5 ms·

> "If you need to give away money, you took too much in the first place". This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least partially targeted at

by imgabe 7y ago

> "If you need to give away money, you took too much in the first place". This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least partially targeted at aspiring company founders. For example the money Bill Gates is giving away is mostly in the form of shares of Microsoft. Those didn't exist before he started the company (with others of course). He signed some paperwork, then later 500 million shares (or however many) came into existence and he had them. Who did he take them from? Later on other people decided they also wanted shares of Microsoft and assigned them a monetary value. Did Bill Gates somehow force them to want the shares he had? To the extent that he "took" money it was in exchange for shares of a company that other people found valuable.

random023987 7y ago
> This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least a partially targeted at aspiring company founders. It's not inconsistent. Most founders are trying to create companies that provide economic value; one can believe that the creation of economic value is a good thing, while also believing that more of the economic surplus created should directly go to the common good.
- jacquesm 7y ago
  And that you can do this while keeping an even keel in the ethics department.
- andrepd 7y ago
  Exactly. Everything he's saying seems reasonable, but the consequence is that there are single people that own 150,000,000,000$. Such a staggeringly absurd amount of money cannot be be a good thing for the public at large. We shouldn't rely on the good will of our fief lords to donate their money, in fact just look at Mr 150 billion who openly says "I can't think of anything that deserves a donation". The corollary is obvious. Tax the ultra-rich at high marginal rates to force them to contribute back to the society that made their success possible in the first place.
  - prepend 7y ago
    The money is a byproduct of a good thing. Amazon is a net positive for humanity. Bezos having $150B is a byproduct of the amazing thing he and many others made. So a single person having that much can certainly be a good thing, or a neutral thing, or a bad thing. But it’s not something that I have to think about fixing. The literature is really clear that taxing the rich won’t do what you think it will do. It’s also surprising because this sentiment somehow thinks the rich are not already taxed. Wealth is taxed during transactions, not at rest. And the rich buy stuff like all others.
dbingham 7y ago
He took them from the employees of Microsoft who's work helped make those shares valuable. Edit: Apparently this statement needs further clarification. What do those shares represent? A share of the profits. And what are the profits? Literally the difference between the company's revenues and expenses. It's literally the difference between the value created by workers and the salary the company paid them in return for that value. So _of course_ Bill Gates took that wealth from the company's workers. That's what profit is! ---------- Now to expand on the broader idea, in a Democratic Socialist economy where the stock corporation is replaced by the worker cooperative, he would not have had the right to claim 500 million shares. Those shares would have been distributed to the employees of Microsoft based on some metric of contribution to the company. Or would never have existed in the first place, and each worker would have had a vote in how the company was run and the profits distributed. In either method, Bill Gates would have gotten some still significant portion of the value the company created, but no where near the amount he walked away with in our current economy. The rest of that value would have been distributed to the company's workers in one way or another - profit distributions, shares, dividends, what have you. In the minds of many - myself included - that is a much more equitable system. Bill Gates took the money from the people who helped create it in the first place. And he took a share that far out paced his contribution to the creation of that value. He was able to do that because our economic system is set up around authoritarian companies, where the founders and CEOs have near dictatorial power (or oligarchical power with the board). And dictatorships are rarely equitable.
- marcinzm 7y ago
  Salary is how companies distribute value to employees and Microsoft paid it's employees. Many people would prefer cold hard cash over stock that may be nothing but fireplace lighting material in five years. Likewise making 30% less this year because the company did badly for reasons in no way related to you doesn't sit well with many people either.
  - dbingham 7y ago
    And the difference between that salary and the company's revenues (the value the workers created) is the profits. Which the shares represent a right to. Can we at least agree that - whether voluntary or not - the share literally represent the excess value taken from workers? Cause that's what I was saying in response to the question. Those shares represent the value taken from workers. As to it being voluntary, it's not. There's a massive power differential in the negotiations. That's what unions were meant to help solve, but unions can't really solve that power differential (they were never strong enough) and they've got their own problems of corruption and power. The idea behind a worker cooperative based system isn't that workers take stock as payment instead of cash. They still get a cash salary. They also get ownership of company and a right to decide what happens to the profits. There are several approaches to how you design that system. In one you do away with the concept of stock (ownership shares) altogether - it's a one person one vote system. In another you keep the concept of ownership shares and workers earn shares in proportion to their time at the company. Maybe you keep an aspect of negotiation and the shares they earn are tied to their negotiated salary. But you no longer allow outside investors to purchase ownership of the company. Or founders to maintain a controlling share long past the point where their contributions have been matched or outweighed by the rest of the company's employees. In this system we recognize that companies, like countries, are communities that should be run democratically by the people involved in them for the people involved in them.
brain5ide 7y ago
Ahem. Microsoft screwed quite a few companies/people in their day. Share value is almost direct consequence of that screwing. I'm not strictly against it, but I'd just like that awareness of it to still be on the table when considering things.
dannypgh 7y ago
> This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least a partially targeted at aspiring company founders. It's not a universally held belief that a company founder must try to make as much money for themselves as possible. Entrepreneurs, like everyone else, have values, and some of the values are in conflict with some of their actions. I have a hard time imagining anyone (excluding sociopaths) who legitimately believe their actions don't create any conflict with their values. Discussing the conflict between "I want to start a company" and "I believe there's a maximum amount of wealth that one can morally or ethically acquire" seems super relevant to the audience here. > He signed some paperwork, then later 500 million shares (or however many) came into existence and he had them. Who did he take them from? I don't think it's worth getting hung up on whether anyone "took" wealth versus created it, because I'm not sure those are mutually exclusive. I would argue MS "took" money from people via unfair bundling practices, many of which were anticompetitive and landed the company in hot water. If you want to be simplistic, MS under BG took money from everyone who was forced to buy a windows license despite not wanting or needing one, at the very least.
- imgabe 7y ago
  > I don't think it's worth getting hung up on whether anyone "took" wealth versus created it, because I'm not sure those are mutually exclusive. I am hung up on this because I do think they're mutually exclusive. You can't create something that already exists. You can't take something that doesn't exist. Something has to exist in order for you to take it. If you created something, it impossible that you have taken it. The quote implies that there is some big pile of money out there and rich people are just greedy people who take more of it than everyone else. While poor people are ... polite I guess? and only take a little amount. If someone honestly believes this then the only question is, why don't you just take more of this money? I mean it's apparently all just there for the taking and the only differentiating factor of the rich is their willingness to take more of it, right? There couldn't possibly be anything else that rich people do that results in them being rich.

