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The thing is, most of the net worth of these people isn't just sitting around in a big bucket of cash; the wealth of these people is overwhelmingly due to their

The thing is, most of the net worth of these people isn't just sitting around in a big bucket of cash; the wealth of these people is overwhelmingly due to their ownership of their businesses. If I own a mom-and-pop sandwich shop worth $1 million, and I take a $50k salary, I imagine most people would be fine with that. If I grow this sandwich shop into a national franchise worth $1 billion and still take a $50k salary, I still am in possession of just as much spendable cash, but suddenly I'm a billionaire on paper. It seems incredibly immoral to strip my own business from me because it's been too successful, and that type of ownership expropriation seems extremely likely to stifle entrepreneurship. Tax people when they sell stock. Tax people's income. Tax collateralized assets. Tax the hell out of them if they're making boatloads of cash. But to wrest ownership of someone's creation from their hands because they've done too good a job creating it seems like a recipe for disaster.

ModernMech 5y ago
> If I grow this sandwich shop into a national franchise worth $1 billion It's very unlikely that you personally, singlehandedly would be able to build your sandwich shop into a billion dollar franchise. The value of Amazon is not a trillion dollars because of Jeff Bezos alone. He helped get it there, sure, and he deserves to be rewarded for that, but so did 800k other people. Can an Amazon driver afford a house, 2 cars, and to put 2 kids through college on a single income today? My dad could working for UPS for 30 years starting in the 80s. He's retired now with a pension. Why can't Amazon provide that kind of life for their workers? They're certainly richer and more profitable than UPS ever was. One key difference is that UPS is unionized, and then you start to realize why Amazon really, really, really, doesn't want their workers to unionize. Bezos' wealth is not a problem in a vacuum. It's a problem in a world where he's using his wealth to fly to space, while others (even people who work for him) are being evicted from their homes during a global pandemic, and there are more than enough homes to house everyone. That's the backdrop for all of this outrage. IMO an example of what would be incredibly immoral is if your ownership stake in your national sandwich chain reaches $1 billion, and your workers aren't making a living wage that can cover rent, food, and healthcare for their families. Yes we want to encourage entrepreneurship, but we cannot do so at the expense of workers. I think we've gone too far in one direction and now the backlash is forming.
- gameman144 5y ago
  This is, in my opinion, the perfect example of where regulation should be applied though. If a business is playing by the rules and we as society aren't okay with the results, then those rules should be changed for all businesses, e.g. minimum wage raises. The roadblocks to these laws is that they don't come for free, and loads of businesses would either no longer be viable or would be able to hire less. This is one of the ways that Amazon is building out its moat to prevent challengers (note that Amazon has had a $15 minimum wage for years). Of course there's a happy equilibrium somewhere in there, but this is not the role of Jeff Bezos (or my hypothetical sandwich shop) to figure out. I expect my government to determine the rules of how society can function, and I expect businesses to be as efficient as possible within the bounds of those rules. As an aside, though, none of this has to do with the concept of someone being forced to give up their own company. If a company needs to act a certain way, then the law should force the company to act that way for sure. If a company was following the law, though, the backlash for crappy outcomes falls firmly at the feet of that law.
- pb7 5y ago
  What if the sandwich shop went from being worth $1M to being worthless instead? Should the workers bear the cost of any business debt and/or have their wages clawed back?
  - ModernMech 5y ago
    When a founder draws a salary and the business goes under, their wages aren't clawed back. Why would a worker's wages be clawed back? Workers should share in ownership. If the value of the business goes to zero, their ownership stake goes to zero, just like the founder.

ModernMech 5y ago

> If I grow this sandwich shop into a national franchise worth $1 billion It's very unlikely that you personally, singlehandedly would be able to build your sandwich shop into a billion dollar franchise. The value of Amazon is not a trillion dollars because of Jeff Bezos alone. He helped get it there, sure, and he deserves to be rewarded for that, but so did 800k other people. Can an Amazon driver afford a house, 2 cars, and to put 2 kids through college on a single income today? My dad could working for UPS for 30 years starting in the 80s. He's retired now with a pension. Why can't Amazon provide that kind of life for their workers? They're certainly richer and more profitable than UPS ever was. One key difference is that UPS is unionized, and then you start to realize why Amazon really, really, really, doesn't want their workers to unionize. Bezos' wealth is not a problem in a vacuum. It's a problem in a world where he's using his wealth to fly to space, while others (even people who work for him) are being evicted from their homes during a global pandemic, and there are more than enough homes to house everyone. That's the backdrop for all of this outrage. IMO an example of what would be incredibly immoral is if your ownership stake in your national sandwich chain reaches $1 billion, and your workers aren't making a living wage that can cover rent, food, and healthcare for their families. Yes we want to encourage entrepreneurship, but we cannot do so at the expense of workers. I think we've gone too far in one direction and now the backlash is forming.

gameman144 5y ago
This is, in my opinion, the perfect example of where regulation should be applied though. If a business is playing by the rules and we as society aren't okay with the results, then those rules should be changed for all businesses, e.g. minimum wage raises. The roadblocks to these laws is that they don't come for free, and loads of businesses would either no longer be viable or would be able to hire less. This is one of the ways that Amazon is building out its moat to prevent challengers (note that Amazon has had a $15 minimum wage for years). Of course there's a happy equilibrium somewhere in there, but this is not the role of Jeff Bezos (or my hypothetical sandwich shop) to figure out. I expect my government to determine the rules of how society can function, and I expect businesses to be as efficient as possible within the bounds of those rules. As an aside, though, none of this has to do with the concept of someone being forced to give up their own company. If a company needs to act a certain way, then the law should force the company to act that way for sure. If a company was following the law, though, the backlash for crappy outcomes falls firmly at the feet of that law.
pb7 5y ago
What if the sandwich shop went from being worth $1M to being worthless instead? Should the workers bear the cost of any business debt and/or have their wages clawed back?
- ModernMech 5y ago
  When a founder draws a salary and the business goes under, their wages aren't clawed back. Why would a worker's wages be clawed back? Workers should share in ownership. If the value of the business goes to zero, their ownership stake goes to zero, just like the founder.