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I think what rubs me the wrong way about this is giving it to a for-profit enterprise. If Elon is willing to step down and run a non-profit to get to Mars, I'm

I think what rubs me the wrong way about this is giving it to a for-profit enterprise. If Elon is willing to step down and run a non-profit to get to Mars, I'm all for it. But I suspect he isn't willing to do that. This is about profit - which isn't bad - but its not charity and therefore is very unlikely in the end to help the bottom 10%.

crusso 13y ago
The profit motive and capitalism have given the Western world the best life for the "bottom 10%" in the history of mankind. Look at the Internet when it was "non profit". It sat there for years in universities and labs, availing the lower 10% not at all. When the profit-motive was allowed to explore the possibilities, the Internet exploded. Now the Internet is available fairly universally.
jessaustin 13y ago
Non-profit status doesn't mean anything about an organization except that dividends are not paid to shareholders. E.g. it doesn't mean that executives don't pull down giant salaries or that sweetheart deals never transfer resources to outside parties. There are wonderful and terrible non-profit and for-profit organizations. It's better to judge an organization by its accomplishments than by its non-profit status.
oskarth 13y ago
If it was about money Musk would have retired already. Tesla and SpaceX are both hugely risky endeavours. It is not unlikely that them being for profit makes them more likely to succeed in the long term.
skizm 13y ago
No one invests in a non-profit. Investors want ROI and going to mars is pretty capital intensive. EDIT: correct me if I am wrong, but YC doesn't expect to make a RIO with Watsi. They just want to make the world a better place. It is a donation not an investment. Most VCs are not that nice. EDIT: EDIT: Found it: "Since some people were confused when we funded Watsi, I'd better clarify that the money we're putting into the nonprofits will be a charitable donation, rather than an investment in the narrow sense. We won't have any financial interest in them." Link here: http://ycombinator.com/np.html http://ycombinator.com/np.html
- toomuchtodo 13y ago
  Watsi is the first non-profit Y Combinator is backing. http://ycombinator.com/watsi.html http://ycombinator.com/watsi.html Disclaimer: HUGE Watsi fan.
- bjelkeman-again 13y ago
  I disagree. We have had a bunch of significant investments in Akvo and we are non-profit. The investments aren't structured for maximum financial ROI, but maximum societal ROI. Nevertheless they are investments. http://Akvo.org/ http://Akvo.org/
- abstractbill 13y ago
  Y Combinator invests in non-profits.
- jack-r-abbit 13y ago
  > No one invests in a non-profit. I thought that was called a donation.
- wpietri 13y ago
  Let me introduce you to people who want more than ROI: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_investing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_investing There are a variety of ways you could structure things. A non-profit could take loans or sell bonds. I've heard talk of a pay-for-success model for public-good bonds. [1] The non-profit could create a for-profit subsidiary, like Mozilla does. A non-profit could enter into a joint venture (e.g., with an aerospace company). I think the main barrier to approaches like this is attitudes like yours: for-profit people often have a hard time of steering by the public good. And, of course, the mirror attitude, where non-profit people are suspicious of anything that looks like capitalism. But there's no necessary conflict; the whole theory of capitalism is that companies are making the world better. And if you want to make the world better, the best way to do that is sustainably, and for-profit companies have done a lot of great thinking on how to stay in the black. [1] http://nonprofitfinancefund.org/pay-for-success http://nonprofitfinancefund.org/pay-for-success
nostromo 13y ago
Nobody on earth is rich enough to get the bottom 10% out of poverty. 700,000,000 (bottom 10%) divide Bill Gate's net worth (70 billion) and they will all get $100 each. The only way to improve the lives of the poor is through capitalism. We've seen this in China: "Between 1981 and 2008 ... 600 million people were taken out of poverty." [1] The profit motive is an incredible force. Btw, I say this as a huge fan of Gate's charity. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_China http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_China
- darklajid 13y ago
  So, I was never good at (or interested in) economy. What I don't understand is where this 'wealth' is coming from. You say no one can provide it now. But it's seemingly coming out of thin air (your chinese example: What happened? The people are the same. Resources are probably comparable. Building an iPhone in CN generates money .. how?). The whole big picture, macroscopic view never made sense for me. The 'click' is missing. It seems that this wealth is more or less as arbitrary as shares (look to me).
  - samolang 13y ago
    Here is a pretty good primer: http://www.reddit.com/r/finance/comments/utf5u/where_has_all_the_money_in_the_world_gone/c4yfkhg http://www.reddit.com/r/finance/comments/utf5u/where_has_all...
  - bradleyjg 13y ago
    In an agrarian society most people are working on small plots of land growing food and/tending animals. Their labor combined with the natural resources is enough to create food for their families and a little bit left over. They take that little bit left over and trade it to a guy that makes clothing, and a guy that makes tools. All the goods and services in the whole country don't amount to all that much -- enough food to feed everyone plus some clothes and tools. Now move to the industrial agricultural age. The same food (better really) that it used to take 90% of the labor of the country to grow now can be done by 5% of the people. Instead of having only enough surplus to support a few guys making clothing or building tools, most of society can go off and find things to do with their time to trade to the farmers for food and to each other for whatever everyone else is doing. Now all the good and services of the country not only include a wide variety of food, clothing, and tools, but it also includes concerts, amusement parks, computers, dishwashers -- all of which can be traded for the very same bushels of corn or herds of cattle that the agrarian society was producing. All of this is very simplified but it should give you the basic idea. Bill Gates can give the global poor money and they can use that to import goods and services made elsewhere, but that's just a temporary change. If you really want the societies to be richer, you need the people in that society to be doing things with their time that are of great value to others. That's what increases the total amount of wealth in the world.
staunch 13y ago
Elon Musk risked $160M of his $160M fortune on SpaceX and Tesla (and Solar City). Most people with $160M do absolutely nothing with it of any consequence to humanity. If part of Musk's ambition is to turn his $160M into $160B I'm personally all for it. In the process of fulfilling his own ambitions he's pushing the entire race forward. The long term benefits of switching to renewable energy are be measured in trillions. Human investment in space travel will ultimately be more valuable than Earth itself.

