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What's with that obsession about "billionaires"? If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? Personally I think we are perfe

What's with that obsession about "billionaires"? If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? Personally I think we are perfectly fine without billionaires.

layer8 4y ago
Unfortunately they still crop up, with increasing frequency.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
college_physics 4y ago
a "nice living" is actually quite hard for small businesses. competition is brutal, all sorts of risks can be fatal etc. the "billionaire adoration" phenomenon is actually putting lipstick on oligopolistic market arrangements and pretending they are still entrepreneurial
MuffinFlavored 4y ago
> If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? I think the allure of being a billionaire is it's "one and done". As in, once you achieve it, you can live the craziest life possible filled with lots of grandeur and not need to run any kind of business whatsoever after. It's mainly a fantasy for people who are tired, overworked, underpaid, under-appreciated (which is like 85% of America I'm guessing). "Wouldn't it be nice..."
- yieldcrv 4y ago
  or if you have something, the response is "must be nice" I feel like this accelerates class segregation. like, going from talking about the new condo in a nice neighborhood changes from "must be nice" to "my friend lives there and says the Tesla charging stations are broken but I'll talk to the leasing office about it tomorrow", just immediately more depth that some groups of people can't contribute to and are dismissive about.
- benjaminwootton 4y ago
  You can do that with $10m or less. 4% safe withdrawal rate, $400k a year is a hell of a lifestyle in the vast majority of locations.
- wing-_-nuts 4y ago
  The thing is, this is achievable even at 10M. Hell, one can support the median household income at a reasonable SWR on ~ 2M. Underlying all of this seems to be paulg's assertion that billionaire founders 'deserve' their wealth and therefore our inequality and their relatively small contribution to the public purse is justified. I have no problem with founders being rich, but once you're earning 1%er income? You should be paying a hefty amount of taxes to support social spending. Think ~ 2/3rds, like it used to be before the regans and thatchers of the world gutted the social contract in the 80s.
  - toast0 4y ago
    > The thing is, this is achievable even at 10M. $10M does get you a nice time, and you would never have to say no to any reasonable expense, but it's also definitely possible to overspend. There's some higher threshold where you really can be 'wild and crazy' and the only way to run out of money would be through bad investments. There's a difference between always flying first class, always flying on a jetshare, and always having your plane fueled up and ready to go. Also, between driving yourself to the airport, taking a car service, having your driver take you, or having your helicopter pick you up.
    - overrun11 4y ago
      10M would give you a safe withdrawal rate somewhere between 300-400k a year. A fairly common household income for people on HN. It affords a very nice quality of life but you're certainly not living the lifestyle that most people think of as "rich."
      - shadowofneptune 4y ago
        That's the average? There's no way to measure it, but that's around five times the US median household income, at a percentile of 97%. It could not be close to the median for HN just by probability, and it's a rich man's income.
        4y ago
- int0x2e 4y ago
  I am very far from being a billionaire, but as soon as I made it to upper-middle-class, I realized that the hedonistic treadmill would never end, even if I was a billionaire. It's a never ending fantasy world where everyone looks up and wants to be as rich as the next tier, even though that's rarely possible, and just like the scene in WarGames, "the only winning move is not to play".
