Should Billionaires exist at all?

[Doctor Amadeus]

Now I understand there are political differences when it comes to economic systems and I can respect that, I would have put this in politics and if that is ultimately where this belongs I apologies in advance.

The question is meant more for the concept itself, even if you are through and thru capitalist, left or right, conservative or liberal, and obviously more than an idea we have Elon Musk, Jeff Bezo's so on and so fourth.

The question is just about

Considering all that being a billionaire means in terms of the entire EARTH, resources and responsibilities that effect everyone Should Billionaires exist at all?

Personally, I am not going to lie growing up I always though "Who Cares" similarly I had the same feeling towards "Family Wealth" I have never hated anyone for being extremely rich, nor having things I and many people don't at the end of the day especially if they were working and doing something I ultimately didn't want.

Gold toilets, and 50+ Cars for one individual really in and of itself never bothered me.


HOWEVER at what expense beyond they have and others don't I say this because what if the majority of the world starves, can't find homes or dies as a result of lack of care, because the resources of the planet are left to unelected few.

For me it is a simple NO, there is never anything any one person or a group collectively, EVER EARN where their choices especially by todays metrics should allow those kinds of resources in that way

So Again what do you think should there ever be Billionaires, if so under what conditions, and is there ever TOO MUCH for any on person to have while so many have NOTHING?

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

Nobody ever became a billionaire without stepping over a lot of bodies on their way to the top.

[Fencers]

No. You can not be a billionaire without lopsided exploitation.

[schmonz]

It scares the shit out of me that a guy like elon musk is that powerful thanks to his wealth. I just have to read some of his twitter posts to know he is not someone who should have any notable power.

[Heathy]

Seems like a difficult concept really seeing as, it isn't a one size fits all scenario, Gates has done a fair amount of good with his wealth so he's probably the most altruistic. If you build something or invent something good enough that millions of people buy it, and you become a billionaire, I don't really see anything inherently wrong with that. at the same time, there probably should be a wealth cap, just so that it doesn't become stupid. Maybe after you have so many billions in capital, you just get a 100% tax rate until you fall below that threshold. It seems like it infringes on freedom, but it would probably make sense to do something like this. Most of that money would (hopefully)likely either go to lowering the debt or welfare. At least it would stay in circulation and not sit in a bank account somewhere.

[molliewoof]

as long as all of their employees earn enough money on reasonable hours to live good lives no worries at all.

I doubt any billionaire can say that.

I don't mind people having more money than me

[Ivanstone]

Gates has done a fair amount of good with his wealth so he's probably the most altruistic.

He looks altruistic now. He still sometimes supports shitty causes like Charter schools.

And then we have to remember how he got that money in the first place.

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as long as all of their employees earn enough money on reasonable hours to live good lives no worries at all.

I doubt any billionaire can say that.

Barre Seid apparently treated his employees well.

He still fucked American democracy in the ass by donating hundreds of millions to shitty causes.

[Doctor Amadeus]

Nobody ever became a billionaire without stepping over a lot of bodies on their way to the top.

Without struggle is there ever progress?

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No. You can not be a billionaire without lopsided exploitation.

Is that because there is an inherent flaw in whatever system or is that just a system not accounting for the choices of individuals?

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It scares the shit out of me that a guy like elon musk is that powerful thanks to his wealth. I just have to read some of his twitter posts to know he is not someone who should have any notable power.

Yeah that Starlink situation in Ukraine really really made me agree with you here. Whether Elon is all Good or All evil by other peoples metric, the fact that he was able to have the kinds of resources to actually play god with peoples lives without ever having been elected by anyone made me less angry or targeting him alone, but more any mechanism that could allow for this.

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Seems like a difficult concept really seeing as, it isn't a one size fits all scenario, Gates has done a fair amount of good with his wealth so he's probably the most altruistic. If you build something or invent something good enough that millions of people buy it, and you become a billionaire, I don't really see anything inherently wrong with that. at the same time, there probably should be a wealth cap, just so that it doesn't become stupid. Maybe after you have so many billions in capital, you just get a 100% tax rate until you fall below that threshold. It seems like it infringes on freedom, but it would probably make sense to do something like this. Most of that money would (hopefully)likely either go to lowering the debt or welfare. At least it would stay in circulation and not sit in a bank account somewhere.

