I want to have a serious conversation on this if possible. As devil’s advocate, if I want to start a business that helps people, what would I have to do to not run afoul and garner this type of criticism? Are you indicating that I must relinquish my business once it gets too big and that I am only entitled to a certain amount of success? Are you indicating that I must pay my workers far beyond what the free market dictates they are worth? Trying to understand how those are my issues. It would seem to me that these would need to change with far reaching government policies. Those policies in many ways go against capitalist principles when you start to consider having to pay a janitor for a company hundreds of thousands of dollars if the company is successful and employees are paid in revenue share. That makes far less sense than the owner of the company reaping the benefit of their innovation. I would also argue that an entrepreneur will potentially use these earnings more interestingly than a janitor, potentially to start additional businesses that help the public by increasing offerings and jobs.
I don’t really have a direct reply to these ideas but I would like to point out an interesting example of a business model that addresses some of these concerns, that is the worker cooperative, where the workers have some portion of ownership of the company, either in revenue sharing or decision making.
My take? The issue I have with the mega rich is that they (generalization here) aren’t playing by the same rules as you or I. I don’t have an issue, with not paying all of your employees 6 figures. Different jobs, skills, training, and capabilities are (and should be) worth different amounts of money. It’s important that people with good ideas, or business capabilities have avenues of expanding, bettering themselves, and enjoying the fruits of their labor.
When you pay money to write rules that are favorable to you, you become the problem. Money in politics is the problem. Imo, that has enabled all of this. Don’t have good healthcare? Likely it was lobbied for because someone wanted more money. Stuck in prison? Oh yeah, money in politics got you there. Minimum wage hasn’t kept up with inflation? Something, something trickledown-bullshit, money in politics. Kids killed in school constantly? Oh you know…FUCKING MONEY IN POLITICS.
Favorable can be lobbying against health & safety or environmental regulations because it impacts your bottom line. It is donating to political campaigns for tax cuts (you know, fucking bribery). It’s blocking minimum wage hikes to secure your bottom line.
All of that said, how people sleep at night with absurd amounts of money and minimal charity is disgusting. I don’t fault someone for enjoying an oppulant lifestyle…I do fault someone for Scrooge McDucking and hoarding cash…for what? Bragging rights? Power?
If you’re paying your employees what they’re worth (not the minimum the market will bear, but actually in line with the value they contribute), and you’re still making Bezos money, then you’re fleecing your customers.
There’s no way to get to a billion dollars without 1) exploiting your labor and supply chain by taking advantage of capitalist forces to pay less than the value of their contribution or 2) exploiting your customers by taking advantage of capitalist forces to charge more than the value of your product. Usually both, to extreme degrees, enabled by monopolies, regulatory capture, collusion, and other capitalist tricks. That’s not “a business that helps people”.
No matter how “innovative” an entrepreneur is, the actual value of their product or service is generated by the people who actually do the work. Of course, you’re entitled to the value that you personally create, but the best business idea in the world is worth exactly zilch without implementation. Bezos doesn’t build those fulfillment centers, he doesn’t manufacture the products, he doesn’t pack the boxes, he doesn’t drive the trucks, he doesn’t program the website. He only has the wealth he does because he pays the people that generate the value of his company the absolute minimum that he can get away with, skimming a big slice of everyone’s labor value for himself. That doesn’t help the public.
You don’t give him enough credit. He worked extremely hard to make Amazon what it is today. Additionally, he took major risks to his credit where he convinced investors to fund a new form of supply chain. He is reaping the reward of taking entrepreneurial risks and creating something innovative. I don’t know how you can say that Amazon doesn’t help people. Their prices are in-line with the market and no one can touch their shipping costs. Their warehouse jobs are demanding, but they explain that to anyone getting into it. In time, the people will mostly be replaced by robots anyways. The employees want more money, but robots work for free. If anything, we should be very interested in potentially implementing UBI and a VAT on automation per Andrew Yang.
