3 ms·

Pretty interesting. One thing that bothers me is "The way our economies are organised means wealth is increasingly and unfairly concentrated among a privileged

Pretty interesting. One thing that bothers me is "The way our economies are organised means wealth is increasingly and unfairly concentrated among a privileged few while millions of people are barely subsisting". I don't fully understand "unfairly" in this context. According to the thefreedictionary this word means: 1. Contrary to justice or a sense of fairness 2. Contrary to laws or conventions, especially in commerce; unethical: unfair dealing. 3. Not kind or considerate: It was unfair of me to laugh when he felt so sad. I am not sure I understand which of those description of unfairness applies to, say, Jeff Bezof (mentioned in the article). I have only limited knowledge about him, but I haven't heard that he had done anything that could be described as "unfair". One might even argue the opposite - he enabled many people to but cheaper goods in an easier way and he also enabled many people to sell goods efficiently and earn good money in this way.

patstew 8y ago
Last year Jeff Bezos earned more money than every other Amazon employee put together. Does this distribution of rewards fairly reflect the contribution of each person to Amazon's success? If either Bezos or every other employee died in an accident, which would cause more damage to Amazon? Even accepting that Bezos deserves a huge pile of money for his achievements, and that the economic system isn't his fault, it would be reasonable to view the status quo as "contrary to justice or a sense of fairness".
- guykdm 8y ago
  Your "harm" by elimination based metric seems rather arbitrary. This rather big bunch of current Amazon employees, if they were cobbled together in a building before they were hired by Bezos, would they have spontaneously created the company? Most probably not. The market sees fairness and reward as proportional to actual creation. This seems just as valid as your abstract reasoning.
  - patstew 8y ago
    It's not really a metric, just an absurd example to illustrate a point. In answer to your example, I would say probably yes, but not exactly the same and it wouldn't be called Amazon. Amazon bought up and merged competitive companies on its way to success. If Amazon didn't exist, it's likely one of those, or another competitor that fell by the wayside would've taken its place. I think it's extremely unlikely that most of the hard work, good decisions, clever innovations etc that led Amazon to win can be attributed to Bezos personally, as most of the spoils have.
  - amaccuish 8y ago
    > This rather big bunch of current Amazon employees, if they were cobbled together in a building before they were hired by Bezos, would they have spontaneously created the company? Most probably not So he did something once and deserves to be paid until he steps down as if he is creating a company everyday? That doesn't seem right to me.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
TheOtherHobbes 8y ago
Amazon warehouse workers who need medical attention after their shifts might disagree with you. Or perhaps you don't consider the reality that some warehouse employees earn so little they have to be subsidised by foodstamps - i.e. from public taxes - to be unfair?
- chosenbreed37 8y ago
  > Amazon warehouse workers who need medical attention after their shifts might disagree with you. They probably would. However, I think they would be in the top 50% in wealth terms and not the the bottom 50%
lesdeuxmagots 8y ago
You're interpreting this incorrectly. It is not that any individual's accumulation of wealth is specifically unfair, it might not be, but rather the system itself that is perceived to be unfair. Society has been structured so that increasingly few people accumulate most of the wealth. To many, it has reached a degree that is unethical, unjust, unkind, particularly because those who are not along the privileged are suffering as a result, therefore the scale of human suffering increases over time, while wealth concentration continues to increase. You may not agree that the degree of wealth disparity is worthy of such descriptions yet, but that is just a matter of where to draw the line, not whether it is an understandable thing to draw a line on. After all, if in say a few hundred years, unrealistically and strictly as a thought experiment, the current system has lead to a single individual accumulating as much wealth as every other individual in the world combined, and having done so in an above board way, while every other person in the world lives in abject poverty, would this be unfair to you? If so, then we only disagree about the degree of wealth inequity that informs our belief on the fairness of our economic and societal systems.
- tomp 8y ago
  > if in say a few hundred years, unrealistically and strictly as a thought experiment, the current system has lead to a single individual accumulating as much wealth as every other individual in the world combined, and having done so in an above board way, while every other person in the world lives in abject poverty How likely do you think that is, and why do you think it's getting more and more likely? If anything, the wealth and power these days is way more dispersed than a couple hunderd years ago when a few royalty held most of wealth/power/property. Like there's untold numbers of billionaires in China/Africa/Saudi Arabia/UAE/Europe/USA etc, and there's more on their way. In addition, the "turnover" of wealth seems to be faster and faster, and self-made billionaires dominate most rich-people lists (which however ignore most Arab dictators). Sure, it's possible that technology fundamentally changes that dynamic (e.g. by making 100% surveillance and oppression possible) in the future but that's not where the world is at right now.
adventured 8y ago
Their definition of unfair is based on "need." That's why it's not making traditional justice-based sense to you. Which is to say, you can then proceed to define unfair and need in any manner as you see fit to push an agenda. It's really quite simple, they're saying wealth - with absolutely no concern for how it was earned - must be taken from those who earned it and given to those who have not. Because one person has a need, it provides a claim against someone else's labor, earnings, wealth, life, time, etc. All forms of statist, gun-point wealth redistribution must derive from this philosophy, without exception and specifically without regard for any concern for an objective justice based on rule of law and property rights. Justice and the rule of law must be thrown out to fulfill true wealth redistribution, there's no other way to steal an honest person's assets and justify it.
- vidarh 8y ago
  There is no "objective justice based on rule of law and property rights". Property rights itself is subjective - they only exist to the extent they exist because of a willingness of a majority to support the use of violence to enforce it, rightly or wrongly. Hence e.g. Proudhon's "property is theft". What is "objective justice based on rule of law and property rights" to you, some see as a perverse use of violence to restrict the liberty of others Incidentally it is quite fascinating that you tie opposition to property rights as "statist, gun-point wealth redistribution" when the opposition to property rights originally came with the firmest opposition to the state. Proudhon was the founder of anarchism. Most others who argued against property rights argued against it from the point of view that property rights only exist through violence, and that the state is the ultimate guarantor of enforcement of what they see as coercion. Whatever point of view one has on how justified property rights are, presenting it as "objective" is ludicrous.
KozmoNau7 8y ago
Simply put, his unfair actions are exploiting his warehouse workers with extreme working conditions and meager pay, and perpetuating the unsustainable cult of consumerism that plagues western society. Our habits are unsustainable and are destroying the world we live in. The reckoning for our thoughtless exploitation of the planet will come, but Bezos and his peers have managed to extract enough wealth and power that they will be the very last to feel the effects of runaway climate change, massive droughts, famines and resulting unrest and war. They do not care, because ordinary people are simply resources to be exploited, wholly beneath their contempt.

