Do billionaires deserve their money?

[Ostroeuropa]

If you had started working at the neolithic revolution, the beginning of human civilization, and worked every single year at the current US Median wage and never spent a single penny, you would have half a billion dollars.

As a further example, let's examine facebook. Mark Zuckerberg has 135 billion dollars.

( https://www.businessinsider.com/meet-th ... ?r=US&IR=T )

Human civilization would need to be 270 times older than it currently is in order for the above to equalize with a perpetual job at the median wage, through all the ages. Hunting mammoths for centuries, making stone tools a while, smelting copper, smelting bronze, smelting steel, all the way up the whole line of human progress in working class jobs. (And i'm already stacking the deck. The working class do not earn the US median wage.).

Does anybody actually believe that the service billionaires provide to humanity exceeds the service of the entirety of the working class throughout all of human history, and if so, how do you justify that in non-circular terms?

What I mean by that is, if you respond to the above observation with "Well they deserve it because that is what capitalism has afforded them" rather than notice "If they are afforded this, then clearly capitalism is not a functional mechanism for distributing what people deserve", by what justification do you do so?

Does anybody actually believe that Mark Zuckerberg has achieved a reward proportional to his contributions, and if you concede that it is wildly disproportionate, what concern can there by from "Disincentivizing" people like him through taxation? Surely, provided the reward is proportional, there is no issue.

[Vistulange]

"Deserve", I feel, is an incredibly subjective term. I don't think discussing whether somebody "deserves" something is productive. As in, it won't be a fruitful discussion—the space of agreement is highly individualistic. You and I may agree that Tim Cook has deserved his billions for some reasons, while disagree on Elon Musk's wealth for other reasons, and so forth.

That being said, it's still a good issue to bring up. For the record—and I'm intentionally not going to use the word "deserve"—I don't think concentrating that much wealth in the hands of an individual (or 500, or 50,000; the fact remains that there are about 8 billion people on the planet) is a good idea no matter how you look at it. It's harmful from a number of perspectives. I don't need to be a Marxist to argue such.

Hell, once you get to 100 million, they should just give you a bloody plaque and say "congratulations, you won capitalism—now fuck off" and siphon the rest of your wealth to redistribution schemes.

[WayNeacTia]

what concern can there by from "Disincentivizing" people like him through taxation? Surely, provided the reward is proportional, there is no issue.

Innovation comes to a stand still. After all what's the point of inventing something, if you can't patent it and milk the fuck out of it?

[Soveiniesberg]

i mean, didn't billionaires technically earn their money?

[Ostroeuropa]

"Deserve", I feel, is an incredibly subjective term. I don't think discussing whether somebody "deserves" something is productive. As in, it won't be a fruitful discussion—the space of agreement is highly individualistic. You and I may agree that Tim Cook has deserved his billions for some reasons, while disagree on Elon Musk's wealth for other reasons, and so forth.

That being said, it's still a good issue to bring up. For the record—and I'm intentionally not going to use the word "deserve"—I don't think concentrating that much wealth in the hands of an individual (or 500, or 50,000; the fact remains that there are about 8 billion people on the planet) is a good idea no matter how you look at it. It's harmful from a number of perspectives. I don't need to be a Marxist to argue such.

Hell, once you get to 100 million, they should just give you a bloody plaque and say "congratulations, you won capitalism—now fuck off" and siphon the rest of your wealth to redistribution schemes.

I think that while it's highly subjective there reaches a point where the only way you can claim somebody "deserves" something is by axiomatically and self-referentially claiming capitalism decides who deserves what. I think the example above highlights how nobody can realistically claim billionaires have "earned" their money by providing something of value proportionate to their reward.

This then suggests that capitalism is not only bad for practical reasons like you note, but patently unjust unless you self-referentially claim "It's the same thing as justice and therefore it is just".

Like we can subjectively disagree over how tall is tall. But if you show me somebody who is 10,000 metres tall, and someone described him as "Very tall", I think the extreme has been reached where nobody would disagree because even as subjects, we all have similar experiences.

[Hispida]

no. /thread

[Ostroeuropa]

what concern can there by from "Disincentivizing" people like him through taxation? Surely, provided the reward is proportional, there is no issue.

Innovation comes to a stand still. After all what's the point of inventing something, if you can't patent it and milk the fuck out of it?

To receive a reward proportional to your work.

[Ostroeuropa]

i mean, didn't billionaires technically earn their money?

They stole it mate. That's how they make their money. By leeching off workers, who actually produce wealth.

[Umeria]

what concern can there by from "Disincentivizing" people like him through taxation? Surely, provided the reward is proportional, there is no issue.

