Are people getting tired of all the billionaires and their billionairing?

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119873689#Comment_119873689

Because such wealth is disproportionate to their skill or effort. I'm not saying that they've no skill or don't put in any effort, but that such obscene wealth is not reflective of it.

Bezos's wealth increased 7 fold from 2012 to 2022, Musk's over 100fold. And both of them were billionaires at that point already. They, and many other Billionaires profit through being in the right place at the right time, and sometimes they have not exactly been too morally upstanding in either getting themselves in to that place, or ensuring that the events of that time happened as they did.

Both of them are strongly anti-union, optimise Government subsidies where they can and have paid disproportionally small amounts of tax on such wealth.

In that same period that Billionaires increased their wealth, the numbers of those who classify as living in poverty also increased significantly. These 2 events might not be directly related, but they are symptoms of policy that have favoured certain sectors of society over others.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119873777#Comment_119873777

So what?

There are a minuscule number of billionaires in the world, and apart from inheritance, they all have one thing in common, they cater to our needs or desires, that is what makes them rich. If you want to be rich, find something that no one, or few can do, then sell it to the masses. If you are just like everyone else, you don’t deserve to have what they have.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119873964#Comment_119873964

That's the whole point.

They don't want to put the work in, and instead want to do the easiest thing in the world - looking atop the hill with the man with a mansion, pointing the finger, and saying I want all his cash redistributed to all us little people down here, and then I can feel good about myself.

The politics of envy writ large.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119873964#Comment_119873964

So what?

The ten richest people on the planet hold the same wealth as the bottom 4Billion (Apparently it's actually much grater than a disparity than that, but let's go with that). And these 4Billions quality of life could be vastly improved if this wealth was more equally distributed.

None of these billionaires, at least those in existence today, can do something that no one else can do. Elon Musk is proving to us daily just how much this is the case. The main thing that most of them have in common is that they they have been lucky enough to benefit from a society that allows those who get ahead, to more easily keep expanding their wealth. Some to an obscene degree.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874091#Comment_119874091

Which of those 4billion invented Amazon/PayPal/Tesla/Microsoft etc?

If you can do what they can/did, prove it, let’s see you build a multi billion business.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874091#Comment_119874091

Throwing money at poor people doesn't help in the way that you think. It doesn't cure poverty.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874006#Comment_119874006

Who do you think works harder, Elon Musk, or an immigrant trying to work 2/3 jobs to support a family?

And before you twist what I am saying, I'm not saying they should be paid the same, or the immigrant should have his wealth, you referred to working hard, that's what I'm talking about.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874115#Comment_119874115

None of them. But Bezos didn't invent online shopping, he has just been lucky enough to be the primary person to capitalize on it because the market facilitated him doing so. The same with the Walton family, they didn't invent the department store, they have just capitalized on its existence.

Elon Musk didn't invent PayPal or Tesla.

Many people would laugh at the idea that Bill Gates invented computer applications such as word processors or spreadsheet applications etc but leaving that aside, the US literally forced him to split his company to avoid monopolization.

I'm not suggesting these guys shouldn't be wealthy, by all means give them 100's of millions, even single digit billions, but once their wealth starts going in to the tens or hundreds of billions, its gone beyond their input or value. At that point, they are exploiting something, or someone or often both. Capitalism says that that is fine, I disagree.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874172#Comment_119874172

Keeping it from them is a bigger problem.

Hungry Burger

Depends,

If they are Bill Gates and want to buy up half the arable farmland in America and fund various shady left wing NGO’s and causes = all good 🥰

If they are Elon Musk and want to create a social media platform where all viewpoints are welcome = bad man 😡

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874183#Comment_119874183

Bezos exploited a gap in the market to sell second hand books online. Now we can all sell **** online, but few of us can identify an opportunity, and then build it into a huge business. A lot of these people started with nothing, or very little, but had the foresight and/or talent to build extremely successful companies. It shows an incredible level of stupidity to say they are no different from everyone else, because the obvious retort would be, why then can’t everyone else do what they do/did?

