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It’s not like the wealth of Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos is in liquid assets: their wealth is from owning shares in a corporation. What we’re saying when we say “l

It’s not like the wealth of Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos is in liquid assets: their wealth is from owning shares in a corporation. What we’re saying when we say “limit their wealth” is that we should force them to lose control of the company they founded and led to success — almost entirely! Eg, Jeff Bezos would go from ~10% of Amazon to ~0.01% if we wanted to reduce his “wealth” below a billion dollars. Given that neither government nor Wall St seem to show greater wisdom than these business leaders with demonstrated success, I’m strongly against forcing corporate leaders to cede more power to those groups.

daenz 5y ago
I'm sure it's by design. I don't know the author's stance on nationalizing, but people who make similar arguments about "you don't need that much money!" also like to propose nationalizing all wealthy companies.
Jochim 5y ago
Isn't this argument entirely defeated by the existence of share classes though? Forgive me if I'm incorrect but aren't founders already free to maintain control of the company by holding all voting shares while issuing separate non voting shares. It seems supremely unimaginative to believe that we couldn't easily come up with a situation where Jeff Bezos owns 0.01% of Amazon but still maintains full control of the company. Personally I think affording that level of control to an individual is supremely irresponsible once a corporation has reached a size that it's failure would cause severe harm to society. Especially since the people responsible, more often than not, remain extremely well off while the rest of us get to pick up the pieces.
- zmgsabst 5y ago
  > Especially since the people responsible, more often than not, remain extremely well off while the rest of us get to pick up the pieces. This is equally true of Wall St and the government, except that neither has shown they’re capable of managing the company — while the founder has. I’m not seeing what the benefit is in removing control from someone successful to give it to people who are routinely not - eg, Wall St running Boeing into the ground, to the point their planes self-crash (737), can’t be certified because the doors blow off (777), or be manufactured to spec (787). > supremely unimaginative to believe that we couldn't easily come up with a situation where Jeff Bezos owns 0.01% of Amazon but still maintains full control of the company Your only argument for really complicated legal structures, including having to constantly change the ownership structure, is that you don’t like people who are wildly successful can parlay that success into other efforts? Okay — but I think that’s dumb. Why is it a problem that Jeff Bezos can try his hand at rockets now that he’s demonstrated success at leading Amazon? — or that Elon Musk can try fixing Twitter now that helps demonstrated success at Tesla?
  - gregorty 5y ago
    Bezos and Musk take far too much credit. Most of the work, including the intellectual work, the vast majority in fact, was done by other people. Those are the people who should be celebrated, not the guy who happens to own the organisation, and nudges it now and again like some tinkering monarch.

daenz 5y ago

I'm sure it's by design. I don't know the author's stance on nationalizing, but people who make similar arguments about "you don't need that much money!" also like to propose nationalizing all wealthy companies.

Jochim 5y ago

Isn't this argument entirely defeated by the existence of share classes though? Forgive me if I'm incorrect but aren't founders already free to maintain control of the company by holding all voting shares while issuing separate non voting shares. It seems supremely unimaginative to believe that we couldn't easily come up with a situation where Jeff Bezos owns 0.01% of Amazon but still maintains full control of the company. Personally I think affording that level of control to an individual is supremely irresponsible once a corporation has reached a size that it's failure would cause severe harm to society. Especially since the people responsible, more often than not, remain extremely well off while the rest of us get to pick up the pieces.

zmgsabst 5y ago
> Especially since the people responsible, more often than not, remain extremely well off while the rest of us get to pick up the pieces. This is equally true of Wall St and the government, except that neither has shown they’re capable of managing the company — while the founder has. I’m not seeing what the benefit is in removing control from someone successful to give it to people who are routinely not - eg, Wall St running Boeing into the ground, to the point their planes self-crash (737), can’t be certified because the doors blow off (777), or be manufactured to spec (787). > supremely unimaginative to believe that we couldn't easily come up with a situation where Jeff Bezos owns 0.01% of Amazon but still maintains full control of the company Your only argument for really complicated legal structures, including having to constantly change the ownership structure, is that you don’t like people who are wildly successful can parlay that success into other efforts? Okay — but I think that’s dumb. Why is it a problem that Jeff Bezos can try his hand at rockets now that he’s demonstrated success at leading Amazon? — or that Elon Musk can try fixing Twitter now that helps demonstrated success at Tesla?
- gregorty 5y ago
  Bezos and Musk take far too much credit. Most of the work, including the intellectual work, the vast majority in fact, was done by other people. Those are the people who should be celebrated, not the guy who happens to own the organisation, and nudges it now and again like some tinkering monarch.