by imgabe 7y ago

random023987 7y ago

> This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least a partially targeted at aspiring company founders. It's not inconsistent. Most founders are trying to create companies that provide economic value; one can believe that the creation of economic value is a good thing, while also believing that more of the economic surplus created should directly go to the common good.

jacquesm 7y ago
And that you can do this while keeping an even keel in the ethics department.
andrepd 7y ago
Exactly. Everything he's saying seems reasonable, but the consequence is that there are single people that own 150,000,000,000$. Such a staggeringly absurd amount of money cannot be be a good thing for the public at large. We shouldn't rely on the good will of our fief lords to donate their money, in fact just look at Mr 150 billion who openly says "I can't think of anything that deserves a donation". The corollary is obvious. Tax the ultra-rich at high marginal rates to force them to contribute back to the society that made their success possible in the first place.
- prepend 7y ago
  The money is a byproduct of a good thing. Amazon is a net positive for humanity. Bezos having $150B is a byproduct of the amazing thing he and many others made. So a single person having that much can certainly be a good thing, or a neutral thing, or a bad thing. But it’s not something that I have to think about fixing. The literature is really clear that taxing the rich won’t do what you think it will do. It’s also surprising because this sentiment somehow thinks the rich are not already taxed. Wealth is taxed during transactions, not at rest. And the rich buy stuff like all others.