  - bluGill 4y ago
    While there is some of that, eventually you reach a point where you don't really know what to do with more money. That is you fly first class, and you see no reason to upgrade to the next level (shared jet, owned jet). Maybe you try a cruise and decide an inside cabin is just as good as the largest balcony room (or something inbetween) and are not interested in owning your own ship at all - perhaps a cruise isn't for you and you still prefer primitive camping in the backwoods with the minimum you can take with you. Of course you can always spend more money. However I have known rich people who decided their mansion was too large and so they downsized (their master bedroom after the downsize was the size of my whole house!) Eventually what you need is time to enjoy what you have not more luxury. Fly coach or have a private jet on call - end the end you get there, and the jet only saves you a bit of time at the airport.
oblio 4y ago
> What's with that obsession about "billionaires"? If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? Personally I think we are perfectly fine without billionaires. https://news.ycombinator.com/ https://news.ycombinator.com/ -> https://www.ycombinator.com/ https://www.ycombinator.com/ -> > Y Combinator created a new model for funding early stage startups. > Twice a year we invest $500,000 per company in a large number of startups. > We work intensively with the companies for three months, to get them into the best possible shape and refine their pitch to investors. Each cycle culminates in Demo Day, when the startups present their companies to a carefully selected, invite-only audience. -> https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/public https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/public Sometimes I guess we just forget where we are :-)
- Sharlin 4y ago
  So is the premise that Y Combinator is only for billionaire-wannabes?
  - iso1631 4y ago
    The irony is the only person I personally know who founded a startup (he's the CTO) which is valued at more than $1b never looks at HN. So I guess yes, it's the wannabes.
    - drewcoo 4y ago
      It might be useful to have a billionaire-wannabe honey pot . . . I'm sure I'm years behind the curve on that idea, though.
    - satvikpendem 4y ago
      YC isn't just HN though. Was he funded by YC at all?
  - beambot 4y ago
    YC is creating venture-backed startups, where the nature of power-law returns necessitates aiming for "grand slams" (i.e. 100x outcomes following SeriesA funding). If successful, this creates billionaires. So in a sense (though I wouldn't conflate cause & effect): Yes, YCombinator is looking for people who want to create companies that could reasonably result in the founders becoming billionaires. Worth noting: Not all companies can or should target this trajectory -- which just means VC might not be the right funding source.
oblivious7 4y ago
Check paulg’s tweet history. A few weeks ago he lamented how fake things are in the US, pointing at things like Kraft singles. I don’t have a Twitter account but almost went to sign up to reply “billionaires whose wealth is based on mathematical inference not possession of tens of billions of real dollars.” I say let’s automate away book smart, street stupid easily deluded normal humans who end up optimizing for themselves while roleplaying something more egalitarian is afoot with their games. Letting a minority monopolize agency is not a greater good as there are no greater goods. It’s typical political corruption. Automate away politicians, VCs, C*O level; organizing life in line with religious traditions is not sacrosanct. Why is organizing life under the prior 60-70 years so special? Ooh right; cause that cohort is where all the wealth is captured. Silly me. Looks like it’s time to revisit Reagan’s policy of expropriating retirement for the youth to invest.

