4 ms·

>>Companies growing so that they can be worth more when their investors sell them is the whole point of businesses in general Eww. I thought it was about tradi

by moate 7y ago

>>Companies growing so that they can be worth more when their investors sell them is the whole point of businesses in general Eww. I thought it was about trading products and labor for currency and vice versa. The investor class is just a parasite on the whole endeavor.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Yup. Our civilization already pulls a bait-and-switch on children by teaching them (us) that work is about the contribution to society, and not making money while incidentally providing some value; the investor mindset of treating companies as first-class objects to pump up and pass around is making things even worse. I for one, when I go to work, don't give a damn about resale value to investors. I'm there to build maximally useful products to the customers that use them.
- PavlovsCat 7y ago
  > The ways in which most men get their living, that is, live, are mere makeshifts, and a shirking of the real business of life, - chiefly because they do not know, but partly because they do not mean, any better. The rush to California, for instance, and the attitude, not merely of merchants, but of philosophers and prophets, so called, in relation to it, reflect the greatest disgrace on mankind. That so many are ready to live by luck, and so get the means of commanding the labor of others less lucky, without contributing any value to society! And that is called enterprise! I know of no more startling development of the immorality of trade, and all the common modes of getting a living. The philosophy and poetry and religion of such a mankind are not worth the dust of a puffball. The hog that gets his living by rooting, stirring up the soil so, would be ashamed of such company. If I could command the wealth of all the worlds by lifting my finger, I would not pay such a price for it. -- Henry David Thoreau, "Life Without Principle" http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER2/thoreau/life.html http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER2/thoreau/life.html

by moate 7y ago

TeMPOraL 7y ago

Yup. Our civilization already pulls a bait-and-switch on children by teaching them (us) that work is about the contribution to society, and not making money while incidentally providing some value; the investor mindset of treating companies as first-class objects to pump up and pass around is making things even worse. I for one, when I go to work, don't give a damn about resale value to investors. I'm there to build maximally useful products to the customers that use them.

PavlovsCat 7y ago
> The ways in which most men get their living, that is, live, are mere makeshifts, and a shirking of the real business of life, - chiefly because they do not know, but partly because they do not mean, any better. The rush to California, for instance, and the attitude, not merely of merchants, but of philosophers and prophets, so called, in relation to it, reflect the greatest disgrace on mankind. That so many are ready to live by luck, and so get the means of commanding the labor of others less lucky, without contributing any value to society! And that is called enterprise! I know of no more startling development of the immorality of trade, and all the common modes of getting a living. The philosophy and poetry and religion of such a mankind are not worth the dust of a puffball. The hog that gets his living by rooting, stirring up the soil so, would be ashamed of such company. If I could command the wealth of all the worlds by lifting my finger, I would not pay such a price for it. -- Henry David Thoreau, "Life Without Principle" http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER2/thoreau/life.html http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER2/thoreau/life.html