Should billionaires exist? 「Yes or No」

[Socialist Macronesia]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

[Ifreann]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

Your mistake is thinking that taking the wealth of billionaires would entail selling their shares on the open market.

[Lord Dominator]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

Your mistake is thinking that taking the wealth of billionaires would entail selling their shares on the open market.

If we're trying to use their wealth for government services it does.

[Takomah]

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

[Sanghyeok]

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

What a productive comment.

[Sanghyeok]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

Sure, quite a bit is in stocks (which I don't think should exist anyways, but I digress), but there's also a lot in offshore tax havens. There's a reason tax havens are used.

[Socialist Macronesia]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

Sure, quite a bit is in stocks (which I don't think should exist anyways, but I digress), but there's also a lot in offshore tax havens. There's a reason tax havens are used.

Why don't you think stocks should exist?

And yeah, tax havens should be investigated, but how are you supposed to get to those havens?

[Ifreann]

Your mistake is thinking that taking the wealth of billionaires would entail selling their shares on the open market.

If we're trying to use their wealth for government services it does.

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

---

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

Are you people already trying to steal cope?

[Nobel Hobos 2]

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

We'll tick the box for "opted-out of UBI" for you then?

[Sanghyeok]

Sure, quite a bit is in stocks (which I don't think should exist anyways, but I digress), but there's also a lot in offshore tax havens. There's a reason tax havens are used.

Why don't you think stocks should exist?

And yeah, tax havens should be investigated, but how are you supposed to get to those havens?

Different reasoning I won't mention here since it's not exactly relevant to discussion, but I might make a thread later. And we get rid of havens by removing the loopholes that led to them.

[Sanghyeok]

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

We'll tick the box for "opted-out of UBI" for you then?

More for the rest of us.

[Lord Dominator]

If we're trying to use their wealth for government services it does.

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

I wasn't sure if you were actually going to advocate either - as the former itself is rather radical (and liable to create perverse incentives if applied to corporations generally) and the latter doesn't actually fund the government to any greater degree.

[Chestaan]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

So then just divest the stock gradually? A few million here, ages million there. Not a huge issue.

To the topic at large, no they should not exist. Like it's absurd to the point where they wouldn't even be able to spend all their money in a lifetime if they did nothing but spend constantly. They don't even benefit from their own insane wealth. There is no moral justification for billionaires.

[Sanghyeok]

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

I wasn't sure if you were actually going to advocate either - as the former itself is rather radical (and liable to create perverse incentives if applied to corporations generally) and the latter doesn't actually fund the government to any greater degree.

Perhaps their second option doesn't fund government as well, but it certainly helps with making sure typical workers can live better lives.

[Lord Dominator]

I wasn't sure if you were actually going to advocate either - as the former itself is rather radical (and liable to create perverse incentives if applied to corporations generally) and the latter doesn't actually fund the government to any greater degree.

Perhaps their second option doesn't fund government as well, but it certainly helps with making sure typical workers can live better lives.

It certainly would probably do so, yes.

[Kubra]

Here's the problem:

Billionaires have lots of money. But they don't have Scrooge McDuck money pits full of gold coins. Most of the richest peoples' stuff is based on things like stocks. That means that a lot of their money is essentially trapped in ice. They can't just "give money" because the more stock they sell, the less money the stock is worth. If Bill Gates sold all his Microsoft stock, he'd end up crashing the stock price instantly, making his shares worth as much as broken glass, and tanking his net worth. You might make a few billion, but you'd essentially be destroying 50+ billion dollars in the market.

Taxing the rich might be a noble cause, but billionaires don't have a ton of tangible, real money to just give out.

So then just divest the stock gradually? A few million here, ages million there. Not a huge issue.

To the topic at large, no they should not exist. Like it's absurd to the point where they wouldn't even be able to spend all their money in a lifetime if they did nothing but spend constantly. They don't even benefit from their own insane wealth. There is no moral justification for billionaires.