It is also hypocritical, why should you earn more than anyone else who has your level of intelligence or your work ethic? The fact is that not all things are equal, and when Communists tried to make it so, it failed miserably. Saying that successful people shouldn’t accumulate wealth because others can’t, is to assume that everyone tries the same, thinks the same and has the same talent, which we all know simply isn’t the case. I wonder how many of those 4billion you speak of are layabout good for nothings who never worked a day in their life, will do as little as possible when they are working, or couldn’t be arsed trying to do/earn more?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874214#Comment_119874214

Elon Musk is worth around 200 billion I think.

If this wealth were spread around the population of India, that would be $6 for each Indian.

Poverty problem stopped? No.

A great entrepreneur destroyed? Yes.

200 billion sounds like a lot when it wouldn't go that far in solving poverty, barely a drop in the ocean.

Most of that wealth is tied up in stock and so on anyway, making the situation even worse than you're suggesting.

Sleepy

It's both incredible, and incredibly depressing, how far some will go to defend those that wouldn't even wash their arse before letting them lick it...

Elon Musk invented nothing, he got lucky in the dot com boom with a registry listing site he and his brother built with their family's apartheid based fortune and luckier again when he invested the over-inflated sale value of that company into paypal...

Jeff Bezos didn't invent anything or innovate in any way. He simply spotted the opportunity that on-line marketplaces represented and set out to try and create a monopoly in that space (as did many others at the time - Value America being one of the more spectacular failures). His main talent was convincing the markets to keep letting him burn their millions in order to get Amazon to a big enough market share that it could act as a virtual monopoly.

These guys aren't geniuses, they're simply rich. And they've got richer because governments all around the world have made it ridiculously easy to make even more money when you're already rich through legal tax avoidance.

jmayo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874115#Comment_119874115

Actually the "great" companies you mention I would say are just marketing successes over substance.

Microsoft the purveyor of shyte products, ideas nicked from others and then used it's position to drive competitors with better products out of the market if they didn't get to take them over.

Microsoft invented the business model where software developers sell the customer cr** half working products and then expect the customers to try iron out the bugs.

Tesla the manufacturer of shyte over priced cars that gimps are falling over themselves to buy as some sort of status symbol.

There is a reason that Tesla's are at the bottom of the JD Power Survey.

Amazon started off selling books online that were cheaper and often not always quickly accessible in bricks and mortar stores.

Of course you will tell us how great they are with their AWS offering, but you may forget to mention that was funded from massive reserves that they like others in your list have built up due to them paying shag all in taxes.

Fair enough Paypal was a good idea, but one could argue that some of the ones that followed have been better.

The one company that you didn't mention that had more of a true visionary and that was Jobs and Apple.

Then again he nicked his original ideas from Xerox.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874333#Comment_119874333

You don’t think creating the Amazon marketplace/PayPal/Microsoft/Apple/eBay/Stripe/Tesla etc was innovation?

The wheel was invented thousands of years ago, was strapping a chassis and engine to it not innovation?

Seriously? What was it then?

Bar inheritance and winning the lotto, few people get rich by doing the same as others who can’t see an opportunity and don’t have the talent to make it work to their benefit.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874260#Comment_119874260

A lot of these people started with nothing, or very little, but had the foresight and/or talent to build extremely successful companies. 

Gate's parents were highly educated, wealthy and had access at the corporate level to many of the countries biggest companies.

Bezos started Amazon with a 300K loan from his parent and other funding from family friends.

Musk grew up in an extremely wealthy and privileged family.

I'm not saying these guys are just run of the mill intellects, not at all, but they benefitted greatly from the circumstances that they were born into which allowed them to optimize their intellect and that opportunity. They are not the only people to be born in such circumstance and many (most) are nowhere near as successful as these guys, so fair play to them, but they're no Albert Einstein or Nikolai Tesla.

