Billionaires should (not) exist?

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djm
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by djm » Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:02 am

Spartan26 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:00 am
How do you figure? What do you mean by more capitalist? I thought the number of people without access to clean water, education, and healthcare was rising. One third of the world's population is living in poverty, why is this number so high?[/quote]

By more capitalist, I mean more free market, more private sector and lower business and personal taxation. My country is pretty wealthy in world terms, all the better off countries have lower taxes and are more capitalist - Switzerland, Ireland and Singapore for instance. When I look at nations like North Korea, Venezuela and France I am not envious. There is a strong correlation between poverty and socialism. There is a strong correlation between capitalism and wealth.

The number of people with access to clean water education and healthcare has also been rising, and has never in human history been higher. The issue is largely one of population growth, bad governance and corruption. Africa is poor largely due to terrible governance. The billionaires you find there are somewhat less worthy than Gates and Bezos!
Utisz wrote:
Sun Apr 11, 2021 3:45 am
Billionaires are nothing more than competent opportunists who are in the right place at the right time. The idea that they should be worth so much as individuals is a glaring bug in the capitalist system that requires legislation to correct.
Might be the case for some, but for others it is through good ideas, hard work, talent and vision. I am not here to blanket defend all billionaires as wonderful human beings, the UK has some rather odious ones (Philip Green and Mike Ashley spring to mind), and some better ones (Alan Sugar, James Dyson). Thing is even the worst among them pay an awful lot of tax and employ a lot of people which is not to be despised. The better amongst them have built great companies, innovated and improved the world. As for 99% tax that is slavery, nobody should keep less of their earnings than they give in tax it is effectively forced labour. In the UK the top 5% pays for more than half of the tax take, they are more than contributing their share already.
Spartan26 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:00 am
While I'd be the first to admit that the work politicians do may be hard quantify, there could have been a number of lost opportunities had there not be the reduction of lead-based paint in children's toys and environment. The number of known carcinogenic elements in food has been greatly reduced and asbestos and other hazardous materials have been stricken leading to a rising life expectancy and better expected quality of life for senior citizens. Voting rights laws, anti discrimination laws. laws against sexual harassment, ensure a more just society which goes well beyond the donation of a generous family.
I am not anti having a state to legislate safety and environmental regulations, far from it. Billionaires existing does not prevent this, the two are not mutually exclusive. Interestingly in this country lead in paint disappeared many years before it was legislated away, it was still legal fairly recently but consumer pressure rid us of it before government did. Not that I think that government shouldn't have done so earlier.

I am in no way trying to paint all billionaires as a wonderful, I simply don't believe they are all evil or that taxing them into oblivion would improve anything. Or that having wealth is necessarily bad, or necessarily ill gotten.

djm
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by djm » Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:47 am

Utisz wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:08 am

Bill Gates has dedicated a large part of the wealth he will never use to philanthropic efforts, which at least means he is spending some of his wealth on something of worth. But the power he yields in the process is unchecked and unvetted and utterly disproportionate.

We can talk about his intent, but this guy is making decisions that affects hundreds of millions of people, even outside of the influence of his philanthropy. For example, he successfully convinced Oxford (who received massive amount of public funding) to not openly license their vaccine, but rather to license it to industry (they chose AstraZeneca). Was he in the right? What were the reasons? Did he pull some strings? Which ones?

Nobody knows. Zero transparency.
The Oxford Astra Zeneca vaccine research was paid for largely through the British tax payer. The vaccine is being made very efficiently by an Anglo-Swedish company and due to the British Government is being supplied to the world at cost. As far as I am aware the price is around £3 a vaccine, which is far cheaper than the Chinese Sinovac one or indeed any other vaccine on the market.

Whatever deal has been done has been a good one. Compare and contrast with how much money Pfizer are making.

