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The Brookings Institute who published this have $435,964,000 in net assets. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-annual-report.pdf https://
by mimikatz 6y ago
The Brookings Institute who published this have $435,964,000 in net assets. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-annual-report.pdf https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/2020-an... Couldn't they pay their people more?
- aaron-santos 6y agoWhat if they did. Would it change the argument?
- mimikatz 6y agoThey did. It is not in dispute. It would at least be hypocritical. It's up to each person what that means.
- aaron-santos 6y agoI'm trying to follow this argument. > Couldn't they pay their people more? > What if they did. > They did. Am I missing something?
- mimikatz 6y agoSorry, I misunderstood your question. I thought you asked did they really have that much, not did they pay their people more. I assume they did not because they still have a huge bankroll.
- renewiltord 6y agoWell, that depends on the argument, but presumably if at some point you state "the moral thing to do is to reduce surplus so that other people may have increased surplus" and no one is really doing that, you have to question the moral argumentation somewhere. For instance, were I to make that argument, and were you to ask me "During the pandemic, did you Doordash any food? How much did you tip? How much money do you have in your bank account?" and it turns out I tipped a very small fraction of the money in my bank account despite "the delivery driver risking his life to deliver nutrition you require to survive" then you might be well within your rights to ask me to justify this behaviour of mine contradictory to my stated morals and see if the argument extends.
- gbanfalvi 6y agoSo... it doesn’t change the actual argument.
- rualca 6y ago> So... it doesn’t change the actual argument. It kind of does. I mean,it's not like they are practicing what they are preaching. If they really believe that sharing the wealth is the right thing to do then why are they reserving their argument exclusively to other companies and organizations?
- renewiltord 6y agoIt absolutely does. If you argue from a basis of moral consensus, it is precisely an argument against that to argue that the moral consensus is the opposite.
- cercatrova 6y agoThey are not arguing from moral consensus, but merely appearing to. It is useful for a company to appear to take the moral high ground in order to increase profits while also not actually doing so of course. See BLM, and others.
- renewiltord 6y agoStrictly, I suppose they're making no argument at all since they are merely asserting a fact: Amazon isn't paying more. There is an implicit other statement: "this is notable". And I suspect an implicit third piece "it is notably bad". None of these are arguments but one could imagine that the last one stems from "because we all think it's bad". Of course, absent justification one could just dismiss that last one out of hand instead.
- cercatrova 6y agoYes, it assumes companies are bad because they don't follow individual moral standards, but organizations are not individuals and cannot be judged the same way. I would even go so far as to say that because there are so many people in it that the entire organization is an amoral entity.
- onetimemanytime 6y ago>>Couldn't they pay their people more? Sure. But what % of Brookings full time employees cannot feed /shelter /educate their kids to the point that taxpayers have to step in? Compare to Amazon.