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The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

independent.co.uk

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Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#41

Post by jeffbee »

roksprok wrote: post #27

Craigslist is often held up as an example of a company "doing it right", but what is never mentioned in these posts is that a large portion of their revenue comes from facilitating scams. Around 25% of rooms/apartments I contact are scams, and Craigslist has so far done nothing to prevent these. A common scam is to take pictures from a real estate site of a house that recently sold and advertise it as for rent, but t…

Craigslist doesn't even charge for rental listings, do they? I thought they only charge for help wanted ads.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#42

Post by jeffbee »

jrmg wrote: post #38

Is Craigslist still the go-to classifieds site in some places? Around here it’s (very sadly IMO) been almost completely replaced by Facebook Marketplace, to the extent that people make Facebook accounts just to use Marketplace.

I use both in the Bay Area and have never succeeded in selling anything on FB. Craigslist usually connects me with some buyer and if not I go to eBay.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#43

Post by csbrooks »

socalgal2 wrote: post #30
jmalicki wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is both absolutely gorgeous and luxurious, yet still at less than $6 million, pretty modest for someone capable of giving away half a billion.

[flagged]

It's even easier to give away money when you don't have it.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#44

Post by dyauspitr »

socalgal2 wrote: post #30
jmalicki wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is both absolutely gorgeous and luxurious, yet still at less than $6 million, pretty modest for someone capable of giving away half a billion.

[flagged]

Giving away money is stupid. With that much money I would rather fund companies that push the frontier on something. If it fails no biggie, if it succeeds it will probably end up employing people and giving them a source of income for life while simultaneously contributing to human progress.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#45

Post by Rooster61 »

socalgal2 wrote: post #30
jmalicki wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is both absolutely gorgeous and luxurious, yet still at less than $6 million, pretty modest for someone capable of giving away half a billion.

[flagged]

That's a very naive, but common, viewpoint of wealth. "Worth" 1.3 billion does not mean "has 1.3 billion lying around in liquid cash". Net worth is tied up usually in many bank accounts across multiple banks, securities, real estate, trusts, etc. And that's all excluding capital tied up in corporations/orgs. Freeing up and giving away half of a billion dollar net worth is a difficult and time consuming thing, one which requires effort to do.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#46

Post by brazukadev »

socalgal2 wrote: post #30
jmalicki wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is both absolutely gorgeous and luxurious, yet still at less than $6 million, pretty modest for someone capable of giving away half a billion.

[flagged]

You would not, tho. The people that think they need to get rich first before giving away won't ever give away. They always want more.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#48

Post by wewtyflakes »

WalterBright wrote: post #22
zuzululu wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America is the place for very few people to get wealthy relatively compared to the rest is more accurate. I don't know how long this asymmetric upside down pyramid structure will hold. Monopoly on violence requires participants to believe in its continuity, any fracture in perception no matter how small, will create an increasingly chaotic redistribution effect.

The top 1% of America pays 40% of the federal income taxes. Getting rid of the rich is probably a pretty bad idea for the rest of us.

This is a byproduct of wild wealth disparity, not because the rich are so generous with paying the government.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#49

Post by swatcoder »

socalgal2 wrote: post #30
jmalicki wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is both absolutely gorgeous and luxurious, yet still at less than $6 million, pretty modest for someone capable of giving away half a billion.

[flagged]

It's easy for some to give away money if they have it, but it's hard to accumulate that much money if you're one of those people.

Newmark maybe representing the occasional exception, most people who accumulate great wealth through their effort and ideas are afflicted with an addiction problem and have a hard time saying "this is enough for me". They become attached to how much more wealth they might be able to gather and recognize how the wealth they already hold plays a role in making the most of that.

Even if they somehow imagine themselves as philanthropists or minimalists, they tend to put off giving away too much too soon under the rationale that they'll be able to eventually share more if they hold out and use it more practically.

And if you don't have that kind of mindset, you're probably just not going to climb your way into the level of riches we're discussing here. You might still do quite well as far as most people are concerned, but that billionaire milestone is hard to catch without some propensity for wealth addiction.

Re: The founder of Craigslist has given away half a billion dollars

#50

Post by tripleee »

Rooster61 wrote: post #45
socalgal2 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

That's a very naive, but common, viewpoint of wealth. "Worth" 1.3 billion does not mean "has 1.3 billion lying around in liquid cash". Net worth is tied up usually in many bank accounts across multiple banks, securities, real estate, trusts, etc. And that's all excluding capital tied up in corporations/orgs. Freeing up and giving away half of a billion dollar net worth is a difficult and time consuming thing, one whi…

I promise they can afford to hire someone to do the difficult and time consuming thing here.
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