5 ms·

> It's your money after all. All money is debt. For you to have money, someone had to get into debt. Either privately via bank loans, or the public via the gov

by mempko 5y ago

> It's your money after all. All money is debt. For you to have money, someone had to get into debt. Either privately via bank loans, or the public via the government spending (most likely bank loans, only 4% is government spending). It's not JUST your money. Your money is also someone's debt. So when Thiel stashes 5 billion away in a Roth IRA instead of spending it, that's 5 billion of debt OTHERS owe. And that's 5 billion in INCOME he is depriving others. (of course he isn't actually holding billions of DOLLARS, but assets valued in dollars, so this isn't exactly the same thing). Think of it like musical chairs. Thiel just took one of the chairs away (put it in the closet) and someone has to lose the game unless more chairs are added to the game. In other words, Thiel's winnings ended up as someone else's losses. The game keeps going as long as someone keeps bringing chairs (the government, or bank loans) but as soon as that stops (2008 or covid), someone will lose, and it isn't Thiel. It will be millions of poor people who will lose their jobs, homes, etc. So the question is, should people hoard debt (and deprive others of income) and gain that much power? That's the question we as a society need to ask ourselves. And so far, judging from the comments here, everyone is ok with that. But as I mentioned before, Thiel doesn't hold cash in the IRA, but assets valued in billions right? So in some sense he is only wealthy if there is a system that can convert those securities into cash. In other words, he is only wealthy as long as the system keeps going. But his efforts ultimately undermine that same system (wealth inequality undermines the system, this is a historic fact).

Moodles 5y ago
I don't think this really makes sense. Capitalism isn't a zero sum game for humanity. He created Paypal, which, generally speaking, provided a net value to society. That was his work, and he was one of the 0.0001% to be mega successful with it. Also, the argument "he has savings which is depriving other of income" is neither here nor there when the article is about a Roth IRA vs, presumably, a normal brokerage account with capital gains tax. At the end of the day, we're going to end up arguing about fundamental moral values like how rich should rich people be allowed to be.
- adolph 5y ago
  If he lives 30 years past IRA checkout time, that's 30 * 365 = 10950 days. $5B / 10950 is $456,621. Spending 456k a day seems like hard work. MacKenzie Scott Gave Away $6 Billion Last Year. It's Not As Easy As It Sounds https://time.com/6050873/mackenzie-scott-profile/ https://time.com/6050873/mackenzie-scott-profile/
- mempko 5y ago
  > provided a net value to society. It helped increase net commerce on the internet. We also know that this increase in commerce contributes to climate change. The reality is we can't escape the second law of thermodynamics. So whenever we do anything of 'value' we must necessarily produce waste. To actually make the statement 'provided net value to society' you have to prove that the waste paypal produced was worth it. Can you prove that? We have a heatwave now in the PNW that is exasperated because of global warming. What if the waste we produced (in the form of CO2, and other heat trapping gasses which paypal most certainly increased) isn't worth it? What if we threaten our existence on this planet or organized human life? So unless you did the math, it's just magical thinking that paypal produced net value.
  - Moodles 5y ago
    Second law of thermodynamics? That's a good one. I really can't be bothered to be drawn into a conversation on the pros and cons of capitalism and human progress (especially if a heatwave is the argument you're running with), sorry
    - mempko 5y ago
      I'm confused, are you denying any work (valuable or not) doesn't produce waste? Or does capitalism magically work outside of physics? Even without CO2, at the 2% annual growth target rate, the amount of energy humans would output as waste into the environment would literally boil the oceans in a couple hundred years. If there is no growth, is capitalism still not a zero sum game?
    - jjulius 5y ago
kristjansson 5y ago
So some weak US tax policy inspires an ill-founded argument against … money, the market economy, and private property, effectively?
adolph 5y ago
> Think of it like musical chairs. Thiel just took one of the chairs away (put it in the closet) and someone has to lose the game unless more chairs are added to the game. 1. The chair Thiel "took" has been subsequently loaned out to other chair users. It wasn't taken away from the table. It isn't in a closet. It isn't in a giant cartoon swimming pool of chairs. 2. Thiel (and team) added net chairs to the larger musical chairs game. The count of new chairs is debatable but is not insignificant. 3. The chairs in Thiel's stash came from people willing to give him those chairs because they speculated they would get more chairs back down the road or at least not lose as many chairs as they would in other ways (like holding a chair as it shrinks due to inflation). 4. Society needs more chairs and specifically it needs people who have (a.) ideas and science to increase chairs, (b.) skills and knowledge to execute those ideas and (c.) leadership to guide and grow organizations to scale up the execution of those ideas. The emergent and evolving method society uses to develop consensus around and incentivize specific a, b, and c outcomes is the accounting of chairs. This year society will account chairs worth $3.5B ($3,539,217,846) towards football. Do these 1,934 people add chairs or take away chairs from the table? https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/salary.htm https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/salary.htm

