instead of your employee's makes them poorer nominally by exactly the same it makes you richer. And relatively ... They get way more poorer than you get richer ...
Taking money from people and keeping it is only ok if you have good idea what to do with it.
I'm not saying Bezos is wrong there. Taxing customers and employees to help the homeless is perfectly fine in my book.
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
The economy isn’t a zero-sum game.
Each dollar that you hold and don't spend represents one potential vote for what the economy should do next. If you vote wisely, your votes usually get returned to you. If you vote poorly, they usually don't come back. Rich people are a form of representative election. Some people give their proxies to others that they think will make wise economic choices. If you choose your proxy well, you also get rewarded with mo…
> If you vote wisely, your votes usually get returned to you. If you vote poorly, they usually don't come back.
Depends on what you want to do. If you are rich want to fund cancer research you might to do it right away and never see your money back, or invest it in a successful business, earn twice as much ... but die of cancer because you didn't use your votes soon enough.
Was it wise to get your votes back?
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
The economy isn’t a zero-sum game.
But keeping price high and salaries low when you are so rich that you can give away 2 billion is a zero sum game. Every dollar you pull out of customer's pocket and put in yours instead of your employee's makes them poorer nominally by exactly the same it makes you richer. And relatively ... They get way more poorer than you get richer ... Taking money from people and keeping it is only ok if you have good idea what…
Only if he's helping the homeless to the same degree he's taking the money from employees and customers. But let's face it, he is not and he wont.
Instead of relying on one out of 50 billionaires to spend a small fraction of their wealth to "give back" how about we pass something like Warren's Accountable Capitalism Act?
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#127it's a sad world that has philanthropy and charity
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can't expect companies to fight for greater good and sacrifice their interests for the overall good. In fact it's against the law for them to do that. Amazon hires a lot of people and in many countries pay reasonably well. With taxes it does what the law allows. If you want to change those things start with changing the law, ending policies hurting the working class (limiting low skill migration would be the firs…
> In fact it's against the law for them to do that. No, it’s not. The corporation’s interests must align with the shareholders, but there’s no law that says short-term profit is the only legal goal. Companies can and have sacrificed in order to build the community.
Public trading often leads to that however with activist investors.
Anyone who sees them acting suboptomally for the short term can buy in, pressure for more short term interests and lobby to get their way then jump off before it collapses with their gains. Even without that scheming continuous gains are demanded generally.
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#129Amazon shares have a lot of value, and Bezos is sitting on a pile of them. What should Bezos do with that currency -- hoard it? spend it? This supermoney represents Bezos' capacity to incentivize his fellow humans to act in concert toward a goal that he can influence. If he hoards it, then it does nothing for society. Bezos doesn't need it for his personal enjoyment either. After he leases a couple jets, buys a few h…
How about getting his workers off of public assistance? That should be a few drops in the bathtub of his wealth.
But he "wants to help the poor". I call bull on it until he helps his own employees.
Re: The Bezos backlash: Is 'big philanthropy' a charade?
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
Each dollar that you hold and don't spend represents one potential vote for what the economy should do next. If you vote wisely, your votes usually get returned to you. If you vote poorly, they usually don't come back. Rich people are a form of representative election. Some people give their proxies to others that they think will make wise economic choices. If you choose your proxy well, you also get rewarded with mo…
> If you vote wisely, your votes usually get returned to you. If you vote poorly, they usually don't come back. Depends on what you want to do. If you are rich want to fund cancer research you might to do it right away and never see your money back, or invest it in a successful business, earn twice as much ... but die of cancer because you didn't use your votes soon enough. Was it wise to get your votes back?
Economics has a somewhat different definition of wisdom than human philosophers and ethicists.
Economically, investing in cancer cures research is wise when selling a cure would be profitable. Even if you had a death oracle that could tell you exactly what a person would die of, and when, it might be wiser (economically) to invest in a cure for the disease that will kill Bill Gates in N years than the one that will kill you in N+M years.
Because the money you spend on curing Gates's disease in N years might return enough to allow you to finance a cure for your own in less than M years, whereas the original amount might cure yours in N+M+C years. It's all hypothetical. You make the best decisions you can with the information you have at the time, but luck and skill are always factors.