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I think most people agree that a book author deserves a couple dollars every time someone purchases their media. JK Rowling's stories have been read and watched
by Aunche 6y ago
I think most people agree that a book author deserves a couple dollars every time someone purchases their media. JK Rowling's stories have been read and watched billions of times? Who deserves to control that capital more than JK Rowling herself?
- Frondo 6y agoLet her control it til the end of the tax year, and then let her help fund the system that made her fabulously wealthy.
- Aunche 6y agoThe government is made up of people who make mistakes even if they have the best of intentions. It doesn't make sense for a bureaucrat to have more control of the wealth than the person who created that wealth purely from her imagination.
- sjm 6y agoA government that makes some "mistakes" is far better than the alternative. Just ask the town a bunch of libertarians took over. [0] 0: https://newrepublic.com/article/159662/libertarian-walks-into-bear-book-review-free-town-project https://newrepublic.com/article/159662/libertarian-walks-int...
- Aunche 6y agoI'm saying that it's reasonable to expect a significant fraction of the wealth that you created, which is true in every developed country. I'm not advocating for libertarianism.
- sjm 6y agoSo do you really believe any single person is so "brilliant" (or whatever adjective you want to use) to have truly created or earned billions of dollars through their own brilliance alone? Do you think Jeff Bezos is 1,310,000x more deserving of his wealth than the average American household? IMO it's not reasonable at all past a certain point to continue to amass this kind of wealth that is a by-product of a broken system driven by exploitation, a system in this stage clearly set up for the rich to get richer while those struggling remain stagnant at best.
- Aunche 6y agoIt's not about brilliance. Technology and organization allow your impact to scale to superhuman levels. I used the JK Rowling example because it's obvious that without her, we would not have the multi-billion dollar franchise that is Harry Potter. Without Harry Potter, there is no guarantee that another franchise would have taken it's place. It's also not a stretch to suggest that Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates have created over 100 times more value than Rowling. Their roles are more nebulous, but they certainly did something better than their competitors. Microsoft Excel alone possibly has possibly saved trillions of hours productivity.
- thn-gap 6y agoThose people in the production chain of her media, who suffer due to their poor economical status. Or at least I'd consider it to have more priority, than J.K Rowling amassing few more millions herself. I wouldn't have such big issue with Billionaires, if there weren't so much suffering from the exploited population.
- cwkoss 6y agoCounterpoint: JK Rowling is now using her billion dollars to fund various "TERF" groups and programs that fight against trans rights and inclusion.
- alisonkisk 6y agoOthers would say she's funding groups to protect girls and women against abuse.
- Aunche 6y agoI'm defending her ownership of capital, not her spending. I may disagree with my government spending money bombing Muslims that disagree with it, but I recognize it's right to collect trillions of dollars in taxes.
- alisonkisk 6y agoWho agrees that, after the first few million copies? Under the original US Constitution, Harry Potter would be public domain by now.
- foxrob92 6y agoWhile Rowling provided the creative input to her stories, they were: - Edited by other people - Printed by other people - (Films were) directed by other people - Characters in the films were played by other people - Distributed by other people If there was no J.K. Rowling, we (admittedly) wouldn't have the stories. But the same is true of all of the other moving parts in the media business. No-one is self-made.