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He was brought-up working class. His father's a Jamaican-born mechanic who moved to the UK in the 60s. He wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth. The clas

by Veen 4y ago

He was brought-up working class. His father's a Jamaican-born mechanic who moved to the UK in the 60s. He wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth. The class-war stuff probably isn't helpful.

ninethirty 4y ago
The battle between capital and the labor is class warfare.
- Veen 4y ago
  Maybe so, but traditional left-wing thinking would put Silicon Valley engineers firmly in the bourgeoisie—a group that pretends to have interests in common with the proletariat, but doesn't really. If it is class war, you guys really aren't on the same side as your nannies, cleaners, gardeners, dog-walkers, and people serving food in your free cafeterias. Their interests are very different, even if it pleases you to think defending your elite benefits somehow helps them too. It seems lots of people commenting here want Google to be a sinecure program for superfluous engineers. They're ardently pro-capitalist when it comes to startups and VC money and fleecing the proles with predatory advertising. But curiously left-wing and we're-all-in-this-together when their privileges are threatened.
  - ninethirty 4y ago
    They might have a lot more in common with the gardeners and carpenters if these hedge funds have their way. Capital is much better at capturing wealth than laborers and that's the core structural issue.
  - drcongo 4y ago
    Do we know that the people laid off by Google, or advocated for layoffs by this billionaire, don't include the cleaners, gardeners and people serving food in the free canteen? I think painting this as a "capitalists vs the left" thing is reductive and unhelpful. Personally, speaking as someone who Americans would probably consider extreme-left, I very much agree with your second paragraph, but I don't see this as "capitalism vs the left", I see it as the elite rich abusing their position to the detriment of everyone else. A story as old as time.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
jszymborski 4y ago
He is currently upper class by virtue of his net worth and literal title as a knight.
- Veen 4y ago
  A bit off topic, but a knighthood doesn't make you upper-class. In England, the real upper-classes are landed nobles with hereditary titles (who will look down on any parvenu with a knighthood and a few billion).
  - 4k3aa4 4y ago
    Also most of the upper class don't have much money left, those houses cost a fortune to maintain.
rpearl 4y ago
Then I guess he should stop engaging in class war, shouldn't he
- Veen 4y ago
  I wouldn't count among the downtrodden proletariat the extremely well-paid Silicon Valley engineers who sell themselves to rapacious advertising companies. This is one elite individual saying something other elite individuals don't like.
  - hellisothers 4y ago
    This is elite class war, it’s turning the low income against the high income to the benefit of the wealthy and elite. Software engineers are no doubt better off than the vast majority of people, top 3% easily when looking at income but most of them are still “wage slaves” and their luck can turn. Pitting us all against each other is the goal.
  - 4k3aa4 4y ago
    The goal is to make silicon valley engineers part of the downtrodden proletariat. Lots of jobs used to be high paying until they weren't.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - mitt_romney_12 4y ago
    Someone making $1m a year would need to work 7,400 years in order to be worth as much as this dude. Silicon Valley engineers are certainly well off but they are in nowhere near the same class as the kinds of people who are worth $7.48B.
- 4k3aa4 4y ago
  Let's be honest, a big part of the goal of the fed action and these layoffs is to even the playing field between labor and capital. Silicon Valley type engineers especially were getting dangerously close to escaping precarity (and did in a lot of cases). Now the FAANG club gets to the join the rest of the precariat in the "I'm constantly worried about losing my job, probably shouldn't be too ballsy with my vacation or ask for more money" world. Obviously the $ values are higher than a lineworker at Ford, but lets be honest if you are a mid level dev with a family in silicon valley your standard of living is the same or below that line worker in the 70s.
quantified 4y ago
He obviously should pay himself less so there is more money for the real value-generators. Owning Google stock doesn't help them do anything, but coding, testing, operating, marketing certainly does.

by Veen 4y ago

He was brought-up working class. His father's a Jamaican-born mechanic who moved to the UK in the 60s. He wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth. The class-war stuff probably isn't helpful.

ninethirty 4y ago

The battle between capital and the labor is class warfare.

Veen 4y ago
Maybe so, but traditional left-wing thinking would put Silicon Valley engineers firmly in the bourgeoisie—a group that pretends to have interests in common with the proletariat, but doesn't really. If it is class war, you guys really aren't on the same side as your nannies, cleaners, gardeners, dog-walkers, and people serving food in your free cafeterias. Their interests are very different, even if it pleases you to think defending your elite benefits somehow helps them too. It seems lots of people commenting here want Google to be a sinecure program for superfluous engineers. They're ardently pro-capitalist when it comes to startups and VC money and fleecing the proles with predatory advertising. But curiously left-wing and we're-all-in-this-together when their privileges are threatened.
- ninethirty 4y ago
  They might have a lot more in common with the gardeners and carpenters if these hedge funds have their way. Capital is much better at capturing wealth than laborers and that's the core structural issue.
- drcongo 4y ago
  Do we know that the people laid off by Google, or advocated for layoffs by this billionaire, don't include the cleaners, gardeners and people serving food in the free canteen? I think painting this as a "capitalists vs the left" thing is reductive and unhelpful. Personally, speaking as someone who Americans would probably consider extreme-left, I very much agree with your second paragraph, but I don't see this as "capitalism vs the left", I see it as the elite rich abusing their position to the detriment of everyone else. A story as old as time.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

jszymborski 4y ago

He is currently upper class by virtue of his net worth and literal title as a knight.

Veen 4y ago
A bit off topic, but a knighthood doesn't make you upper-class. In England, the real upper-classes are landed nobles with hereditary titles (who will look down on any parvenu with a knighthood and a few billion).
- 4k3aa4 4y ago
  Also most of the upper class don't have much money left, those houses cost a fortune to maintain.

rpearl 4y ago

Then I guess he should stop engaging in class war, shouldn't he

Veen 4y ago
I wouldn't count among the downtrodden proletariat the extremely well-paid Silicon Valley engineers who sell themselves to rapacious advertising companies. This is one elite individual saying something other elite individuals don't like.
- hellisothers 4y ago
  This is elite class war, it’s turning the low income against the high income to the benefit of the wealthy and elite. Software engineers are no doubt better off than the vast majority of people, top 3% easily when looking at income but most of them are still “wage slaves” and their luck can turn. Pitting us all against each other is the goal.
- 4k3aa4 4y ago
  The goal is to make silicon valley engineers part of the downtrodden proletariat. Lots of jobs used to be high paying until they weren't.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- mitt_romney_12 4y ago
  Someone making $1m a year would need to work 7,400 years in order to be worth as much as this dude. Silicon Valley engineers are certainly well off but they are in nowhere near the same class as the kinds of people who are worth $7.48B.
4k3aa4 4y ago
Let's be honest, a big part of the goal of the fed action and these layoffs is to even the playing field between labor and capital. Silicon Valley type engineers especially were getting dangerously close to escaping precarity (and did in a lot of cases). Now the FAANG club gets to the join the rest of the precariat in the "I'm constantly worried about losing my job, probably shouldn't be too ballsy with my vacation or ask for more money" world. Obviously the $ values are higher than a lineworker at Ford, but lets be honest if you are a mid level dev with a family in silicon valley your standard of living is the same or below that line worker in the 70s.

quantified 4y ago

He obviously should pay himself less so there is more money for the real value-generators. Owning Google stock doesn't help them do anything, but coding, testing, operating, marketing certainly does.