Earlier quoted context omitted.
I always salute at the McDonalds drive-thru.
The man has enviable health.
*wealth
Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
191–200 of 612 posts
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
I do feel exactly that with few exceptions.
What would warrant an exception? I generally don’t like billionaires either, but I wouldn’t put Buffet at the top of my shit list just for curating a public persona.
There are couple of artists for example that had managed to become near- or full billionaires. Of course I do not know the details but in my view this warrants an exception
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
Poor people should properly budget and cook at home to avoid staying poor If you can afford to eat McDonald's nobody cares (well it's not healthy either but that's a different matter that doesn't really have to do with being poor or not)
You don’t have time to do those things if you are poor and working 2-3 jobs. Properly budgeting and analyzing costs takes a lot of time, and unexpected expenses and cost of living increases destroy your budget a lot more than McDonald’s.
> Properly budgeting and analyzing costs takes a lot of time
For family? Not really
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#194Earlier quoted context omitted.
Work life is quite a lot different for a working-stiff than it is for a CEO. In large part, their company is an extension of themselves. Work whatever hours you want to. Private plane to take you wherever you want to go for free, if you can come up with a work-related excuse to go there (with no need to justify not coming back for weeks). Multiple folks acting more-or-less as your personal assistants. An office bigge…
Based on this description, you could say that what the CEO does in no way resembles what real work looks like for 90% of the population. Which I think is true. It's a pity they make so much more than people who do actual work.
> you could say that what the CEO does in no way resembles what real work looks like for 90% of the population
I’d wager you can say this about most jobs. The anomaly is butt-in-seats office jobs.
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, that's giving it away (some after death), not specifically using it to address wealth inequality.
> that's giving it away (some after death), not specifically using it to address wealth inequality Because the money isn’t being spent on your pet issue it’s being mis-spent?
I was responding to a comment that defended Buffet by saying he "argued for changing complex and unfair taxation". I'm saying if you have billions that could be spent on taking tangible action to change such taxation, simply "arguing for" changing it is not very impressive.
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#196I don't think he's a hero, particularly, but he also does not strike me as a villain like some of the modern day billionaires either. I read a biography of him and he seems like an interesting guy. I don't think the 'humble lifestyle' thing was a schtick, like some suggest. I mean he mostly lived in Nebraska... give me a tiny fraction of his wealth and I would have taken right off out of Nebraska as the first thing I did, to go live somewhere warm and sunny.
He also seemed a bit more aware of how much power money can translate into, and it seems he kind of stuck to "being rich" rather than shooting for "rich and also politically powerful" (although I'm sure there are probably a few exceptions).
Compare his investment in the Washington Post with Bezos'. Buffett actually made money off it, and kept his hands off the direction of the paper. We all saw how much Bezos started leaning on it - which has had the effect of shedding subscribers as no one trusts it any more, and it's not attracting new readers of... the Fox News persuasion I guess we can call it.
It also seems he mostly stuck to what he knows in terms of kind of boring investments rather than flashy rockets and other showy things.
And of course he's been good with giving his money away and convincing others to do likewise.
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#197It's not possible to become a billionaire with a B without fucking over a lot of people, but for a billionaire he isn't so bad. If we can't get rid of billionaires the next best thing is to hope they are more like Buffett and less like Musk or Thiel or Trump...
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Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#198Greeks had their Mythology with heroes and pseudo-Gods, we have oligarchs and pseudo-philantrops
In what world is he a “pseudo” philanthropist? He’s already given more than $60 Billion away and pledged to donate 99%+ of his wealth. He has also called for his class of ultra-wealthy to be taxed more
Also, on what planet did Ancient Greeks not celebrate their wealthy.
Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
Buffet is not a good guy. Our society’s greatest problem right now is concentrated corporate power being used to destroy the ability of working people to prosper. Buffet had an active and direct role in making this happen. He supported and advocated for monopoly, and profited from it. He lived a lavish life that included opulent mansions and private jets, and used his resources to deftly drive a media narrative of hi…
Which “opulent mansions”?
He lives in the same home in Omaha that he had in the 60's. BH does not own any corporate jets but they do own NetJets that sells/leases fractional shares of their jet fleet of which Buffet uses for his travel.