I agree gates has done a lot of good, but I do think it's hard to ignore the cemetery (figuratively) from which he stands on that allowed for it.

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as long as all of their employees earn enough money on reasonable hours to live good lives no worries at all.

I doubt any billionaire can say that.

I don't mind people having more money than me

I use to kind of agree with this, again anyone having something you don't could be for a variety of reasons. Maybe Elon Musk has his level of success for a great deal of a many things for which I don't care about. I don't care if he has solid gold toilets if everyone he deals with is compensated fairly.

The PROBLEM is that is goes so much deeper than the trivial, it's environmental. It doesn't really matter who it is, no one should ever have soo much power over the very course of the planet, and love or hate Elon if there was or could be it shouldn't be an unelected person like him.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

Without struggle is there ever progress?

What "struggles" has Elon Musk ever faced? He was already a Millionaire the day he was born.

[Doctor Amadeus]

What "struggles" has Elon Musk ever faced? He was already a Millionaire the day he was born.

True.

However without Elon would we have infrastructure being developed for electric cars or battery development for solar or alternative energy sources?

What about Space X.


Now I’m not starting all those things as facts because of him. But it could be argued. Without them those things might not be reality in the way it is now.

[draynay]

Survival of the fittest? It's the second time I've seen this misused in recent threads, do people have no concept of what these words mean? Billions of dollars don't help you "survive" all they do is funnel resources from those that need it to those that don't, creating scarcity where there need not be any - the billionaires are hindering not promoting survival.

[Daedius]

Nobody ever became a billionaire without stepping over a lot of bodies on their way to the top.

Taylor Swift is a cold blooded killer.

[PACOX]

Taylor Swift is a cold blooded killer.

She may or might have stepped on others, but the concert industry that generates her revenue certainly does. Not her fault, thats reality. A billionaire themself might just have been smart or luvked out. When people say billionaires, they aren't saying rich people shouldn't exist, but that level of wealth shouldn't exist while that capital can be used better distributed. There are a lot of questionable practices involved for one person to amass that kind of wealth. Lots of monopoly money being thrown around - someone or multiple in the chain between consumer and billionaires exploiting something/someone.

After a certain point the money is actually useless - it's just taking resources out of the economy without putting it back in. Thus the whole concept of why people are allowed to just hold onto so much capital while others scramble for basic necessities becomes questionable

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True.

However without Elon would we have infrastructure being developed for electric cars or battery development for solar or alternative energy sources?

What about Space X.


Now I’m not starting all those things as facts because of him. But it could be argued. Without them those things might not be reality in the way it is now.

Without Musk would we have the infrastructure for electric cars?

We would. He didn't invent the infrastructure and it's subsidized by the government. The actual problem is government incentive because of the government just did it people would yell 'communism'. So smart people learned how to funnel infrastructure through corporations even if some are headed by slimy undeserving like Elon Musk.


Same goes for SpaceX. The engineers that actually do the work, the fabricators, the accountants, etc exist without Musk. Hell half the tech was sitting around before SpaceX. It's was caught of in bureaucracy. SpaceX is HEAVILY a way for NASA to funnel dollars into rocket RND, to actually get stuff off the ground, without having to deal with Congress and stank defense contractors that spent decades messaging up the field for profit.

The engineers that SpaceX employ should have just been working down the street, literally, but on projects that probably constantly get cancelled because of the way NASA funding works.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

True.

However without Elon would we have infrastructure being developed for electric cars or battery development for solar or alternative energy sources?

What about Space X.


Now I’m not starting all those things as facts because of him. But it could be argued. Without them those things might not be reality in the way it is now.

None of those things are because of Elon Musk.

Electric cars and alternative energy sources would probably be a lot farther along if it wasn't for the billionaires in the Fossil fuel industries lobbying against them.

[Karreck]

Billionaires are a blight upon society and should not exist.

[cubby]

No. Capitalism, and the "rights" it's been given, shouldn't even exist. The resources exist on the planet for everyone to live a comfortable life doing what they want for the most part, yet here we are.

