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Not a reddit take, just common sense. At a billion your more powerful than several smaller countries, it’s millions of dollars a day in net worth growth, you co
by techdragon 4y ago
Not a reddit take, just common sense. At a billion your more powerful than several smaller countries, it’s millions of dollars a day in net worth growth, you could buy a new house smash the dining room wall in and use a brand new luxury car as a dinner table … every day… and still be making more money than you can spend…
Being a billionaire is like ascending to a higher plane of financial being where the trivialities of normal day to day expenses no longer matter to you. Unless you do really stupid things with that money it’s almost impossible for a billionaire to get poorer.
It’s a limit break on the functionality of capitalist society which regardless of the ethics of capitalism itself requires some sort of nerf/patch to prevent the billionaires from exploiting the rest of us and preventing us from striving to be what we want, wether that be a broke artist or a multi millionaire real estate developer.
- notright8 4y ago
- MrBuddyCasino 4y ago[flagged]
- giaour 4y ago> Unless you do really stupid things with that money it’s almost impossible for a billionaire to get poorer. "Really stupid things" like buying a social media company?
- sgc 4y agoThat is like the average FAANG-wealthy programmer buying a modest house with a loan. It has little effect on his wealth outside of the egregious display of his behavior.
- ceejayoz 4y agoHis behavior can impact Tesla share prices, if it's bad enough. That has a large and direct impact on his wealth.
- ModernMech 4y agoIt already has. Tesla is underperforming the S&P 500, as well as their competitors like GM and Ford. It’s on track for its wort year ever. Tesla brand perception has dramatically tanked for 50% of the market since Musk bought Twitter, where he seemingly spends all his time there trolling. People are wondering who the hell is running Tesla since Musk tied himself to Tesla’s branding and image, but now he’s suddenly completely MIA.
- sgc 4y agoThat is literally what I said, so yes, I agree. But the fact he bought a social media company does not impact it, outside of him using it to amplify his visibility.
- pedrocr 4y agoI do think billionares are undertaxed, but mostly because they can easily get around the tax system itself. The personal wealth comparison seems flawed though because it's treating wealth as if it's just bank accounts of cash and we're discussing how much everyone has to spend on consumption. But at even millionaire levels of wealth most of it is in real estate and ownership of companies. And at that point disallowing certain levels of wealth just means you can't have your business grow above a certain size and still keep it, or keep your family's real estate if the market has grown substantially around you. Fixing the tax system either at the base or with a progressive wealth tax as a hack on top may be a better solution.
- whywhywhywhy 4y ago> I do think billionares are undertaxed How does politicians profiting from them solve anything.
- Jochim 4y agoI like roads and schools.
- whatthesmack 4y agoEverybody does. But--speaking from the US perspective--most taxes don't go to those things.
- davidcuddeback 4y ago> Everybody does. Then we're in agreement that taxes are a necessity. Can we also agree that taxes should be collected fairly (even if we might disagree on what a fair balance might be)?
- Jochim 4y agoThe manner in which those taxes are distributed is a choice made by a person. Convince your countrymen to vote for people who will direct taxes towards those things. While not an easy feat, the way things are today are not the way they must be tomorrow.
- koonsolo 4y ago> use a brand new luxury car as a dinner table … every day… and still be making more money than you can spend Just because you own a company doesn't mean you have instant access to its value in cash.
- ceejayoz 4y agoA billionaire will have an extensive amount of credit - Amex alone will probably let you put millions on one of their charge cards without any questions asked - and the ability to have nearly instant access to enormous amounts of cash.
- brookst 4y agoBanks won’t do same day spot loans collatoralized by equity? Since when?
- UncleEntity 4y agoThe billionaires today are a different bunch than the “billionaires”[0] when I was a kid. You’d think they would have risen up and stopped these new people from becoming rich. How hard could it have been? [0] don’t righty know if anyone was a billionaire in the 70s
- Lanolderen 4y agoYou'd also have difficulty spending/losing 100 mil though. And at that amount it's hard to gauge wealth. If, for example, Musk were to sell all of his stock they'd take a massive nose dive. I feel after 100 mil money is more or less just a number.