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I dunno, think Zuck losing however may billions of dollars of net worth is a pretty stiff consequence. He didn’t have to take responsibility but did. He also li

I dunno, think Zuck losing however may billions of dollars of net worth is a pretty stiff consequence. He didn’t have to take responsibility but did. He also literally paid for the consequences.

ForHackernews 4y ago
Is it, though? On paper, I've lost about 35% of my net worth in the recent market downturn, and it hasn't affected my life even the slightest. Maybe it's different if it's your own company and your ego is tied up in the stock price, but some numbers in a brokerage account going down doesn't feel like a "stiff consequence" to me.
runarberg 4y ago
A billionaire that looses half their net-worth is still a billionaire. They still hold more money than you can dream of, they still hold more power then you can imagine. It is not the same for a billionaire to loose money as it is for you or me. To take a concrete example. Elon Musk could just close down Twitter right now, and waste away his 44 bn USD he spent on it. After that squander, he would still be the richest man on the planet.
- smsm42 4y ago
  True, but what should happen instead? If losing lots of billions won't be enough, what would be?
  - runarberg 4y ago
    idk. If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. But perhaps there also ought to be a class action law suite, workers should be able to sue a negligent business leaders that costs them their jobs, similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%.
    - jlawson 4y ago
      Such a policy would mean that the consequences of a risk going wrong vastly outweigh the benefits of success. That would incentivize extremely risk-averse decisions by business leaders and lead to society-wide stagnation. The result would be far more suffering overall.
      - runarberg 4y ago
        I think that doesn’t need to be a bad thing. This all depends on what risk behavior does in a societal context and how much a particular leader is actually contributing to the business. We actually have a reason to believe that the standard risk attracted business is a net-negative for society. These businesses tend to rely on government bailouts when their risky behavior doesn’t work out, or they lay off a large number of people, or they cause massive environmental damage, etc. I much prefer a business that plays it safe and doesn’t risk our environment and our economy while maximizing the profits they give to their shareholders. Secondly, there is no reason to believe that a CEO is any sort of supreme decision maker of a company. Perhaps a democratized workplace—where the workers have a say in whether the business should engage in a risky behavior—is better at evaluating the risk. If that is the case then a CEO dictator might not want to lead the business into a risky endeavor at since they might get sued if it goes wrong, but workers who have only their jobs to loose might vote to do exactly that. I find the society-wide stagnation prediction lacking in imagination.
    - nomel 4y ago
      > If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. This doesn't seem logical. Companies aren't some static things. Especially social media companies, which usually have very short lives. A corrective, appropriate, action, in response to a changing market, could very easily be a reduction in headcount. All evidence suggests Facebook has no future [1]. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? 1. https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-pew-study/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-p...
- jahewson 4y ago
  Right but that’s got nothing to with consequences. You’re annoyed that the consequence is… the consequence. Instead of what? Some abstract punitive ideal?
- smabie 4y ago
  I mean if you have one billion and you lose half you are not a billionaire any more?
  - runarberg 4y ago
    You are correct on technicality, but you know I was speaking generally. Even so, a millionaire that still has 500 millions after they seriously screw up, still has a ton of money and power. The consequence is still minuscule next to me loosing half my money. A real consequence would be them loosing everything except 5000 USD

I dunno, think Zuck losing however may billions of dollars of net worth is a pretty stiff consequence. He didn’t have to take responsibility but did. He also literally paid for the consequences.

ForHackernews 4y ago

Is it, though? On paper, I've lost about 35% of my net worth in the recent market downturn, and it hasn't affected my life even the slightest. Maybe it's different if it's your own company and your ego is tied up in the stock price, but some numbers in a brokerage account going down doesn't feel like a "stiff consequence" to me.

runarberg 4y ago

A billionaire that looses half their net-worth is still a billionaire. They still hold more money than you can dream of, they still hold more power then you can imagine. It is not the same for a billionaire to loose money as it is for you or me. To take a concrete example. Elon Musk could just close down Twitter right now, and waste away his 44 bn USD he spent on it. After that squander, he would still be the richest man on the planet.

smsm42 4y ago
True, but what should happen instead? If losing lots of billions won't be enough, what would be?
- runarberg 4y ago
  idk. If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. But perhaps there also ought to be a class action law suite, workers should be able to sue a negligent business leaders that costs them their jobs, similar how a shareholder can sue for lost profits. But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad, should probably loose all their wealth, like 100%.
  - jlawson 4y ago
    Such a policy would mean that the consequences of a risk going wrong vastly outweigh the benefits of success. That would incentivize extremely risk-averse decisions by business leaders and lead to society-wide stagnation. The result would be far more suffering overall.
    - runarberg 4y ago
      I think that doesn’t need to be a bad thing. This all depends on what risk behavior does in a societal context and how much a particular leader is actually contributing to the business. We actually have a reason to believe that the standard risk attracted business is a net-negative for society. These businesses tend to rely on government bailouts when their risky behavior doesn’t work out, or they lay off a large number of people, or they cause massive environmental damage, etc. I much prefer a business that plays it safe and doesn’t risk our environment and our economy while maximizing the profits they give to their shareholders. Secondly, there is no reason to believe that a CEO is any sort of supreme decision maker of a company. Perhaps a democratized workplace—where the workers have a say in whether the business should engage in a risky behavior—is better at evaluating the risk. If that is the case then a CEO dictator might not want to lead the business into a risky endeavor at since they might get sued if it goes wrong, but workers who have only their jobs to loose might vote to do exactly that. I find the society-wide stagnation prediction lacking in imagination.
  - nomel 4y ago
    > If this many people were to loose their jobs under my authority, I think I would at the very least loose my job. This doesn't seem logical. Companies aren't some static things. Especially social media companies, which usually have very short lives. A corrective, appropriate, action, in response to a changing market, could very easily be a reduction in headcount. All evidence suggests Facebook has no future [1]. > But honestly a business leader that screws up so bad What's your metric for screwing up? Is it short, medium, or long term? Should short term goals/profits be the only goal of a company? 1. https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-pew-study/ https://techcrunch.com/2022/08/11/teens-abandoned-facebook-p...
jahewson 4y ago
Right but that’s got nothing to with consequences. You’re annoyed that the consequence is… the consequence. Instead of what? Some abstract punitive ideal?
smabie 4y ago
I mean if you have one billion and you lose half you are not a billionaire any more?
- runarberg 4y ago
  You are correct on technicality, but you know I was speaking generally. Even so, a millionaire that still has 500 millions after they seriously screw up, still has a ton of money and power. The consequence is still minuscule next to me loosing half my money. A real consequence would be them loosing everything except 5000 USD