And lets put the communist strawman argument to bed, I'm not advocating for that. I'm advocating for more equitable distribution of wealth that is more reflective of actual contribution rather than luck of opportunity that some enjoy coupled with their hard work and intellect (which some have more than others).

A lot of these people started with nothing, or very little, but had the foresight and/or talent to build extremely successful companies. 

I wonder how many of those 4billion you speak of are layabout good for nothings who never worked a day in their life, will do as little as possible when they are working, or couldn’t be arsed trying to do/earn more?

Vastly less, as a percentage I expect than those who have been born in a world of easy access to opportunity and wealth.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874272#Comment_119874272

You do know that this post suggests that the population of India is about 33Billion?

You might want to have a think about that.

Musk himself previously claimed he could solver world hunger for 6B (3% of his current reported worth). When the UN gave him a pathway to do this, he went very quiet.

And, like with the last guy I've responded to, I'm not suggesting taking his wealth and distributing it in one singular payment. I'm advocating for improved working conditions and payment for people so that a single or handful of people don't grow vast wealth while many of the workers of the company struggle.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874333#Comment_119874333

I've never referred to Bezos or Musk as "geniuses". I'd reserve that title for the likes of Einstein and other experts in modern physics.

But they are very good businessmen.

All the armchair critics think being a highly successful businessman is easy, or that it's handed on a plate for you. When it really isn't.

Yet again more spite and vindictiveness against people just because they happen to be wealthy and successful.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874384#Comment_119874384

Did Gates parents invent Microsoft? Were Jobs parents in the garage when himself and Woz invented the first Apple computer? Were Bezos’s parent in their spare room when he and his wife packaged second hand books and posted them to buyers?

Surely you recognise that though they may have possessed the same skill set and opportunities as others at the time, they were different, and as a result of that, they benefitted.

What makes you, or me different to everyone else? Probably very little, but they are different to me and you, how do I know this? Because we didn’t/haven’t done what they have done, why is that?

jmayo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874359#Comment_119874359

Seriously in the grand scheme of automotive engineers Musk ranks, ehhh nowhere.

Oh wait he is the only guy to have created a successful automotive company in US since, I don't know Henry Ford.

BTW he didn't found it, he bought into it and then invested his already vast wealth.

And as Sleepy mentioned I think about Bezos, Musk was for some reason able to convince investors and customers to hang around and even weirder pay more that they originally agreed for their cars.

That is his greatest achievement.

He definitely aint no Diesel, Benz, Otto, Daimler, Porsche, Chapman, Ford or Piëch.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874439#Comment_119874439

This is just irrational hatred against billionaires, and nothing more.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874439#Comment_119874439

Jesus wept, Tesla is at the forefront of EV vehicles and technology, one of the greatest advances since the advent of the combustion car engine.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874406#Comment_119874406

Yet again more spite and vindictiveness against people just because they happen to be wealthy and successful.

Nope. Wrong.

I have little time for Musk/Bezos because they have simultaneously become 'beyond' wealthy while fighting against their workers being able to unionize to advocate for their collective rights. And they have done this while profiteering on massive government incentives and subsidies when, in the case of Bezos, a lot of their workers work a 40 hour week and still cannot have an acceptable standard of living.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874464#Comment_119874464

How many of those people does Jeff Bezos force to work for Amazon?

jmayo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874454#Comment_119874454

Would you mind telling us how many Tesla patents have Musk's name on them ?

You and the eskimo lad are one minute telling us what great innovators these lads are and then when that is debunked you revert to what great business men they are.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874497#Comment_119874497

A quick google shows that Tesla has 3300 patents globally. Surely you understand that the patents are registered by the company rather than by the main shareholder.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874473#Comment_119874473

You tell me.

He has decimated the retail market industry over the last 10 years.

