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It's great that you mention Cuba. They have basically the same number of people as Belgium and Cuba is nearly four times bigger than Belgium... Yet their GDP i
by martinced 14y ago
It's great that you mention Cuba. They have basically the same number of people as Belgium and Cuba is nearly four times bigger than Belgium... Yet their GDP is 1/8th that one of Belgium.
And they're at these "high" levels only because Cuba wasn't doing bad at all before the communist took power and because, after the revolution, Cuba was heavily subsidized by soviet russia (they were sending billion of $ to Cuba).
Thing is: if Cuba was a place of freedom where people were free to create businees, maybe Larry and Sergey's parents would have moved to Cuba and created Google there, say in Pig's bay which would have been the Cuban Silicon Valley. And Cuba's GDP would be closer to the one it should have.
In my opinion people able to earn $10bn know much about creating present growth and future wealth than people admiring homophobic racist mysoginist slaughterers like Che Guevara.
So, no, I don't find it unfair at all that a single person is more "wealthy" than the GDP of communist countries ; )
- tokenadult 14y agoI don't find it unfair at all that a single person is more "wealthy" than the GDP of communist countries ; ) I have read that before the fall of communism in Hungary, the inventor of the Rubik's Cube made more foreign exchange income for the Hungarian state than all the state-owned enterprises combined.
- philwelch 14y agoIf you wanted to wave your hands and suppose that, as the hereditary dictators of Cuba, the Castro family owns the whole country, then they are the biggest billionaires of all. The GDP of Cuba is about 60 billion, but owning an asset that produces 60 billion a year is worth some multiple of 60 billion. And you thought Microsoft, Berkshire Hathaway, Google, or IKEA were big fortunes!
- jonpeda 14y agoIt's interesting you mention Belgium, which has 50% income tax, including inheritance taxes: http://www.belgium.be/en/taxes/ http://www.belgium.be/en/taxes/ http://www.taxation.be/content/view/28/37 http://www.taxation.be/content/view/28/37