They benefit from it from about the same way as monarch benefits from subjects.
You know, the cash is just a bonus.

[Ifreann]

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

I wasn't sure if you were actually going to advocate either - as the former itself is rather radical (and liable to create perverse incentives if applied to corporations generally) and the latter doesn't actually fund the government to any greater degree.

We're talking about imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires. That premise is radical, so it's strange to then complain "Oh but their wealth isn't very liquid " as if we can only take cash.

[Unojo]

yeah

[Kubra]

If we're trying to use their wealth for government services it does.

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

---

Yeah sure, cope harder all you greater gooders.

Are you people already trying to steal cope?

In fairness, "just nationalise it" has tended to be a shit plan. Folks look more at the profits they hope for rather than the boring drudgery of, you know, running the thing.
Which is why I, of course, prefer direct expropriation.

[Lord Dominator]

I wasn't sure if you were actually going to advocate either - as the former itself is rather radical (and liable to create perverse incentives if applied to corporations generally) and the latter doesn't actually fund the government to any greater degree.

We're talking about imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires. That premise is radical, so it's strange to then complain "Oh but their wealth isn't very liquid " as if we can only take cash.

I don't disagree on that front, though I don't actually think their wealth is particularly illiquid, it just requires not cashing it in all at once (which is probably logical anyways, if you're doing anything other than a one-off with the money).

[Cordel One]

*people who billionaires don't care about desperately attempting to defend their every action*

[Fahran]

Why? Where is that written? If we're imagining the government taking the wealth of billionaires, why would the government take shares and be stuck having to sell them off carefully so as to not crash the price? Why not just take the company? Take Microsoft, the whole company, and turn its profits to funding public services. Or better yet, give it to the workers.

Because seizing companies with scant justification entails actually running those companies profitably and risks causing sources of capital to shrink as investors begin to look with greater suspicion on American investments since they can be arbitrarily seized at any point in time. And $143 billion extra a year doesn't even plug our deficit spending all that much. "The workers" in the abstract cannot run a large corporation. You're going to need management - which might well come from the union or from a government board, opening an entirely new can of worms.

The best solution for raising revenues or redistributing currency is a tax hike on income and capital gains at the higher brackets. You could probably get away with nationalizing certain natural resources and public services as well, but I would reinvest the profits into infrastructure and diversification to sustain or increase productive output rather than spending on social welfare - which should principally come from tax revenues.

[Fahran]

*people who billionaires don't care about desperately attempting to defend their every action*

Hating billionaires simply because they're billionaires or are "exploiting the workers" is financially and economically illiterate. I dislike certain billionaires because of how they run their businesses. For instance, I think Bezos is an ass who treats his workers poorly and implements remarkably poor internal controls. Beyond that, I think we have to look at our entire economy, our governmental fiscal and monetary policy, and our society as a whole when making decisions about taxation, economic organization, and such. Whether or not billionaires exist becomes a very unimportant consideration in that context.

[Cordel One]

*people who billionaires don't care about desperately attempting to defend their every action*

Hating billionaires simply because they're billionaires or are "exploiting the workers" is financially and economically illiterate. I dislike certain billionaires because of how they run their businesses. For instance, I think Bezos is an ass who treats his workers poorly and implements remarkably poor internal controls. Beyond that, I think we have to look at our entire economy, our governmental fiscal and monetary policy, and our society as a whole when making decisions about taxation, economic organization, and such. Whether or not billionaires exist becomes a very unimportant consideration in that context.

I wrote a bit addressing the economic factors on page 1

[Fahran]

I wrote a bit addressing the economic factors on page 1

Given I think that the labor theory of value is complete nonsense on a fundamental level, I didn't find your argument altogether persuasive. Labor has no intrinsic value, and that becomes apparent almost immediately when we take the example of an incompetent baker compared to a maestro baker or, even more magnificently, when we substitute the incompetent baker for a child creating mudpies.

Marxism is refuted by high school economics.