3 ms·

> Satya Nadella having more money than me doesn't make my life worse; That is simply not true. Money is not an absolut good, but relative. When a few people ow

> Satya Nadella having more money than me doesn't make my life worse; That is simply not true. Money is not an absolut good, but relative. When a few people own a large portion of money, that affords them the power to decide what people do and usually makes their life worse.

engineer_22 3y ago
Well except when they have gained such wealth by providing goods or services in an open competitive market which customers have decided to spend their own wealth on. We must assume people spend their wealth on things that make their lives better. Fortunately the people living in the United States of America have a society of laws and have been to bat against the monopolistic tendencies of unfettered capitalism at least once before.
- madsbuch 3y ago
  Well, surely you also calculate that companies pay the true cost of offering those services? As long as Facebook has not paid for their true use of the internet infrastructure, they have been subsidised by the (public) entities who did pay form them. Maybe a lot of companies (erhm, platform-companies) use unfair market dynamics that should be regulated to yield a fair market place (Eg. European platform directives)? For an ideal marketplace it should never be possible to accrue extreme wealth as other providers should swoop in when they discover that there are profit opportunities. If the marketplace does not work like that, then regulation should ensure that we go towards an ideal marketplace. This is, btw, why all industrialised countries have rules against monopolies. Ie. extreme wealth inequality is a sign of a dysfunctional capitalistic system.
LargeTomato 3y ago
By your logic the following argument holds. > Any income differential that results in a power imbalance makes the world worse. And that might be true but I think it misses the point of the argument. Increasing the quality of life for the global poor is much more important than capping Satya's wealth. There's no equivalence here.
- madsbuch 3y ago
  This is a question of politics and can not be divorced. Satya's wealth will go down. Eg. global minimum tax schemes are a promising category og tools to fix this. Indifferently to how you see it, that would decrease somebody's wealth, that they are being taxed on their (foreign) assets. Increasing quality of life for the poorest people will have to require wealth (and power) redistribution – but that should happen within a framework of fair regulation and fair taxing.

engineer_22 3y ago

Well except when they have gained such wealth by providing goods or services in an open competitive market which customers have decided to spend their own wealth on. We must assume people spend their wealth on things that make their lives better. Fortunately the people living in the United States of America have a society of laws and have been to bat against the monopolistic tendencies of unfettered capitalism at least once before.

madsbuch 3y ago
Well, surely you also calculate that companies pay the true cost of offering those services? As long as Facebook has not paid for their true use of the internet infrastructure, they have been subsidised by the (public) entities who did pay form them. Maybe a lot of companies (erhm, platform-companies) use unfair market dynamics that should be regulated to yield a fair market place (Eg. European platform directives)? For an ideal marketplace it should never be possible to accrue extreme wealth as other providers should swoop in when they discover that there are profit opportunities. If the marketplace does not work like that, then regulation should ensure that we go towards an ideal marketplace. This is, btw, why all industrialised countries have rules against monopolies. Ie. extreme wealth inequality is a sign of a dysfunctional capitalistic system.

LargeTomato 3y ago

By your logic the following argument holds. > Any income differential that results in a power imbalance makes the world worse. And that might be true but I think it misses the point of the argument. Increasing the quality of life for the global poor is much more important than capping Satya's wealth. There's no equivalence here.

madsbuch 3y ago
This is a question of politics and can not be divorced. Satya's wealth will go down. Eg. global minimum tax schemes are a promising category og tools to fix this. Indifferently to how you see it, that would decrease somebody's wealth, that they are being taxed on their (foreign) assets. Increasing quality of life for the poorest people will have to require wealth (and power) redistribution – but that should happen within a framework of fair regulation and fair taxing.