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On the other hand it WAS NOT Zuckerberg who built the company and hired 20000 people. Zuckerberg hired the first few, those all built the first stage and hired

On the other hand it WAS NOT Zuckerberg who built the company and hired 20000 people. Zuckerberg hired the first few, those all built the first stage and hired the next round of prople, who built and hired more. The success of FB or any company is due to their combined efforts. And, it’s built over the efforts of hundreds of thousands more who built the critical infrastructure outside FB. Of course Zuck should reap more rewards for his founding and leadership role. But not to the tune of 75 billion dollars. And it should not require billion-dollar paydays to incentivize people to build companies.

thatswrong0 9y ago
If Zuckerberg didn’t exist, Facebook as it stands would not exist. Everyone he hired agreed to be compensated with the terms he decreed. Every person he gave equity, every person whose salary he directly determined, they all agreed to the terms of their employment. No one was forced to work for him or Facebook. Why should he be forced to relinquish control or equity in his company if literally everyone he worked with agreed to the terms of their employment at his company? Who is the person that should decide “oh, at this point he has enough, he doesn’t deserve more”? You? Some other corrupt government individual? I just don’t understand why you think that random people should be able to determine the fate of a fortune that someone amassed when they had nothing to do with it. He pays his taxes. Facebook pays their taxes as required by law. Why do you think that’s not enough? I understand closing loopholes, but you apparently think we should go further? You think that we should set a hard cap on wealth? How would that not create adverse economic incentives?
- khazhou 9y ago
  Yes, taxes should effectively impose a cap on wealth, reaching 99% tax rate at some point (certainly, when you're in the billions). If a founder decides to move on because he can no longer earn a billion... well, we as a society will just have to live with that tragic loss of leadership, and hope that somebody will be brave enough to take over. Also, I'm not confused about people agreeing to their compensation terms. That's true and not the issue, any more than royalty was "ok" because for many hundreds of years, people were ok with it. There's a funnel that leads to one human being having over 75-million times more than another. We tolerate this today. And here in the tech world, we make apologies for it (even while many still manage to scoff at Wall St)
  - thatswrong0 9y ago
    The difference is that people voluntarily agreed to the terms of compensation with Facebook.. the same can’t be said of people who deal with royalty existing in their society. People may have been ok with it, but they didn’t have a choice. Your whole argument seems to come from the viewpoint that wealth is zero-sum.. when it so obviously isn’t.
simonh 9y ago
If someone spends a few million dollars and builds a company worth billions, how do you confiscate almost all those billions of dollars from the company owners without killing the company, or crippling it's ability to raise funds for expansion and growth? The investors in Facebook took risks based on expected rewards and Zuckerberg and nobody else had the strategy and vision to deliver that for them. How can you take most of those rewards away, while still expecting investors to invest millions, build companies and fuel technological advancement and growth? Until you can answer these questions, how do you expect anyone to take your position seriously?
- retailbuyout 9y ago
  Well, you start by valuing the humans over the corporations. Weird, I know.
  - simonh 9y ago
    How do you value the welfare of the people in those corporations, their jobs and prosperity? You start by valuing having a job and having new businesses and services that put food on the table. These are easy things to take for granted in the developed world with our dynamic economies, extensive social services, free basic education and in many countries free health care. You cant tax people and companies to fund these things if those people don't have jobs, or have only subsistence level incomes or the businesses never get started or are starved of capital so they can't grow or adapt. Countries that tried to do without economies like ours though, such as Soviet Russia, China under Mao, Venezuela and Cuba today, etc didn't do so well. So how do you confiscate the majority of the capital in society that is used to generate all this wealth without killing the goose that's laying the golden eggs? But if you do allow the accumulation of capital so that it can be deployed efficiently, how do you prevent free people in a democracy from using that capital for other things too? How do you restrict individual freedom for people like Zuckerberg while meeting your social engineering goals? Still waiting for even a perfunctory attempt to actually answer my questions with anything other than meaningless platitudes.
    - 9y ago
mcbruiser4 9y ago
if you don't like it, stop using facebook. if others follow suite, he won't be a billionaire for long.

thatswrong0 9y ago

If Zuckerberg didn’t exist, Facebook as it stands would not exist. Everyone he hired agreed to be compensated with the terms he decreed. Every person he gave equity, every person whose salary he directly determined, they all agreed to the terms of their employment. No one was forced to work for him or Facebook. Why should he be forced to relinquish control or equity in his company if literally everyone he worked with agreed to the terms of their employment at his company? Who is the person that should decide “oh, at this point he has enough, he doesn’t deserve more”? You? Some other corrupt government individual? I just don’t understand why you think that random people should be able to determine the fate of a fortune that someone amassed when they had nothing to do with it. He pays his taxes. Facebook pays their taxes as required by law. Why do you think that’s not enough? I understand closing loopholes, but you apparently think we should go further? You think that we should set a hard cap on wealth? How would that not create adverse economic incentives?

khazhou 9y ago
Yes, taxes should effectively impose a cap on wealth, reaching 99% tax rate at some point (certainly, when you're in the billions). If a founder decides to move on because he can no longer earn a billion... well, we as a society will just have to live with that tragic loss of leadership, and hope that somebody will be brave enough to take over. Also, I'm not confused about people agreeing to their compensation terms. That's true and not the issue, any more than royalty was "ok" because for many hundreds of years, people were ok with it. There's a funnel that leads to one human being having over 75-million times more than another. We tolerate this today. And here in the tech world, we make apologies for it (even while many still manage to scoff at Wall St)
- thatswrong0 9y ago
  The difference is that people voluntarily agreed to the terms of compensation with Facebook.. the same can’t be said of people who deal with royalty existing in their society. People may have been ok with it, but they didn’t have a choice. Your whole argument seems to come from the viewpoint that wealth is zero-sum.. when it so obviously isn’t.

simonh 9y ago

If someone spends a few million dollars and builds a company worth billions, how do you confiscate almost all those billions of dollars from the company owners without killing the company, or crippling it's ability to raise funds for expansion and growth? The investors in Facebook took risks based on expected rewards and Zuckerberg and nobody else had the strategy and vision to deliver that for them. How can you take most of those rewards away, while still expecting investors to invest millions, build companies and fuel technological advancement and growth? Until you can answer these questions, how do you expect anyone to take your position seriously?

retailbuyout 9y ago
Well, you start by valuing the humans over the corporations. Weird, I know.
- simonh 9y ago
  How do you value the welfare of the people in those corporations, their jobs and prosperity? You start by valuing having a job and having new businesses and services that put food on the table. These are easy things to take for granted in the developed world with our dynamic economies, extensive social services, free basic education and in many countries free health care. You cant tax people and companies to fund these things if those people don't have jobs, or have only subsistence level incomes or the businesses never get started or are starved of capital so they can't grow or adapt. Countries that tried to do without economies like ours though, such as Soviet Russia, China under Mao, Venezuela and Cuba today, etc didn't do so well. So how do you confiscate the majority of the capital in society that is used to generate all this wealth without killing the goose that's laying the golden eggs? But if you do allow the accumulation of capital so that it can be deployed efficiently, how do you prevent free people in a democracy from using that capital for other things too? How do you restrict individual freedom for people like Zuckerberg while meeting your social engineering goals? Still waiting for even a perfunctory attempt to actually answer my questions with anything other than meaningless platitudes.
  - 9y ago

mcbruiser4 9y ago

if you don't like it, stop using facebook. if others follow suite, he won't be a billionaire for long.