5 ms·

But then, why should particular individuals capture such massive capital when their success has more to with circumstance than anything else ? It's also funny

by pstch 9y ago

But then, why should particular individuals capture such massive capital when their success has more to with circumstance than anything else ? It's also funny how we make heroes out of corporations themselves, not only their heads : technological advance is often attributed to some specific companies, and we don't see that as appropriation of the results of particular circumstances, but as a sign of the performance of this company. However; Would there be no XXXXX if we didn't live in an environment that attributes the results of circumstances to specific individuals ? I really don't know.

dsacco 9y ago
I don't find your point coherent. Why should anyone be paid well for anything if their revenue generation is due more to circumstance than anything else? How far down the rabbit hole would we be going to go with this? Who gets to decide what the capital cutoff point is for "too massive" and the contribution cutoff point is for "due to circumstance"? If I don't believe in free will, and thereby claim you make too much money because you technically weren't responsible for any of your actions and never chose the outcome that happened, can I incite a communist revolution and seize your assets? If I feel someone won the lottery because they were lucky, do I get to take all their money because they didn't contribute value or "earn" it in a way that I find agreeable? Can you give me an example of someone who is wealthy who earned their money in a manner that isn't arguably due to circumstance? As it stands, I can't think of an example that is materially different from a tech CEO who happened to be in the right place and right time. Go far enough back and every idea and execution on that idea is due to chance. But that applies to everyone, not just tech CEOs, or whoever the robber baron of the week is.
- danmaz74 9y ago
  Playing devil's advocate: because the chance of winning the lottery is a big motivation...
  - dsacco 9y ago
    I don't follow - wealth itself is motivating to people who want it. Why single out the lottery?
    - grogenaut 9y ago
      GP is likely referring to the startup lottery. Why did amazon win and pets.com fail? Why Facebook and not Myspace or orkut? Right place, right time + skill to make it + lucky = lottery.
      - papabrown 9y ago
        You really believe that the different between MySpace and Facebook is total lottery? Circumstances? MySpace sucked. It was an idea that was executed very poorly. Letting users turn their profile pages into CPU sucking machines was one of many poor choices made by the company. The reason Facebook succeeded and MySpace failed was because Facebook made different decisions than MySpace did. This whole concept is like saying, well, one guy decided to do the things he loved, go to baseball games, get drunk with his buddies, and watch copious amounts of TV. But this other guy spent 8 years educating himself and working his butt off accomplishing many things. Let's reward them equally because they both grew up in the same town thus should have equal outcomes.
- Frondo 9y ago
  Who gets to decide? How about all of us voters, taxpayers, and citizens, collectively, in a democratic fashion? I'd be fine having a discussion about what's "too massive" for a company and trying to figure out how to balance the interests of society and any given company (and its constituent individuals). But I'd like to start from a position of, what do we want society to look like? rather than a position of, how do we preserve the status quo?
  - papabrown 9y ago
    You do get to decide. You either reward them by being a consumer of their products/services or you don't. Sorry, looks like you got outvoted. Now you want to sit on some panel of judgement to overrule the public. I love it when people say stuff like this. Society has spoken. You simply don't like their decision so your answer to is to create some super-powerful organization that can veto the public and instill its own version of what society should look like.
    - Frondo 9y ago
      What? Those companies exist because society has granted them permission. That "super-powerful organization" is the government. Always has been, always will be. Fortunately, now, for the most part, in the west, we all get a say in that super-powerful organization. It, and everything it spawns, like mega-corporations, exists to serve us, not the other way around.
ericd 9y ago
They take large risks, and do work that not many people would be able to do - there aren't that many Bezoses and Musks out there. It's not just luck and circumstance, despite the current common narrative around success. That's certainly one component, but people at least partly make their own luck via their outlook and skills. If you want people to continue to take large risks, you need to offer them good rewards if they succeed, and/or reduced downside in the case of failure.
- bigtimeidiot 9y ago
  >If you want people to continue to take large risks, you need to offer them good rewards if they succeed Is this what you think drives people like Jobs? The guy who had billions, worked relentlessly, and died of Cancer at a fairly young age?
  - pyre 9y ago
    I had a teacher in highschool that put it this way (paraphrasing): "After a certain level of wealth, it just becomes a game and money is just points to keep score."
  - ericd 9y ago
    The reward is the power to do what you want, and bend the world to your whim. Money is the enabler of that. And yes, I think that the power to do what you want is a very large driver for people like Jobs, Musk, and Bezos. If you prevent them from getting lots of money for their efforts, you necessarily limit their ability to gather power. Everyone seems to always think that money is for getting a faster car or a bigger house, because that's most people would buy a car or house if they had money, but that's not really the primary driver past a point.
- Terr_ 9y ago
  > there aren't that many Bezoses and Musks out there How would you disprove this belief, short of an alternate-universe device? To me, it feels a bit like saying: "There aren't that many apex predators, therefore Leo the Lion must have incredible intrinsic properties"... Ignoring the fact that the local ecosystem doesn't allow that many contenders in the first place, and overlooking how many baby lions Leo kills.