He did not work multiple billions of dollars hard. No one can possibly work multiple billions of dollars hard. Bezos is worth 157 billion, and he’s 59 years old, which averages to over $10 million per day since he was 18. Are you seriously suggesting that he has done 100 times more work, every single day of his life, than someone making $100,000 does in a whole year? Sure, he had some good ideas, and deserves to be fairly compensated, but that’s monstrously out of proportion.
Capitalism does not, and has never, fundamentally rewarded hard work. Capitalism, fundamentally, rewards having a bunch of money to buy the rights to the value of the hard work of others. The most reliable way to get rich in capitalism isn’t even to have great business ideas, it’s to be born with rich parents so you can buy lots of shares in a company, and then use your shares to demand the company prioritize maximum dividends and minimum employee compensation. The investors that actually contribute meaningful ideas are a coincidential minority at best.
Sure, UBI and VAT are valuable ideas, but the main problem is that the robots will be owned by rich investors who made their money by being born rich enough to throw money at ventures that made them richer.
The actual solution is vesting the employees who actually create value with shares of the means of production they use to create that value. When the workers are the shareholders, they are actually compensated for their hard work, and the problem solves itself.
I don’t think there is a simple answer to this question. Not bribing politicians for favours, not exploiting workers and not selling substandard goods might be considered a basic minimum. Beyond this, there have been businessmen who tried to help their employees (or society as a whole), such as Ernst Abbe of Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung and John Spedan Lewis of JLP / Waitrose.
This is an easy question to answer. Look at Henry Ford and look at Bezos and his type (oh for example Walmart, etc). Ford wanted his workers to be able to afford the product he was making, and he even lost a landmark case because he was looking out for the best interest of his employees and his customers, from wikipedia:
Dodge v. Ford Motor Company, 204 Mich. 459, 170 N.W. 668 (Mich. 1919)[1] is a case in which the Michigan Supreme Court held that Henry Ford had to operate the Ford Motor Company in the interests of its shareholders, rather than in a manner for the benefit of his employees or customers. It is often taught as affirming the principle of “shareholder primacy” in corporate America, although that teaching has received some criticism
I want to have a serious conversation on this if possible. As devil’s advocate, if I want to start a business that helps people, what would I have to do to not run afoul and garner this type of criticism? Are you indicating that I must relinquish my business once it gets too big and that I am only entitled to a certain amount of success? Are you indicating that I must pay my workers far beyond what the free market dictates they are worth? Trying to understand how those are my issues. It would seem to me that these would need to change with far reaching government policies. Those policies in many ways go against capitalist principles when you start to consider having to pay a janitor for a company hundreds of thousands of dollars if the company is successful and employees are paid in revenue share. That makes far less sense than the owner of the company reaping the benefit of their innovation. I would also argue that an entrepreneur will potentially use these earnings more interestingly than a janitor, potentially to start additional businesses that help the public by increasing offerings and jobs.
I don’t really have a direct reply to these ideas but I would like to point out an interesting example of a business model that addresses some of these concerns, that is the worker cooperative, where the workers have some portion of ownership of the company, either in revenue sharing or decision making.
My take? The issue I have with the mega rich is that they (generalization here) aren’t playing by the same rules as you or I. I don’t have an issue, with not paying all of your employees 6 figures. Different jobs, skills, training, and capabilities are (and should be) worth different amounts of money. It’s important that people with good ideas, or business capabilities have avenues of expanding, bettering themselves, and enjoying the fruits of their labor.
When you pay money to write rules that are favorable to you, you become the problem. Money in politics is the problem. Imo, that has enabled all of this. Don’t have good healthcare? Likely it was lobbied for because someone wanted more money. Stuck in prison? Oh yeah, money in politics got you there. Minimum wage hasn’t kept up with inflation? Something, something trickledown-bullshit, money in politics. Kids killed in school constantly? Oh you know…FUCKING MONEY IN POLITICS.
Favorable can be lobbying against health & safety or environmental regulations because it impacts your bottom line. It is donating to political campaigns for tax cuts (you know, fucking bribery). It’s blocking minimum wage hikes to secure your bottom line.