dbingham 7y ago

He took them from the employees of Microsoft who's work helped make those shares valuable. Edit: Apparently this statement needs further clarification. What do those shares represent? A share of the profits. And what are the profits? Literally the difference between the company's revenues and expenses. It's literally the difference between the value created by workers and the salary the company paid them in return for that value. So _of course_ Bill Gates took that wealth from the company's workers. That's what profit is! ---------- Now to expand on the broader idea, in a Democratic Socialist economy where the stock corporation is replaced by the worker cooperative, he would not have had the right to claim 500 million shares. Those shares would have been distributed to the employees of Microsoft based on some metric of contribution to the company. Or would never have existed in the first place, and each worker would have had a vote in how the company was run and the profits distributed. In either method, Bill Gates would have gotten some still significant portion of the value the company created, but no where near the amount he walked away with in our current economy. The rest of that value would have been distributed to the company's workers in one way or another - profit distributions, shares, dividends, what have you. In the minds of many - myself included - that is a much more equitable system. Bill Gates took the money from the people who helped create it in the first place. And he took a share that far out paced his contribution to the creation of that value. He was able to do that because our economic system is set up around authoritarian companies, where the founders and CEOs have near dictatorial power (or oligarchical power with the board). And dictatorships are rarely equitable.

marcinzm 7y ago
Salary is how companies distribute value to employees and Microsoft paid it's employees. Many people would prefer cold hard cash over stock that may be nothing but fireplace lighting material in five years. Likewise making 30% less this year because the company did badly for reasons in no way related to you doesn't sit well with many people either.
- dbingham 7y ago
  And the difference between that salary and the company's revenues (the value the workers created) is the profits. Which the shares represent a right to. Can we at least agree that - whether voluntary or not - the share literally represent the excess value taken from workers? Cause that's what I was saying in response to the question. Those shares represent the value taken from workers. As to it being voluntary, it's not. There's a massive power differential in the negotiations. That's what unions were meant to help solve, but unions can't really solve that power differential (they were never strong enough) and they've got their own problems of corruption and power. The idea behind a worker cooperative based system isn't that workers take stock as payment instead of cash. They still get a cash salary. They also get ownership of company and a right to decide what happens to the profits. There are several approaches to how you design that system. In one you do away with the concept of stock (ownership shares) altogether - it's a one person one vote system. In another you keep the concept of ownership shares and workers earn shares in proportion to their time at the company. Maybe you keep an aspect of negotiation and the shares they earn are tied to their negotiated salary. But you no longer allow outside investors to purchase ownership of the company. Or founders to maintain a controlling share long past the point where their contributions have been matched or outweighed by the rest of the company's employees. In this system we recognize that companies, like countries, are communities that should be run democratically by the people involved in them for the people involved in them.

brain5ide 7y ago

Ahem. Microsoft screwed quite a few companies/people in their day. Share value is almost direct consequence of that screwing. I'm not strictly against it, but I'd just like that awareness of it to still be on the table when considering things.

dannypgh 7y ago

> This is a strange sentiment to find on a board that is at least a partially targeted at aspiring company founders. It's not a universally held belief that a company founder must try to make as much money for themselves as possible. Entrepreneurs, like everyone else, have values, and some of the values are in conflict with some of their actions. I have a hard time imagining anyone (excluding sociopaths) who legitimately believe their actions don't create any conflict with their values. Discussing the conflict between "I want to start a company" and "I believe there's a maximum amount of wealth that one can morally or ethically acquire" seems super relevant to the audience here. > He signed some paperwork, then later 500 million shares (or however many) came into existence and he had them. Who did he take them from? I don't think it's worth getting hung up on whether anyone "took" wealth versus created it, because I'm not sure those are mutually exclusive. I would argue MS "took" money from people via unfair bundling practices, many of which were anticompetitive and landed the company in hot water. If you want to be simplistic, MS under BG took money from everyone who was forced to buy a windows license despite not wanting or needing one, at the very least.

imgabe 7y ago
> I don't think it's worth getting hung up on whether anyone "took" wealth versus created it, because I'm not sure those are mutually exclusive. I am hung up on this because I do think they're mutually exclusive. You can't create something that already exists. You can't take something that doesn't exist. Something has to exist in order for you to take it. If you created something, it impossible that you have taken it. The quote implies that there is some big pile of money out there and rich people are just greedy people who take more of it than everyone else. While poor people are ... polite I guess? and only take a little amount. If someone honestly believes this then the only question is, why don't you just take more of this money? I mean it's apparently all just there for the taking and the only differentiating factor of the rich is their willingness to take more of it, right? There couldn't possibly be anything else that rich people do that results in them being rich.