Utisz wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:08 am
Bill Gates, Elon Musk, and Jeff Bezos are not innovative geniuses. They were lucky, mediocre opportunists, in the right place, at the right time, with the right idea, and the right shoulders to stand on, and the right people to exploit, like thousands of other people. If it were not them, it would be some other Fred Fucks or Sam Shits with the same idea a few months down the road.
Wealth like that does not just happen. Those people have all worked hard and are talented. There are plenty of billionaires that did not earn their wealth (Bezos ex wife for example) but those three have all worked at it. You do not go from a book shop in a garage to the worlds richest man without talent and work.
Utisz wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:08 am
As far as I can tell, there has not been a single person with a truly innovative idea more than a year ahead of its time since maybe Einstein (even Einstein is debatable). So how does progress happen? A slow collective war of attrition. That's not so sexy a story to get your funding with though. So we give Nobel prizes and patents and turn people into billionaires with houses we would like to occupy.

They run the last two meters of the relay and claim their hundreds of billions of dollars.
Can't agree with that at all. Patents are not easy to get and encourage investment in research and development. There are plenty of innovative ideas out there. Nobel prizes are not usually conferred to billionaires, although I admit some recent choices have been questionable (Dylan, Obama).
Utisz wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:08 am
Tim Berners-Lee invented the Web we are all using now. He was not an innovative genius either (though he has a far better claim than Gate and Bezos and Musk to that title) and chose not to patent the Web, but to make it open for society. Billions of people benefit from his selflessness every day. All of the jobs that Bezos and Musk have generated and all of the money they made can be traced back to him. And yet his net worth is a paltry $10 million. Any society that celebrates or rewards Gates or Bezos or Musk more than Berners-Lee is gravely misguided.
Regards Berners-Lee. I would hardly call $10m paltry. I used to share an office with his brother Mike, I never got the impression he felt hard done by.

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jyng1
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by jyng1 » Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:57 am

djm wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:02 am
There is a strong correlation between poverty and socialism. There is a strong correlation between capitalism and wealth.
Funny how the average U.S. wage is almost exactly the same as it was 40 years ago. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2 ... r-decades/

The average worker's take home pay would be $102,000 if wages had grown at the same pace as GDP. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/medi ... ?r=US&IR=T

Almost like capitalism needs a little socialism to keep it honest.

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ashi
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by ashi » Sat Apr 17, 2021 12:29 pm

Utisz wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:08 am
ashi wrote:
Fri Apr 16, 2021 11:00 pm
You speak far too kindly of them. Such extreme wealth is the fruit of rapidly growing inequality, the hideous expanding gut of these ravenous leeches pushing more and more people into the gutter as they valiantly reach for the stars on our behalf and in our name while contributing nothing to society beyond adding their own visage to the vast gallery of smug cunts to whom we might pray to be similarly blessed with the sociopathy needed to gleefully benefit from the misery of those around us.
I see the recipe wisely called for a teaspoon of Oscar Wilde.
Sorry, I don't care for fruitless arguing with the politically illiterate and chose another approach. In the future I will do as I should have from the start and just not comment.

djm
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by djm » Sat Apr 17, 2021 1:29 pm

jyng1 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:57 am
Funny how the average U.S. wage is almost exactly the same as it was 40 years ago. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2 ... r-decades/

The average worker's take home pay would be $102,000 if wages had grown at the same pace as GDP. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/medi ... ?r=US&IR=T

Almost like capitalism needs a little socialism to keep it honest.
The example that is most obvious is North Korea vs South Korea. Two halves of the same country following socialism vs capitalism for 50 years.

Similar experiment happened in Germany.

Romania, Poland, Czechia and the Baltic states are all doing a lot better since 1990. I don't know anyone in those countries that wants to go back to socialism anytime soon.