What's with that obsession about "billionaires"? If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? Personally I think we are perfectly fine without billionaires.

layer8 4y ago

Unfortunately they still crop up, with increasing frequency.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

college_physics 4y ago

a "nice living" is actually quite hard for small businesses. competition is brutal, all sorts of risks can be fatal etc. the "billionaire adoration" phenomenon is actually putting lipstick on oligopolistic market arrangements and pretending they are still entrepreneurial

MuffinFlavored 4y ago

> If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? I think the allure of being a billionaire is it's "one and done". As in, once you achieve it, you can live the craziest life possible filled with lots of grandeur and not need to run any kind of business whatsoever after. It's mainly a fantasy for people who are tired, overworked, underpaid, under-appreciated (which is like 85% of America I'm guessing). "Wouldn't it be nice..."

yieldcrv 4y ago
or if you have something, the response is "must be nice" I feel like this accelerates class segregation. like, going from talking about the new condo in a nice neighborhood changes from "must be nice" to "my friend lives there and says the Tesla charging stations are broken but I'll talk to the leasing office about it tomorrow", just immediately more depth that some groups of people can't contribute to and are dismissive about.
benjaminwootton 4y ago
You can do that with $10m or less. 4% safe withdrawal rate, $400k a year is a hell of a lifestyle in the vast majority of locations.
wing-_-nuts 4y ago
The thing is, this is achievable even at 10M. Hell, one can support the median household income at a reasonable SWR on ~ 2M. Underlying all of this seems to be paulg's assertion that billionaire founders 'deserve' their wealth and therefore our inequality and their relatively small contribution to the public purse is justified. I have no problem with founders being rich, but once you're earning 1%er income? You should be paying a hefty amount of taxes to support social spending. Think ~ 2/3rds, like it used to be before the regans and thatchers of the world gutted the social contract in the 80s.
- toast0 4y ago
  > The thing is, this is achievable even at 10M. $10M does get you a nice time, and you would never have to say no to any reasonable expense, but it's also definitely possible to overspend. There's some higher threshold where you really can be 'wild and crazy' and the only way to run out of money would be through bad investments. There's a difference between always flying first class, always flying on a jetshare, and always having your plane fueled up and ready to go. Also, between driving yourself to the airport, taking a car service, having your driver take you, or having your helicopter pick you up.
  - overrun11 4y ago
    10M would give you a safe withdrawal rate somewhere between 300-400k a year. A fairly common household income for people on HN. It affords a very nice quality of life but you're certainly not living the lifestyle that most people think of as "rich."
    - shadowofneptune 4y ago
      That's the average? There's no way to measure it, but that's around five times the US median household income, at a percentile of 97%. It could not be close to the median for HN just by probability, and it's a rich man's income.
      - 4y ago
int0x2e 4y ago
I am very far from being a billionaire, but as soon as I made it to upper-middle-class, I realized that the hedonistic treadmill would never end, even if I was a billionaire. It's a never ending fantasy world where everyone looks up and wants to be as rich as the next tier, even though that's rarely possible, and just like the scene in WarGames, "the only winning move is not to play".
- bluGill 4y ago
  While there is some of that, eventually you reach a point where you don't really know what to do with more money. That is you fly first class, and you see no reason to upgrade to the next level (shared jet, owned jet). Maybe you try a cruise and decide an inside cabin is just as good as the largest balcony room (or something inbetween) and are not interested in owning your own ship at all - perhaps a cruise isn't for you and you still prefer primitive camping in the backwoods with the minimum you can take with you. Of course you can always spend more money. However I have known rich people who decided their mansion was too large and so they downsized (their master bedroom after the downsize was the size of my whole house!) Eventually what you need is time to enjoy what you have not more luxury. Fly coach or have a private jet on call - end the end you get there, and the jet only saves you a bit of time at the airport.

oblio 4y ago

> What's with that obsession about "billionaires"? If somebody can make a nice living with their business, isn't that good enough? Personally I think we are perfectly fine without billionaires. https://news.ycombinator.com/ https://news.ycombinator.com/ -> https://www.ycombinator.com/ https://www.ycombinator.com/ -> > Y Combinator created a new model for funding early stage startups. > Twice a year we invest $500,000 per company in a large number of startups. > We work intensively with the companies for three months, to get them into the best possible shape and refine their pitch to investors. Each cycle culminates in Demo Day, when the startups present their companies to a carefully selected, invite-only audience. -> https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/public https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/public Sometimes I guess we just forget where we are :-)

Sharlin 4y ago
So is the premise that Y Combinator is only for billionaire-wannabes?
- iso1631 4y ago
  The irony is the only person I personally know who founded a startup (he's the CTO) which is valued at more than $1b never looks at HN. So I guess yes, it's the wannabes.
  - drewcoo 4y ago
    It might be useful to have a billionaire-wannabe honey pot . . . I'm sure I'm years behind the curve on that idea, though.
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    YC isn't just HN though. Was he funded by YC at all?
- beambot 4y ago
  YC is creating venture-backed startups, where the nature of power-law returns necessitates aiming for "grand slams" (i.e. 100x outcomes following SeriesA funding). If successful, this creates billionaires. So in a sense (though I wouldn't conflate cause & effect): Yes, YCombinator is looking for people who want to create companies that could reasonably result in the founders becoming billionaires. Worth noting: Not all companies can or should target this trajectory -- which just means VC might not be the right funding source.

oblivious7 4y ago

Check paulg’s tweet history. A few weeks ago he lamented how fake things are in the US, pointing at things like Kraft singles. I don’t have a Twitter account but almost went to sign up to reply “billionaires whose wealth is based on mathematical inference not possession of tens of billions of real dollars.” I say let’s automate away book smart, street stupid easily deluded normal humans who end up optimizing for themselves while roleplaying something more egalitarian is afoot with their games. Letting a minority monopolize agency is not a greater good as there are no greater goods. It’s typical political corruption. Automate away politicians, VCs, C*O level; organizing life in line with religious traditions is not sacrosanct. Why is organizing life under the prior 60-70 years so special? Ooh right; cause that cohort is where all the wealth is captured. Silly me. Looks like it’s time to revisit Reagan’s policy of expropriating retirement for the youth to invest.