patstew 8y ago

Last year Jeff Bezos earned more money than every other Amazon employee put together. Does this distribution of rewards fairly reflect the contribution of each person to Amazon's success? If either Bezos or every other employee died in an accident, which would cause more damage to Amazon? Even accepting that Bezos deserves a huge pile of money for his achievements, and that the economic system isn't his fault, it would be reasonable to view the status quo as "contrary to justice or a sense of fairness".

guykdm 8y ago
Your "harm" by elimination based metric seems rather arbitrary. This rather big bunch of current Amazon employees, if they were cobbled together in a building before they were hired by Bezos, would they have spontaneously created the company? Most probably not. The market sees fairness and reward as proportional to actual creation. This seems just as valid as your abstract reasoning.
- patstew 8y ago
  It's not really a metric, just an absurd example to illustrate a point. In answer to your example, I would say probably yes, but not exactly the same and it wouldn't be called Amazon. Amazon bought up and merged competitive companies on its way to success. If Amazon didn't exist, it's likely one of those, or another competitor that fell by the wayside would've taken its place. I think it's extremely unlikely that most of the hard work, good decisions, clever innovations etc that led Amazon to win can be attributed to Bezos personally, as most of the spoils have.
- amaccuish 8y ago
  > This rather big bunch of current Amazon employees, if they were cobbled together in a building before they were hired by Bezos, would they have spontaneously created the company? Most probably not So he did something once and deserves to be paid until he steps down as if he is creating a company everyday? That doesn't seem right to me.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