crusso 13y ago

The profit motive and capitalism have given the Western world the best life for the "bottom 10%" in the history of mankind. Look at the Internet when it was "non profit". It sat there for years in universities and labs, availing the lower 10% not at all. When the profit-motive was allowed to explore the possibilities, the Internet exploded. Now the Internet is available fairly universally.

jessaustin 13y ago

Non-profit status doesn't mean anything about an organization except that dividends are not paid to shareholders. E.g. it doesn't mean that executives don't pull down giant salaries or that sweetheart deals never transfer resources to outside parties. There are wonderful and terrible non-profit and for-profit organizations. It's better to judge an organization by its accomplishments than by its non-profit status.

oskarth 13y ago

If it was about money Musk would have retired already. Tesla and SpaceX are both hugely risky endeavours. It is not unlikely that them being for profit makes them more likely to succeed in the long term.

skizm 13y ago

No one invests in a non-profit. Investors want ROI and going to mars is pretty capital intensive. EDIT: correct me if I am wrong, but YC doesn't expect to make a RIO with Watsi. They just want to make the world a better place. It is a donation not an investment. Most VCs are not that nice. EDIT: EDIT: Found it: "Since some people were confused when we funded Watsi, I'd better clarify that the money we're putting into the nonprofits will be a charitable donation, rather than an investment in the narrow sense. We won't have any financial interest in them." Link here: http://ycombinator.com/np.html http://ycombinator.com/np.html