Thousands of people who before might have had their own store, delivery service or whatever are now just worker bees in the Bezos metaverse.

The entire low-skilled work space has seen increased exploitation of workers over the last 50 odd years. The minimum wage reached it's peak in real value in 1968 and if had increased in line with inflation, would be $24 today rather than the $7.25 it is. CEO's used to earn about 19 times what their workers earn, now it's over 300 times the difference.

Telling people to shut up or go to another location where they are likely going to be treated in a similar exploitative manner is not the argument you think it is.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874532#Comment_119874532

These IP attorneys disagree with you.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874172#Comment_119874172

Bezos, Gates, Dell etc. had money thrown at them by their parents and it worked out really well.

fly_agaric

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119873689#Comment_119873689

Because it becomes incompatible with democracy when you have private entities + individuals with this level of power (given to them by their wealth if discussing people like Musk or Bezos/the huge resources + a monopoly or "too big to fail" position in the case of the large MNC companies, which is of course a connected problem).

As we all know, democracy in the US looks to be in no great shakes at all, and may not survive past next few years if the wrong/right people get their hands on the controls. I don't think these things (growth of inequality, the funnelling of wealth/resources into fewer hands and the rot eating away at US politics + society) are unconnected.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874250#Comment_119874250

I’m putting you in the tired bucket.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874272#Comment_119874272

$143.

It was real easy to check before posting.

With a median salary of $422 per month in India, this distributed to each person would be equivalent to a major stimulus release - like the ones conservatives blame for “nobody wanting to work anymore etc”

That actually is a lot of money and can provide upward mobility to countless Indians out of poverty…

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874706#Comment_119874706

I made a math error in haste, I admit.

That said, if you believe that $143 per person will solve the Indian poverty problem, then I have some seafront property in Offaly to sell you.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874651#Comment_119874651

Ok, I will,

Jeff Bezos does not force a single employee to take a job at Amazon against their will, not one.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874532#Comment_119874532

“Surely you understand,” that the inventors are still listed on the patent.

Again, folks, you don’t have to wait to fact check yourselves before you post.

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/03/65/95/169be679916bbc/US9536671.pdf

Only 10 of these patents you speak of have Elon credited as an inventor. Well, not even 10 Tesla patents.

https://patents.google.com/?inventor=Elon+musk&oq=Elon+musk

growleaves

There are strong corporatist elements to the success of Amazon, SpaceX, Tesla and others.

Amazon moved to a state (Ohio?) that gave tax exemptions to online businesses and then used these tax advantages to undercut all their competitors and then bury them.

France then prevented them from repeating this in their own market by giving legislative protection to SMEs in the bookselling trade.

"Tesla has received more than $3.2 billion worth of direct and indirect California subsidies and market mechanisms since 2009, according to an estimate from Newsom's office."

https://www.govtech.com/policy/gov-newsom-says-california-subsidies-powered-teslas-success

I do not like the fawning admiration for these CEOs and watching large corporate chains use regulations and tax tricks to wipe the floor with SMEs and put countless independents out of business is not edifying to me. WalMart and Microsoft too.

They haven't produced a superior product as such, just made use of political advantages to undercut on price. Well give me tax and other advantages over my competitors and I'll show you a successful business too.

Now granted life isn't fair and that's just how things go but then we are constantly being asked to admire and suck up to these people which I find distasteful.

Granted Tesla is impressive but then so was DeLorean - yet DeLorean that wasn't kept alive by endless subsidies. It went kaput.

Netscape, a casualty of Microsoft and Bill Gates' anti-competitive tricks, had a superior product in Navigator.

It isn't a free market at the top because there is too much at stake, so winners and losers are chosen to an extent. I would call it semi-corporatist at the very least.

Bezos should not be allowed to turn non-union workers into a slave army. Teddy Roosevelt broke up the railroads for less.

