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Last time I looked into things, the fines they were going to pay is a tiny slap on the wrist compared to the obscene money they made. They can put the billions

Last time I looked into things, the fines they were going to pay is a tiny slap on the wrist compared to the obscene money they made. They can put the billions in an account and use just some of the interest for the fines. The biggest hit to them so far was having their name removed from some museums. Let that sink in. They've lost some slight prestige with other wealthy folks.

legitster 2y ago
They took in something like $11 billion and were going to fund something like $6 billion. As far as purely pragmatic solutions go this was not a bad deal for victims. There are a lot of members of the Sackler family and a lot of them have a lot of money despite personally not being connected to the Purdue business in any way. Even if they could all be connected to wrongdoing actually getting money from, like, the second step-grand-nephew who lives in Copenhagen is going to be really, really hard.
- BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
  $6 billion dollars is a lot of money, but it's also just half of what they profited from what was effectively mass murder. Is that really something you want to let people buy their way out of for less than they profited?
  - legitster 2y ago
    Think of it this way - if you found out your great-grand-uncle was a Nazi official, and that the house you grew up in or the favorable college you got into or whatever lifestyle you had growing up was initially partly funded by his misdeeds? Could your assets be targeted by descendants of the victims and you personally be made bankrupt? That's a bit of an exaggeration, but a lot of the wealth of the Sackler family is distributed this way. The original brothers have died, there is a huge lump of easily gotten money from the direct family, and then there is a lot of money that has been spread around 2 or 3 generations removed. At a certain point if you want the full $11 billion you are going to have to go into the weeds.
    - lesuorac 2y ago
      I don't think "partly funded by his misdeeds" is an accurate description. Members of the Sackler family ran Perdue Pharma and they aren't dead. Sure, a relative of the Perdue Pharma executives should be off limit for liability. But there's still plenty of actual executives that should be held accountable.
    - BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
      > and that the house you grew up in or the favorable college you got into or whatever lifestyle you had growing up Are we talking about wealth I inherited? About wealth I wrongfully inherited from the wrung necks of the dead? When in this framing do we start to consider where that money should have been vs where it is now? I presumably in this scenario did nothing wrong personally, and yet what wealth do I _deserve_? Do I _deserve_ this wealth extracted by mass destruction enacted by my relatives, granted not by myself, but that someone else would otherwise have?
- hyeonwho4 2y ago
  645,000 people died due to opiate abuse while their company was promoting opiates, and their prescriptions peaked at 6.2 million prescription users pee year. Under EPA standards for damages they would be liable for trillions.

legitster 2y ago

They took in something like $11 billion and were going to fund something like $6 billion. As far as purely pragmatic solutions go this was not a bad deal for victims. There are a lot of members of the Sackler family and a lot of them have a lot of money despite personally not being connected to the Purdue business in any way. Even if they could all be connected to wrongdoing actually getting money from, like, the second step-grand-nephew who lives in Copenhagen is going to be really, really hard.

BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
$6 billion dollars is a lot of money, but it's also just half of what they profited from what was effectively mass murder. Is that really something you want to let people buy their way out of for less than they profited?
- legitster 2y ago
  Think of it this way - if you found out your great-grand-uncle was a Nazi official, and that the house you grew up in or the favorable college you got into or whatever lifestyle you had growing up was initially partly funded by his misdeeds? Could your assets be targeted by descendants of the victims and you personally be made bankrupt? That's a bit of an exaggeration, but a lot of the wealth of the Sackler family is distributed this way. The original brothers have died, there is a huge lump of easily gotten money from the direct family, and then there is a lot of money that has been spread around 2 or 3 generations removed. At a certain point if you want the full $11 billion you are going to have to go into the weeds.
  - lesuorac 2y ago
    I don't think "partly funded by his misdeeds" is an accurate description. Members of the Sackler family ran Perdue Pharma and they aren't dead. Sure, a relative of the Perdue Pharma executives should be off limit for liability. But there's still plenty of actual executives that should be held accountable.
  - BugsJustFindMe 2y ago
    > and that the house you grew up in or the favorable college you got into or whatever lifestyle you had growing up Are we talking about wealth I inherited? About wealth I wrongfully inherited from the wrung necks of the dead? When in this framing do we start to consider where that money should have been vs where it is now? I presumably in this scenario did nothing wrong personally, and yet what wealth do I _deserve_? Do I _deserve_ this wealth extracted by mass destruction enacted by my relatives, granted not by myself, but that someone else would otherwise have?
hyeonwho4 2y ago
645,000 people died due to opiate abuse while their company was promoting opiates, and their prescriptions peaked at 6.2 million prescription users pee year. Under EPA standards for damages they would be liable for trillions.