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jyng1
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by jyng1 » Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:41 pm

djm wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 1:29 pm
jyng1 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:57 am
Funny how the average U.S. wage is almost exactly the same as it was 40 years ago. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2 ... r-decades/

The average worker's take home pay would be $102,000 if wages had grown at the same pace as GDP. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/medi ... ?r=US&IR=T

Almost like capitalism needs a little socialism to keep it honest.
The example that is most obvious is North Korea vs South Korea. Two halves of the same country following socialism vs capitalism for 50 years.

Similar experiment happened in Germany.

Romania, Poland, Czechia and the Baltic states are all doing a lot better since 1990. I don't know anyone in those countries that wants to go back to socialism anytime soon.
Those states don't detract from my point. I'll give you that Socialism in the strictest sense where the State runs all business doesn't have a history of success, but a strict market economies also don't have a history of social equity.

I haven't looked too closely at it, but I hazard a guess the majority of the happiest/most liveable countries are mixed economies where they have more than a touch of socialism to keep the capitalists honest.

djm
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by djm » Sat Apr 17, 2021 9:20 pm

jyng1 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:41 pm


Those states don't detract from my point. I'll give you that Socialism in the strictest sense where the State runs all business doesn't have a history of success, but a strict market economies also don't have a history of social equity.

I haven't looked too closely at it, but I hazard a guess the majority of the happiest/most liveable countries are mixed economies where they have more than a touch of socialism to keep the capitalists honest.
Here in the UK, it is the socialists that need keeping an eye on for corruption. More than 35 labour MPs and councillors under investigation in the last six months! Liverpools mayor was recently arrested and the council there has had to be taken over due to corruption.

https://vote-watch.com/2021/04/08/break ... erborough/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/04/07/anoth ... legations/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/03/23/updat ... -in-derby/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/03/10/updat ... uncillors/

I don't advocate unbridled capitalism anymore than you do communism. I agree mixed economies have more to offer than either.

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jyng1
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by jyng1 » Sat Apr 17, 2021 9:34 pm

djm wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 9:20 pm
jyng1 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 8:41 pm


Those states don't detract from my point. I'll give you that Socialism in the strictest sense where the State runs all business doesn't have a history of success, but a strict market economies also don't have a history of social equity.

I haven't looked too closely at it, but I hazard a guess the majority of the happiest/most liveable countries are mixed economies where they have more than a touch of socialism to keep the capitalists honest.
Here in the UK, it is the socialists that need keeping an eye on for corruption. More than 35 labour MPs and councillors under investigation in the last six months! Liverpools mayor was recently arrested and the council there has had to be taken over due to corruption.

https://vote-watch.com/2021/04/08/break ... erborough/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/04/07/anoth ... legations/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/03/23/updat ... -in-derby/

https://vote-watch.com/2021/03/10/updat ... uncillors/

I don't advocate unbridled capitalism anymore than you do communism. I agree mixed economies have more to offer than either.
Corruption also doesn't detract from my point. In fact I'd postulate the major reason why Socialism fails is due to corruption.

Corruption is "built in" to Capitalism hence the average worker in the U.S. being $65,000 per annum worse off than they would be if wages had kept pace with GDP growth.

djm
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by djm » Sat Apr 17, 2021 10:49 pm

jyng1 wrote:
Sat Apr 17, 2021 9:34 pm
Corruption also doesn't detract from my point. In fact I'd postulate the major reason why Socialism fails is due to corruption.

Corruption is "built in" to Capitalism hence the average worker in the U.S. being $65,000 per annum worse off than they would be if wages had kept pace with GDP growth.
Wages have stayed the same for doing the same job, big deal. Don't like the job and think you can do better move. Thankfully living in the free world it is possible to do so, unlike in a socialist country.

avolkiteshvara
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Re: Billionaires should (not) exist?

Post by avolkiteshvara » Sat Apr 17, 2021 11:08 pm

Should taxes be higher for billionaires, probably.

Should we prevent anyone for achieving billionaire levels. I don't know. What is the different between a 100 Millionaire and a Billionaire.

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