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Most tech workers in SF are probably in the top 10-5% range. Adjusting for cost of living means that they are probably more or less middle class.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> A wealth tax is a tax on capital, period - and making capital more expensive hurts everyone, but it hugely hurts those who need capital the most. This doesn't really follow at all, and is directly in contradiction with your desire to get rid of Prop 13. Property taxes are the most common wealth tax!
Wrong. Property taxes mostly bear on land, not capital. Especially in heavily urbanized areas with lots of land value, as we see in CA. Landed property is not "wealth", it's just undue appropriation of something that is created by the community. Land taxes reverse this undue appropriation and let the community that actually created that wealth benefit from it, as it should. It's like the opposite of a wealth tax!
Likewise, the results of hoarding the vast wealth in the forms of property, land, legal entities that operate and depend on these same communities which generated them is damagingly extractive.
We should, too, somewhat reverse the hoarding of vast wealth and let our communities reap some benefit from the treasures they are capable of producing.
Breaking up big tech companies is undoubtedly good for the workers, create more competition in hiring. It would probably send money downwards and be a huge boon to innovation tbh.
The major damage big tech is doing is in my opinion dodging regulations or inventing business streams that have no regulation, moving as fast as possible to get a solid footing, and then asking the government to regulate them. Therefore, they lock the smaller guys out. Therefore, there’s little to no competition.
Can someone explain why SV tech workers are more left-wing to me as an outsider? I always thought these tech workers were more libertarian.
Libertarianism started on the far left - The "original libertarian", the anarcho-communist Joseph Dejacque, attacked Proudhon, the "original anarchist" for being a "moderate anarchist, liberal, but not libertarian" for his regressive views on women. Right-libertarianism was an attempt to unite the libertarian parts of the left with socially liberal elements on the right against authoritarian ideologies; their main di…
I don't think this is correct at all. What's called right libertarianism or laissez-faire capitalism emerged in the mid 20th century (e.g. Ayn Rand). It stole the term which had historically been a left term and simply cleansed it of its critique of corporate power.
Corporations are authoritarian, anti-democratic organizations that exercise a great deal of control over our economic lives. Laissez-faire capitalists saw an opportunity to use Left anti-authoritarian concepts to attack democratic state controls and regulations on corporate power. Often they will employ some mental gymnastics to redefine corporations as extensions of individual rights, hence the John Galt cult of personality stuff. This is akin to calling feudalism "liberty" because, think of the rights of kings. As such we have entered an era of unparalleled corporate power, control and concentration of wealth.
What exposes the sheer fraud of "right libertarianism" in Silicon Valley is that much of SV was created by the state and continues to be subsidized to the tune of billions annually. Look up DARPA.[1] So they're not even against state capitalism.
[1] https://unherd.com/2018/06/government-agency-made-silicon-va...
What a surprise. I'd love to be a billionaire, but I like Sanders opinions about whether they should exist. I'd love to be worth enough for it to hurt me, but I like Warren's wealth tax idea. I'd love to pay lower taxes, or less progressive taxes, but I'm happy to support those less fortunate. As a matter of fact, I'm not even a single-issue voter! Perhaps most controversially, I think altruism is good for society. S…
Can someone explain why SV tech workers are more left-wing to me as an outsider? I always thought these tech workers were more libertarian.
Antitrust concerns are reasonably bipartisan. The democratic candidates are getting traction with antitrust platforms because the time is right and they’re the presidential challengers. If Obama was still president, Josh Hawley (for example) would be running a similar primary campaign, with similar success.
The rage induced by that event got directed at Facebook initially and has now broadened to include all the big tech companies that profit from data collection.
If Hillary had won or in a theoretical world where Obama was still president then talk of breaking up Facebook/Google would still be a niche murmur.
Breaking up big tech companies is undoubtedly good for the workers, create more competition in hiring. It would probably send money downwards and be a huge boon to innovation tbh.
Well, maybe. But on the other hand, the biggest tech companies seem to pay the most? Why is that?
Also, if you need the best database developer, they might find their own lucrative vertical and/or disruptive passion project. It makes great sense to counter the potentially hypertensive corporate rigamarole with a fat paycheck. Similarly, if it would have convinced Elon Musk to forget about this EV thing and take a well funded engineering department at Daimler, well that might've felt like winning the hiring lottery.
Breaking up big tech companies is undoubtedly good for the workers, create more competition in hiring. It would probably send money downwards and be a huge boon to innovation tbh.
Big tech companies are able to try 100 things out instead of 1 because they can rely on their stable revenue streams to pay the bills. I’m not sure how it would be a boon to innovation but am open to learning why you think that. The major damage big tech is doing is in my opinion dodging regulations or inventing business streams that have no regulation, moving as fast as possible to get a solid footing, and then aski…
Is Apple trying 100 things out or are they hoarding insane amounts of cash in Ireland?
What a surprise. I'd love to be a billionaire, but I like Sanders opinions about whether they should exist. I'd love to be worth enough for it to hurt me, but I like Warren's wealth tax idea. I'd love to pay lower taxes, or less progressive taxes, but I'm happy to support those less fortunate. As a matter of fact, I'm not even a single-issue voter! Perhaps most controversially, I think altruism is good for society. S…
Wealth taxes are actually bad for society, and especially bad for altruistic people who care about the less fortunate. A wealth tax is a tax on capital, period - and making capital more expensive hurts everyone, but it hugely hurts those who need capital the most. If you care about lowering inequality without hurting folks more than you have to, what you want is a mildly-progressive consumption tax. (I.e. an income t…
This is some weird ideological bullshit. There is plenty of evidence that capital hurts markets and therefore society with those lacking capital ending up competitive and beneficial for society providing cheap high quality products and services, and those influenced by capital ending up monopolistic rent seeking monsters used against society to protect wealth.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Only in the same sense that's happening here, though. I assume you're talking about takes like "Why don't working class white voters vote for democrats?", which isn't fundamentally any different as I see it. It's a legitimate question, and the answers (in both cases) tell us things about how politics work in a way that simple analysis doesn't. And FWIW: as far as tone, this one seems more "accusatory" to me. There's…
The tone is accusatory because usually there is a classist dimension to the question. Why does a high income tech worker vote Democrat when that would cause her own taxes to go up? The question implies noble intent on the part of the tech worked: because it’s better for society as a whole. We don’t extend that charitable interpretation to the blue collar worker in Iowa. Why do they vote Republican even though Democra…
That's not a nuanced "better for the country" discussion.
It was a real discussion, in a real factory, not a fake discussion in a fake coffee shop.