toomuchtodo 13y ago
Watsi is the first non-profit Y Combinator is backing. http://ycombinator.com/watsi.html http://ycombinator.com/watsi.html Disclaimer: HUGE Watsi fan.
bjelkeman-again 13y ago
I disagree. We have had a bunch of significant investments in Akvo and we are non-profit. The investments aren't structured for maximum financial ROI, but maximum societal ROI. Nevertheless they are investments. http://Akvo.org/ http://Akvo.org/
abstractbill 13y ago
Y Combinator invests in non-profits.
jack-r-abbit 13y ago
> No one invests in a non-profit. I thought that was called a donation.
wpietri 13y ago
Let me introduce you to people who want more than ROI: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_investing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_investing There are a variety of ways you could structure things. A non-profit could take loans or sell bonds. I've heard talk of a pay-for-success model for public-good bonds. [1] The non-profit could create a for-profit subsidiary, like Mozilla does. A non-profit could enter into a joint venture (e.g., with an aerospace company). I think the main barrier to approaches like this is attitudes like yours: for-profit people often have a hard time of steering by the public good. And, of course, the mirror attitude, where non-profit people are suspicious of anything that looks like capitalism. But there's no necessary conflict; the whole theory of capitalism is that companies are making the world better. And if you want to make the world better, the best way to do that is sustainably, and for-profit companies have done a lot of great thinking on how to stay in the black. [1] http://nonprofitfinancefund.org/pay-for-success http://nonprofitfinancefund.org/pay-for-success

nostromo 13y ago

Nobody on earth is rich enough to get the bottom 10% out of poverty. 700,000,000 (bottom 10%) divide Bill Gate's net worth (70 billion) and they will all get $100 each. The only way to improve the lives of the poor is through capitalism. We've seen this in China: "Between 1981 and 2008 ... 600 million people were taken out of poverty." [1] The profit motive is an incredible force. Btw, I say this as a huge fan of Gate's charity. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_China http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_China

darklajid 13y ago
So, I was never good at (or interested in) economy. What I don't understand is where this 'wealth' is coming from. You say no one can provide it now. But it's seemingly coming out of thin air (your chinese example: What happened? The people are the same. Resources are probably comparable. Building an iPhone in CN generates money .. how?). The whole big picture, macroscopic view never made sense for me. The 'click' is missing. It seems that this wealth is more or less as arbitrary as shares (look to me).
- samolang 13y ago
  Here is a pretty good primer: http://www.reddit.com/r/finance/comments/utf5u/where_has_all_the_money_in_the_world_gone/c4yfkhg http://www.reddit.com/r/finance/comments/utf5u/where_has_all...
- bradleyjg 13y ago
  In an agrarian society most people are working on small plots of land growing food and/tending animals. Their labor combined with the natural resources is enough to create food for their families and a little bit left over. They take that little bit left over and trade it to a guy that makes clothing, and a guy that makes tools. All the goods and services in the whole country don't amount to all that much -- enough food to feed everyone plus some clothes and tools. Now move to the industrial agricultural age. The same food (better really) that it used to take 90% of the labor of the country to grow now can be done by 5% of the people. Instead of having only enough surplus to support a few guys making clothing or building tools, most of society can go off and find things to do with their time to trade to the farmers for food and to each other for whatever everyone else is doing. Now all the good and services of the country not only include a wide variety of food, clothing, and tools, but it also includes concerts, amusement parks, computers, dishwashers -- all of which can be traded for the very same bushels of corn or herds of cattle that the agrarian society was producing. All of this is very simplified but it should give you the basic idea. Bill Gates can give the global poor money and they can use that to import goods and services made elsewhere, but that's just a temporary change. If you really want the societies to be richer, you need the people in that society to be doing things with their time that are of great value to others. That's what increases the total amount of wealth in the world.

staunch 13y ago

Elon Musk risked $160M of his $160M fortune on SpaceX and Tesla (and Solar City). Most people with $160M do absolutely nothing with it of any consequence to humanity. If part of Musk's ambition is to turn his $160M into $160B I'm personally all for it. In the process of fulfilling his own ambitions he's pushing the entire race forward. The long term benefits of switching to renewable energy are be measured in trillions. Human investment in space travel will ultimately be more valuable than Earth itself.