TheOtherHobbes 8y ago

Amazon warehouse workers who need medical attention after their shifts might disagree with you. Or perhaps you don't consider the reality that some warehouse employees earn so little they have to be subsidised by foodstamps - i.e. from public taxes - to be unfair?

chosenbreed37 8y ago
> Amazon warehouse workers who need medical attention after their shifts might disagree with you. They probably would. However, I think they would be in the top 50% in wealth terms and not the the bottom 50%

lesdeuxmagots 8y ago

You're interpreting this incorrectly. It is not that any individual's accumulation of wealth is specifically unfair, it might not be, but rather the system itself that is perceived to be unfair. Society has been structured so that increasingly few people accumulate most of the wealth. To many, it has reached a degree that is unethical, unjust, unkind, particularly because those who are not along the privileged are suffering as a result, therefore the scale of human suffering increases over time, while wealth concentration continues to increase. You may not agree that the degree of wealth disparity is worthy of such descriptions yet, but that is just a matter of where to draw the line, not whether it is an understandable thing to draw a line on. After all, if in say a few hundred years, unrealistically and strictly as a thought experiment, the current system has lead to a single individual accumulating as much wealth as every other individual in the world combined, and having done so in an above board way, while every other person in the world lives in abject poverty, would this be unfair to you? If so, then we only disagree about the degree of wealth inequity that informs our belief on the fairness of our economic and societal systems.

tomp 8y ago
> if in say a few hundred years, unrealistically and strictly as a thought experiment, the current system has lead to a single individual accumulating as much wealth as every other individual in the world combined, and having done so in an above board way, while every other person in the world lives in abject poverty How likely do you think that is, and why do you think it's getting more and more likely? If anything, the wealth and power these days is way more dispersed than a couple hunderd years ago when a few royalty held most of wealth/power/property. Like there's untold numbers of billionaires in China/Africa/Saudi Arabia/UAE/Europe/USA etc, and there's more on their way. In addition, the "turnover" of wealth seems to be faster and faster, and self-made billionaires dominate most rich-people lists (which however ignore most Arab dictators). Sure, it's possible that technology fundamentally changes that dynamic (e.g. by making 100% surveillance and oppression possible) in the future but that's not where the world is at right now.

adventured 8y ago

Their definition of unfair is based on "need." That's why it's not making traditional justice-based sense to you. Which is to say, you can then proceed to define unfair and need in any manner as you see fit to push an agenda. It's really quite simple, they're saying wealth - with absolutely no concern for how it was earned - must be taken from those who earned it and given to those who have not. Because one person has a need, it provides a claim against someone else's labor, earnings, wealth, life, time, etc. All forms of statist, gun-point wealth redistribution must derive from this philosophy, without exception and specifically without regard for any concern for an objective justice based on rule of law and property rights. Justice and the rule of law must be thrown out to fulfill true wealth redistribution, there's no other way to steal an honest person's assets and justify it.

vidarh 8y ago
There is no "objective justice based on rule of law and property rights". Property rights itself is subjective - they only exist to the extent they exist because of a willingness of a majority to support the use of violence to enforce it, rightly or wrongly. Hence e.g. Proudhon's "property is theft". What is "objective justice based on rule of law and property rights" to you, some see as a perverse use of violence to restrict the liberty of others Incidentally it is quite fascinating that you tie opposition to property rights as "statist, gun-point wealth redistribution" when the opposition to property rights originally came with the firmest opposition to the state. Proudhon was the founder of anarchism. Most others who argued against property rights argued against it from the point of view that property rights only exist through violence, and that the state is the ultimate guarantor of enforcement of what they see as coercion. Whatever point of view one has on how justified property rights are, presenting it as "objective" is ludicrous.

KozmoNau7 8y ago

Simply put, his unfair actions are exploiting his warehouse workers with extreme working conditions and meager pay, and perpetuating the unsustainable cult of consumerism that plagues western society. Our habits are unsustainable and are destroying the world we live in. The reckoning for our thoughtless exploitation of the planet will come, but Bezos and his peers have managed to extract enough wealth and power that they will be the very last to feel the effects of runaway climate change, massive droughts, famines and resulting unrest and war. They do not care, because ordinary people are simply resources to be exploited, wholly beneath their contempt.