Innovation comes to a stand still. After all what's the point of inventing something, if you can't patent it and milk the fuck out of it?

There must be some point, as plenty of innovation has occurred where there isn't a huge reward for doing so.

[Kanaka Maol]

People who worked hard all there life and use their money for good: yes, they definitely deserve it
People who got heir money through illegal or wrong means (Slavery like Factory work, Robbery’s, ETC.) or People who don’t use it for good: no, they definitely shouldn’t be Billionaires

[WayNeacTia]

Innovation comes to a stand still. After all what's the point of inventing something, if you can't patent it and milk the fuck out of it?

To receive a reward proportional to your work.

I suppose if you take the basic human trait of greed out of the picture, then yeah.....

[The Black Forrest]

Some do.

They don’t deserve all the benefits and protections the two parties give them….

[Ostroeuropa]

To receive a reward proportional to your work.

I suppose if you take the basic human trait of greed out of the picture, then yeah.....

As we all know, literally all of human history never innovated anything. It was only when the Billionaire came into existance, that fire was discovered. Before 1916 when the first billionaire came, it was a notoriously uninventive time. And that's why billionaires are the cause of most scientific discoveries, not scientists being funded by public research grants.

[Atlantic Federalist Republic]

i mean, didn't billionaires technically earn their money?

They stole it mate. That's how they make their money. By leeching off workers, who actually produce wealth.

Bilionaires get rich by taking advantage and sucking poverty, but for starters, many of them were geniuses at first, but then with money and power they end up corrupting.

[Ostroeuropa]

Some do.

They don’t deserve all the benefits and protections the two parties give them….

How do you figure they have done something to deserve such a large amount of money?

[WayNeacTia]

Some do.

They don’t deserve all the benefits and protections the two parties give them….

How do you figure they have done something to deserve such a large amount of money?

They haven't, nor do they actually have the money. Most billionaires possess stock options, that are "worth" billions of dollars.

[Atlantic Federalist Republic]

Some do.

They don’t deserve all the benefits and protections the two parties give them….

How do you figure they have done something to deserve such a large amount of money?

Many started with incredible ideas, or were way ahead of their time.
Elon Musk, was very smart as a child, created an electronic game. And that's pretty impressive for a 12-year-old.

[Umeria]

$999 million is plenty of money. Also two of the poll options are the same

They haven't, nor do they actually have the money. Most billionaires possess stock options, that are "worth" billions of dollars.

Then how could they have innovated if there's no huge reward???

[Ostroeuropa]

How do you figure they have done something to deserve such a large amount of money?

Many started with incredible ideas, or were way ahead of their time.
Elon Musk, was very smart as a child, created an electronic game. And that's pretty impressive for a 12-year-old.

No idea is worth this amount of money.

[WayNeacTia]

$999 million is plenty of money. Also two of the poll options are the same

They haven't, nor do they actually have the money. Most billionaires possess stock options, that are "worth" billions of dollars.

Then how could they have innovated if there's no huge reward???

The joys of limited liability, public corporations....

[Fourth Jellian Republic]

Out current system rewards wealth, not work, and as long as that stands, you will concentrate more and more wealth into the hands a few oligarchs,
It’s much scarier now than it was in the oil boom with the barons for old because now with AI, mass data collection, and the up coming neuralAink (which may or may not happen) we are setting up for a real dystopia.

So no, I do not believe such amounts of wealth are “deserved”

[Vistulange]

I don't think it's pertinent to the overarching issue whether a person has $500 million as assets, $999 million, or $1 billion. I'm guessing, just maybe, that it's more to do with the massive inequality that we observe alongside it.

[The Black Forrest]

$999 million is plenty of money. Also two of the poll options are the same

They haven't, nor do they actually have the money. Most billionaires possess stock options, that are "worth" billions of dollars.

Then how could they have innovated if there's no huge reward???

So the billionaires are the innovators…creators…. I have feeling most are not. Simple taxes keep them in the game…..

[Ostroeuropa]

How do you figure they have done something to deserve such a large amount of money?

They haven't, nor do they actually have the money. Most billionaires possess stock options, that are "worth" billions of dollars.

Money is simply a stand-in for value anyway. It is wealth that matters. The stock options have financial value. It wouldn't matter what they were paid in, it's still far too much.

[Atlantic Federalist Republic]

Many started with incredible ideas, or were way ahead of their time.
Elon Musk, was very smart as a child, created an electronic game. And that's pretty impressive for a 12-year-old.

No idea is worth this amount of money.

It really depends on the idea. And man, most billionaires are not that rich because of their ideas, but because of selling them or simply, rich family.