Antitrust legislation is long overdue for these companies which use their market share as a vehicle for direct interference in world affairs in the case of Bezos and Dorsey, and now Musk.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119872967#Comment_119872967

Your hero Bezos started selling books with his wife from his garage, with a little bit of help by way of a $250,000 investment from his parents. Sure any of us could have done the same, right?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874724#Comment_119874724

Are Tesla not the applicants, is it not a Tesla registered patent?. Though I do concede that the Tesla employees, or whom they bought it off are listed as the inventors, it is a Tesla assigned patent.

My point stands though, it is Tesla, not its main shareholder listed on the patent as the owner/assignee. Without Tesla/Musk the conditions would not exist for those patent applications, so saying he is not innovative because he isn’t the actual inventor is simple.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874713#Comment_119874713

Seen it lived it. Family of 4 gets a months national median salary.

11.7 million Americans lifted above the poverty line by stimulus:

https://www.census.gov/america-counts/impact-of-stimulus

By contrast the monthly US median salary is $6,000. The Stimulus was $1200(x2 or x3), about half a months salary.

The napkin stimulus you’re suggesting would imply that in fact that amount of money would be significant in the Indian economy where it would be more than the monthly median salary in stimulus, not half or doled out in breadcrumbs. That kind of stimulus could reshape the Asian economy.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874454#Comment_119874454

'Forefront of EV vehicles and technology, one of the greatest advances'

https://twitter.com/generalslug/status/1591868427932962816

https://twitter.com/jammonravager/status/1591869702598701058

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874764#Comment_119874764

"Above the poverty line" is temporary.

That money will exhaust quickly. The fundamental causes of the poverty problem will remain untouched.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874735#Comment_119874735

No Andrew, you might think you could, but you couldn’t, don’t kid yourself.

If you sold your house, all your assets and somehow got 250k together today, could you build a multibillion Euro company? In your dreams.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874772#Comment_119874772

The fundamental causes of the poverty problem will remain untouched.

You're so close to getting it.

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874772#Comment_119874772

Agree to disagree. You can research the US stimulus and you’ll find a lot of sugar rush injection but you’ll also find that some people turned that stimulus into fortunes via the game stonks episode. Countless other people used having 2 weeks salary in their account to get out from under **** horrible bosses, too, it underpinned the anti work movement and essentially flipping the jobs market from an employers market to a workers market where “nobody wants to work anymore” for exploitatively cheap wages attached to ridiculous work descriptions.

Overheal

Bezos lays off 10,000 employees while sending girlfriend into space in a phallus

https://gizmodo.com/jeff-bezos-amazon-big-tech-layoffs-amazon-prime-1849780290

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874859#Comment_119874859

Should we be concerned with what you spend your earnings on?

That is a click bait article, if he wants to pay for his girlfriend to go into space, more power to him, I don’t care if you send your partner out on the road in a new car, why should we care how he spends his money?

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874787#Comment_119874787

was my sarcasm not fairly obvious?

Overheal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874886#Comment_119874886

When he’s the benefit of public sector tax breaks in exchange for being a stable employer and does the shower above it’s the publics interest.

If you want to do all of the above while not engaging in regulatory capture and you pay all your taxes then I don’t give a duck.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874901#Comment_119874901

Sarcasm is never obvious on the internet in the absence of inflection.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874907#Comment_119874907

1% of total workforce when there has been a significant deterioration in worldwide financial conditions and after it expanded rapidly in the last year to cater for demand during the pandemic, it’s hard to argue that Amazon is an unstable employer.

Most people wouldn’t give a duck about your partners car even if you benefitted from Covid supports or tax breaks from the Government.

growleaves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119874936#Comment_119874936

More deniable corporatist advantages. Amazon were selling gangbusters when their competitors were barred from trading on very thin justifications - basically a media-fuelled germ panic.

DCC even shut outdoor food markets while large food manufacturers and supermarkets like Tesco were raking in money.