There is a terrific fictional book, called The Ministry for the Future, by Kim Stanley Robinson, and he postulates methods and solutions to move away from systematic and hurtful wealth. In the book, he ends up capping the future society at $50MM of individual wealth. There are some good ideas in there about what one particular path could look like if we started thinking about the future.

[Hotmail]

Definitely. Who else are we going to eat once the apocalypse happens?

[NED funded]

Depends on the type of billionaire. Tech billionaires dont bother me as much as finance billionaires do. Being a tech billionaire means that you swasbuckled your way into that level of wealth on an idea that couldve failed at any moment. Finance billionaires are parasites through and through.

[Raeph]

What kind of billionaires are we talking about?

I can identify at least four kinds: knowledge workers, lucky salesman, robber barons and legacy.

Knowledge workers (people or persons who leverage unique skill or knowledge to meet an unknown need or desire) - Markus Persson, the man who solo created the original version of Minecraft and after years of supporting it as a side project he sold out to Microsoft for 2.5billion

Lucky Salesman (people or persons who are the last people standing after financial crisis and have just enough infrastructure to sell goods in the aftermath) - Jeff Bezos, started with selling books in the 90s and through investments in infrastructure, dips and rises in the market, and flat-out lucking out during dotcom, 2008 and Covid is now worth about $205 billion, mainly in Amazon stock.

Robber Baron (people or persons who are willing to sell anything to anything to anyone at the highest price they can extract from the market regardless of the long-term value of the good they are selling) - Mark Cuban, started as a street smart-ish technology salesman in the 80s and 90s and through some early investments in dotcom bubble turned a website called Audionet into broadcast.com and during the height of the dotcom bubble was able to sell it to Yahoo for 5.7 billion in 1999. In 2016 Verizon bought Yahoo for 4.83 billion.

Legacy (people who inherited/deeded/settled their wealth): Koch brothers, Makenzie Scott, Walton Family, etc.

The first I would argue is a good thing as the large scale success of a small group of knowledge workers can show where there is a need and bring in more people to provide for that need. You can make the argument that minecraft led to a resurgence in small scale game studios that have had mixed success but has lead to an increase in jobs in that global market.

The second is more problematic in that institutional investors are then encouraged to invest only in companies controlled by these billionaires with large infrastructure that have a conservative approach to R&D and business expansion and are not looking for new ideas and ventures anymore but are simply looking for what kind of business will survive the next storm.

Third is a problem because these people are looking only for wealth extraction from the market for a short term benefit that can damage their partners, customers and investors irreparably as they exit the market after making a sale of dubious value.

Legacies are a mixed bag and mostly seem to be fairly useless overall outside of the first generation. Makenzie Scott has given away about a quarter of the shares of Amazon stock she gained in her divorce from Jeff Bezos but the value those stocks has increased since she acquired them in the settlement and her donation "speed" for lack of a better word has slowed down some in the last few years. The other family legacy billionaires generally have so many people that have say over what happens to the trust of family funds that it takes years if not decades for any decisions on the principle of the family funds to change from whatever conservative investment strategy is and the only thing the trust beneficiaries really can spend is the disbursements they gain each year from the interest and dividends from their families investments.

So of those four categories: good, meh, bad and meh.

Should they exist? I would argue the existence of a billionaire or multibillionaire doesn't change much because when we are talking about a billionaire we aren't talking about someone who has a swimming pool of money that they swim in as they flip off the rest of the world rather they represent someone who has an ownership stake in a large portion of the world economy that is usually tied up in a combination of digital, paper and physical assets. Generally this means they want to profit off of that ownership stake and that concept is really one that should wrestled with.

If you have an ownership stake in something should you expect to earn a profit from it?

If yes, then you can ask questions about how much profit is moral and what restrictions do you place on that profit generated.
If no, then you can ask questions like "What is the point of owning anything at all then?".

[Twdft]

Nobody ever became a billionaire without stepping over a lot of bodies on their way to the top.

Yeah, the exploiting needed to get to so much inequality between the people working to achieve the billionaires wealth is the problem. Maybe make a law that everyone working for a billionaire has to be paid 10x minimum wage. I guess noone would have a problem with Bezos buying his fourth yacht if every single one of his employees makes at least 10x minimum wage.