All of that said, how people sleep at night with absurd amounts of money and minimal charity is disgusting. I don’t fault someone for enjoying an oppulant lifestyle…I do fault someone for Scrooge McDucking and hoarding cash…for what? Bragging rights? Power?
TLDR: be gaddamn ethical about it.
This is a fair take.
If you’re paying your employees what they’re worth (not the minimum the market will bear, but actually in line with the value they contribute), and you’re still making Bezos money, then you’re fleecing your customers.
There’s no way to get to a billion dollars without 1) exploiting your labor and supply chain by taking advantage of capitalist forces to pay less than the value of their contribution or 2) exploiting your customers by taking advantage of capitalist forces to charge more than the value of your product. Usually both, to extreme degrees, enabled by monopolies, regulatory capture, collusion, and other capitalist tricks. That’s not “a business that helps people”.
No matter how “innovative” an entrepreneur is, the actual value of their product or service is generated by the people who actually do the work. Of course, you’re entitled to the value that you personally create, but the best business idea in the world is worth exactly zilch without implementation. Bezos doesn’t build those fulfillment centers, he doesn’t manufacture the products, he doesn’t pack the boxes, he doesn’t drive the trucks, he doesn’t program the website. He only has the wealth he does because he pays the people that generate the value of his company the absolute minimum that he can get away with, skimming a big slice of everyone’s labor value for himself. That doesn’t help the public.
You don’t give him enough credit. He worked extremely hard to make Amazon what it is today. Additionally, he took major risks to his credit where he convinced investors to fund a new form of supply chain. He is reaping the reward of taking entrepreneurial risks and creating something innovative. I don’t know how you can say that Amazon doesn’t help people. Their prices are in-line with the market and no one can touch their shipping costs. Their warehouse jobs are demanding, but they explain that to anyone getting into it. In time, the people will mostly be replaced by robots anyways. The employees want more money, but robots work for free. If anything, we should be very interested in potentially implementing UBI and a VAT on automation per Andrew Yang.
He did not work multiple billions of dollars hard. No one can possibly work multiple billions of dollars hard. Bezos is worth 157 billion, and he’s 59 years old, which averages to over $10 million per day since he was 18. Are you seriously suggesting that he has done 100 times more work, every single day of his life, than someone making $100,000 does in a whole year? Sure, he had some good ideas, and deserves to be fairly compensated, but that’s monstrously out of proportion.
Capitalism does not, and has never, fundamentally rewarded hard work. Capitalism, fundamentally, rewards having a bunch of money to buy the rights to the value of the hard work of others. The most reliable way to get rich in capitalism isn’t even to have great business ideas, it’s to be born with rich parents so you can buy lots of shares in a company, and then use your shares to demand the company prioritize maximum dividends and minimum employee compensation. The investors that actually contribute meaningful ideas are a coincidential minority at best.
Sure, UBI and VAT are valuable ideas, but the main problem is that the robots will be owned by rich investors who made their money by being born rich enough to throw money at ventures that made them richer.
The actual solution is vesting the employees who actually create value with shares of the means of production they use to create that value. When the workers are the shareholders, they are actually compensated for their hard work, and the problem solves itself.
I don’t think there is a simple answer to this question. Not bribing politicians for favours, not exploiting workers and not selling substandard goods might be considered a basic minimum. Beyond this, there have been businessmen who tried to help their employees (or society as a whole), such as Ernst Abbe of Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung and John Spedan Lewis of JLP / Waitrose.
This is an easy question to answer. Look at Henry Ford and look at Bezos and his type (oh for example Walmart, etc). Ford wanted his workers to be able to afford the product he was making, and he even lost a landmark case because he was looking out for the best interest of his employees and his customers, from wikipedia:
Dodge v. Ford Motor Company, 204 Mich. 459, 170 N.W. 668 (Mich. 1919)[1] is a case in which the Michigan Supreme Court held that Henry Ford had to operate the Ford Motor Company in the interests of its shareholders, rather than in a manner for the benefit of his employees or customers. It is often taught as affirming the principle of “shareholder primacy” in corporate America, although that teaching has received some criticism
WTF did I just read?