> Who cares what Larry does with his money. That's less the worry than, "It's not totally healthy to have a culture which idolizes people who have a lot of mon

> Who cares what Larry does with his money. That's less the worry than, "It's not totally healthy to have a culture which idolizes people who have a lot of money and then give some of it away, because it reinforces the message that making money = good person, not making money = slob or freeloader." I have a grandfather who hates, hates, welfare recipients, with a passion. If I showed him this story, he would interpret it as "proof that rich people are better than poor people," guaranteed. > Uh, by giving them access to healthcare, like vaccines? Yes, but as has been mentioned elsewhere, the problem isn't "let's give them healthcare!" Almost everybody thinks that's a good idea. The bigger question is, how do we pay for that healthcare? A much thornier question, as this thread proves. > what the hell does Larry's employer have to do with his personal donation of money for vaccines. See the above "are we validating wealth as the only means of value" question, only add to that the perspective that our lives revolve unhealthily around our employers already, that we work arbitrarily hard because our economic system forces us to work just for basic, unrelated needs (it's like "making money = good" only worse, because this is more like "working a lot = not dying of sickness"), and that perhaps employers working even harder to take control of every aspect of our lives, like where we live (Google dorms) and what we eat and how we stay healthy, is yet another sign of dysfunction. > I'm sorry, I don't buy this attempt to legitimize the miserable attitudes of some in this thread. I don't fully agree with any of the three opinions I stated above, to be clear. But I think that each is a valid and interesting perspective, and each one is worth a discussion. Honestly, why post a story to Hacker News if you don't want a discussion? And aren't discussions about interesting, controversial perspectives better than discussions that go "Man, I wish I was Larry Page," and "Look at this other rich person that gave money too!", and "Boy, this proves that not all rich people are evil people, rah rah 1%, boo boo Occupy Wall Street!" – I mean, aren't conversations that introduce new and interesting perspectives good in general?