by mempko 5y ago

Moodles 5y ago

I don't think this really makes sense. Capitalism isn't a zero sum game for humanity. He created Paypal, which, generally speaking, provided a net value to society. That was his work, and he was one of the 0.0001% to be mega successful with it. Also, the argument "he has savings which is depriving other of income" is neither here nor there when the article is about a Roth IRA vs, presumably, a normal brokerage account with capital gains tax. At the end of the day, we're going to end up arguing about fundamental moral values like how rich should rich people be allowed to be.

adolph 5y ago
If he lives 30 years past IRA checkout time, that's 30 * 365 = 10950 days. $5B / 10950 is $456,621. Spending 456k a day seems like hard work. MacKenzie Scott Gave Away $6 Billion Last Year. It's Not As Easy As It Sounds https://time.com/6050873/mackenzie-scott-profile/ https://time.com/6050873/mackenzie-scott-profile/
mempko 5y ago
> provided a net value to society. It helped increase net commerce on the internet. We also know that this increase in commerce contributes to climate change. The reality is we can't escape the second law of thermodynamics. So whenever we do anything of 'value' we must necessarily produce waste. To actually make the statement 'provided net value to society' you have to prove that the waste paypal produced was worth it. Can you prove that? We have a heatwave now in the PNW that is exasperated because of global warming. What if the waste we produced (in the form of CO2, and other heat trapping gasses which paypal most certainly increased) isn't worth it? What if we threaten our existence on this planet or organized human life? So unless you did the math, it's just magical thinking that paypal produced net value.
- Moodles 5y ago
  Second law of thermodynamics? That's a good one. I really can't be bothered to be drawn into a conversation on the pros and cons of capitalism and human progress (especially if a heatwave is the argument you're running with), sorry
  - mempko 5y ago
    I'm confused, are you denying any work (valuable or not) doesn't produce waste? Or does capitalism magically work outside of physics? Even without CO2, at the 2% annual growth target rate, the amount of energy humans would output as waste into the environment would literally boil the oceans in a couple hundred years. If there is no growth, is capitalism still not a zero sum game?
  - jjulius 5y ago

kristjansson 5y ago

So some weak US tax policy inspires an ill-founded argument against … money, the market economy, and private property, effectively?

adolph 5y ago

> Think of it like musical chairs. Thiel just took one of the chairs away (put it in the closet) and someone has to lose the game unless more chairs are added to the game. 1. The chair Thiel "took" has been subsequently loaned out to other chair users. It wasn't taken away from the table. It isn't in a closet. It isn't in a giant cartoon swimming pool of chairs. 2. Thiel (and team) added net chairs to the larger musical chairs game. The count of new chairs is debatable but is not insignificant. 3. The chairs in Thiel's stash came from people willing to give him those chairs because they speculated they would get more chairs back down the road or at least not lose as many chairs as they would in other ways (like holding a chair as it shrinks due to inflation). 4. Society needs more chairs and specifically it needs people who have (a.) ideas and science to increase chairs, (b.) skills and knowledge to execute those ideas and (c.) leadership to guide and grow organizations to scale up the execution of those ideas. The emergent and evolving method society uses to develop consensus around and incentivize specific a, b, and c outcomes is the accounting of chairs. This year society will account chairs worth $3.5B ($3,539,217,846) towards football. Do these 1,934 people add chairs or take away chairs from the table? https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/salary.htm https://www.pro-football-reference.com/players/salary.htm