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Which billionaires are doing the most good?

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Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#121

Post by ztratar »

0x262d wrote: post #13

I'm not sure how they can be considered to be doing much, or any, good, when effectively they are passively siphoning off profits and despite all the "good" they do, as a class they get rapidly richer every year. That has always been a conundrum behind Bill Gates' charity. Of course, it's not really a conundrum. The charity is just tax-advantaged PR or tax-advantaged complementary investment masquerading as goodwill.

Creator here.

It's all arbitrary, IMO. Idk if they're "siphoning off profits", since most of their value is in equity and Amazon, for example, isn't historically very profitable.

Getting richer every year in equity value is a strange concept. I think there should be some additional taxes, but we also shouldn't expect taxes to be a real solution.

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#122

Post by malandrew »

0x262d wrote: post #89
malandrew wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trying to do something about homelessness and actually doing something about homelessness are two different things. Many of the policies that those trying to do something about homelessness in Seattle are trying to implement are similar to those policies that were enacted in San Francisco that made homelessness worse such as rent control.

The left politicians I’m referring to have their hands completely tied by the centrist majority who won’t act on this, and people who profit from high rent turn around, point to the lack of political action they caused, and say it means the politically blocked proposed solutions are “unviable”. Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments. Of course rents elsewhere are sky…

> Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments.

That's flat out wrong.

"San Francisco has a roughly thirty-five percent homeownership rate. Then 172,000 units of the city's 376,940 housing units are under rent control. (That's about 75 percent of the city's rental stock.)"

source: https://techcrunch.com/2014/04/14/sf-housing/

Please point out a solution from these politicians on the left that won't make things worse.

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#123

Post by malandrew »

orwin wrote: post #88
malandrew wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the kids still don't get that money. They only get control of a charity. It's not like they can buy a yacht.

but they get the connections with the charity. That's why any vaguely defined charity that organize "events" for donors should be under a lot of scrutiny. people should check if the charityPR and lobbying dpt is working for the charity, the founder, or both.

I'm okay with scrutiny and oversight as you suggested to prevent fraud from related party transactions, but what's wrong with someone's children getting connections with the charity?

One of the reasons I'm working hard and saving money is to provide my family with better opportunities than I had. To say I'm not allowed to better the lives of my family is to deprive me of rights and freedoms to do what I want with what I create.

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#125

Post by ztratar »

munk-a wrote: post #120
ztratar wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm the designer. And engineer, etc. :P Sorry, which are the three titles? I see "billionaire board" and "Top donors this month" as two, but what's the third? Will put the caps in sync!

Specifically I'd consider the main title to be: "billionaire board" the title caption to be "These are the world's most powerful people. Let's track their impact & inspire them to do more good, starting with COVID-19." and the subtitle "Top donors this month" - on further reading it looks like this might work a lot better if the subtitle was considered a content title in the case where there were multiple content blo…

Great feedback! Will take this to heart as I ponder the next iteration.

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#127

Post by OJFord »

igravious wrote: post #69
OJFord wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Top donors this month Is the (admittedly quite small) heading. Also I noted that Brin (only one I clicked on) is in last place/#29 at $0 this month. So (and to find out was the reason I clicked) this is 'how much have these 29 billionaires donated this month'; not 'who are the top billionaire donors, all listed are big donors'.

Donations this month is a meaningless metric. Total % of net worth would be the obvious metric, wouldn't it? Is this only US billionaires? There are 614 billionaires in the US according to Forbes[0], there are only 29 listed here, ~5% of the total. [0] https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/

Yeah, %net worth would be more meaningful, but I still think monthly is odd. Why should it look bad if you donate nothing for 11 months and then drop a big one, because that's what you do every Christmas or something.

Assuming accurate monthly data is even available, I think a 12mo moving average would make more sense. In addition to the %net worth you suggest.

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#128

Post by 0x262d »

malandrew wrote: post #122
0x262d wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The left politicians I’m referring to have their hands completely tied by the centrist majority who won’t act on this, and people who profit from high rent turn around, point to the lack of political action they caused, and say it means the politically blocked proposed solutions are “unviable”. Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments. Of course rents elsewhere are sky…

> Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments. That's flat out wrong. "San Francisco has a roughly thirty-five percent homeownership rate. Then 172,000 units of the city's 376,940 housing units are under rent control. (That's about 75 percent of the city's rental stock.)" source: https://techcrunch.com/2014/04/14/sf-housing/ Please point out a solution from these politici…

taxamazon.net/about

Re: Which billionaires are doing the most good?

#129

Post by 0x262d »

malandrew wrote: post #122
0x262d wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The left politicians I’m referring to have their hands completely tied by the centrist majority who won’t act on this, and people who profit from high rent turn around, point to the lack of political action they caused, and say it means the politically blocked proposed solutions are “unviable”. Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments. Of course rents elsewhere are sky…

> Also you’re just incorrect about rent control. SF has it in a tiny fraction of apartments. That's flat out wrong. "San Francisco has a roughly thirty-five percent homeownership rate. Then 172,000 units of the city's 376,940 housing units are under rent control. (That's about 75 percent of the city's rental stock.)" source: https://techcrunch.com/2014/04/14/sf-housing/ Please point out a solution from these politici…

I'm surprised that the number is that high and very skeptical of it, but I don't have time to investigate at this exact moment. Regardless, they all have vacancy decontrol, which is a gaping loophole that nullifies the effectiveness of the regulation.
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