by pstch 9y ago

dsacco 9y ago

I don't find your point coherent. Why should anyone be paid well for anything if their revenue generation is due more to circumstance than anything else? How far down the rabbit hole would we be going to go with this? Who gets to decide what the capital cutoff point is for "too massive" and the contribution cutoff point is for "due to circumstance"? If I don't believe in free will, and thereby claim you make too much money because you technically weren't responsible for any of your actions and never chose the outcome that happened, can I incite a communist revolution and seize your assets? If I feel someone won the lottery because they were lucky, do I get to take all their money because they didn't contribute value or "earn" it in a way that I find agreeable? Can you give me an example of someone who is wealthy who earned their money in a manner that isn't arguably due to circumstance? As it stands, I can't think of an example that is materially different from a tech CEO who happened to be in the right place and right time. Go far enough back and every idea and execution on that idea is due to chance. But that applies to everyone, not just tech CEOs, or whoever the robber baron of the week is.

danmaz74 9y ago
Playing devil's advocate: because the chance of winning the lottery is a big motivation...
- dsacco 9y ago
  I don't follow - wealth itself is motivating to people who want it. Why single out the lottery?
  - grogenaut 9y ago
    GP is likely referring to the startup lottery. Why did amazon win and pets.com fail? Why Facebook and not Myspace or orkut? Right place, right time + skill to make it + lucky = lottery.
    - papabrown 9y ago
      You really believe that the different between MySpace and Facebook is total lottery? Circumstances? MySpace sucked. It was an idea that was executed very poorly. Letting users turn their profile pages into CPU sucking machines was one of many poor choices made by the company. The reason Facebook succeeded and MySpace failed was because Facebook made different decisions than MySpace did. This whole concept is like saying, well, one guy decided to do the things he loved, go to baseball games, get drunk with his buddies, and watch copious amounts of TV. But this other guy spent 8 years educating himself and working his butt off accomplishing many things. Let's reward them equally because they both grew up in the same town thus should have equal outcomes.
Frondo 9y ago
Who gets to decide? How about all of us voters, taxpayers, and citizens, collectively, in a democratic fashion? I'd be fine having a discussion about what's "too massive" for a company and trying to figure out how to balance the interests of society and any given company (and its constituent individuals). But I'd like to start from a position of, what do we want society to look like? rather than a position of, how do we preserve the status quo?
- papabrown 9y ago
  You do get to decide. You either reward them by being a consumer of their products/services or you don't. Sorry, looks like you got outvoted. Now you want to sit on some panel of judgement to overrule the public. I love it when people say stuff like this. Society has spoken. You simply don't like their decision so your answer to is to create some super-powerful organization that can veto the public and instill its own version of what society should look like.
  - Frondo 9y ago
    What? Those companies exist because society has granted them permission. That "super-powerful organization" is the government. Always has been, always will be. Fortunately, now, for the most part, in the west, we all get a say in that super-powerful organization. It, and everything it spawns, like mega-corporations, exists to serve us, not the other way around.

ericd 9y ago

They take large risks, and do work that not many people would be able to do - there aren't that many Bezoses and Musks out there. It's not just luck and circumstance, despite the current common narrative around success. That's certainly one component, but people at least partly make their own luck via their outlook and skills. If you want people to continue to take large risks, you need to offer them good rewards if they succeed, and/or reduced downside in the case of failure.

bigtimeidiot 9y ago
>If you want people to continue to take large risks, you need to offer them good rewards if they succeed Is this what you think drives people like Jobs? The guy who had billions, worked relentlessly, and died of Cancer at a fairly young age?
- pyre 9y ago
  I had a teacher in highschool that put it this way (paraphrasing): "After a certain level of wealth, it just becomes a game and money is just points to keep score."
- ericd 9y ago
  The reward is the power to do what you want, and bend the world to your whim. Money is the enabler of that. And yes, I think that the power to do what you want is a very large driver for people like Jobs, Musk, and Bezos. If you prevent them from getting lots of money for their efforts, you necessarily limit their ability to gather power. Everyone seems to always think that money is for getting a faster car or a bigger house, because that's most people would buy a car or house if they had money, but that's not really the primary driver past a point.
Terr_ 9y ago
> there aren't that many Bezoses and Musks out there How would you disprove this belief, short of an alternate-universe device? To me, it feels a bit like saying: "There aren't that many apex predators, therefore Leo the Lion must have incredible intrinsic properties"... Ignoring the fact that the local ecosystem doesn't allow that many contenders in the first place, and overlooking how many baby lions Leo kills.