Society/Culture Billionaires

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At some point the reward isn’t honest and it’s earned off the back of workers who are not allowed to unionise and fight harsh working conditions or unfair contract terms.

Regulatory capture is a big issue. The people who write rules are beholden to the people the rules apply to.

I would have thought that a system where the will of the people is expressed through elections would protect them from business interests controlling legislation that allows union forming restriction is not capitalist, there's nothing free market about that.

Corporatism, absolutely. Corrupt politicians for sure.

The easy solution is fixing the politics.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
Oct 27, 2007
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That’s saying everyone should be equal economically, which is Lenin/Trotsky nonsense.

It's not saying that. That wouldn't even be true if the wealth redistribution went entirely into income equality, which it wouldn't. You could still make 1 million a MONTH. That doesn't mean everyone would be making that much, ya muppet.
 

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Belushi Brassiere

Team Captain
Mar 9, 2011
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And obsolete 19th century socialism is Belgiuming acceptable?!
Reagan and Thatcher won remember? Unions brought back into sane control, the New Deal consensus decisively and permanently ended… how do you like those little green apples?
 
Apr 12, 2010
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I've got a billionaire mate. Known him since I was young and we still catch uo for beer once in a blue moon. He said to me once that the person who dies with the most, wins. I suspect he wasn't being entirely tongue-in-cheek.

Ironic in its simplicity - for when we all die, we all end up with the same - nothing.
 
Sep 15, 2007
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I've got a billionaire mate. Known him since I was young and we still catch uo for beer once in a blue moon. He said to me once that the person who dies with the most, wins. I suspect he wasn't being entirely tongue-in-cheek.
Is your billionaire mate Australian?

if so which of the top 38 is he?
 

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Sep 15, 2007
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Useful list to figure out which sectors get the best deals from the government.
There was an Interesting book released a few years ago whose name escape me. but it counted the proportion of billionaires in each region that were self made vs those that either inherited most of their wealth or benefitted from massive government support in rent seeking industries such as mining/media/real estate etc.


it found that Australia had one of the highest proportion of billionaires in the developed world coming from the latter group. I.e. our bilionaires dont deserve their money. They are rent extractors/inheritors.
 
Jun 16, 2012
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There was an Interesting book released a few years ago whose name escape me. but it counted the proportion of billionaires in each region that were self made vs those that either inherited most of their wealth or benefitted from massive government support in rent seeking industries such as mining/media/real estate etc.


it found that Australia had one of the highest proportion of billionaires in the developed world coming from the latter group. I.e. our bilionaires dont deserve their money. They are rent extractors/inheritors.
I think you're thinking of Game of Mates – How favours bleed the nationhttps://gameofmates.com
 
Aug 12, 2012
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I think my main concern with legislating billionaires away with taxation is the loss of that '* you money' craziness that leads to unique innovation. Think old mate Musk and SpaceX. Would that money in the hands of government become used like that? Wouldn't think so.

It's obviously hypothetical and therefore limited in accuracy, but if I could be shown that we'd all be significantly better off by putting caps on wealth and having the excess managed by the State, then I'd be happy to support it.
 

Coolangatta

Norm Smith Medallist
Oct 27, 2007
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I think my main concern with legislating billionaires away with taxation is the loss of that 'fu** you money' craziness that leads to unique innovation. Think old mate Musk and SpaceX. Would that money in the hands of government become used like that? Wouldn't think so.

It's obviously hypothetical and therefore limited in accuracy, but if I could be shown that we'd all be significantly better off by putting caps on wealth and having the excess managed by the State, then I'd be happy to support it.

From my understanding, preventing Elon Musk from owning more than 1 billion worth of stock doesn't stop SpaceX from being worth about 74 billion USD. As long as Elon owns more than the other shareholders, he controls the company and strongly influences what that company does with its profits, right?

But as for his actual individual net worth, he won't ever need 150 billion or whatever stock he owns. I suppose by capping how much he has would handicap him from using his own liquidations to put into his businesses, so yeah, I don't have all the answers, and I get where you're coming from.
 
Aug 12, 2012
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The US government gave him $5 billion or so didn’t they?
Wouldn't surprise me - governments probably see value in giving people like that some money in order to stake a claim on whatever the output is. They reduce their risk of loss, and increase the potential gain. Again, no billionaires = no government investment in some whacky things.
 
Wouldn't surprise me - governments probably see value in giving people like that some money in order to stake a claim on whatever the output is. They reduce their risk of loss, and increase the potential gain. Again, no billionaires = no government investment in some whacky things.
Only I don't think they ever took a stake. Just gave Tesla government grants.
 
Aug 21, 2016
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And Elon’s ideas are ******* sh*t anyway…



Elon is a very smart man. He figured out early that a good way to get rich was to scam government dollars under the environmental banner. A couple of local examples.

They have put up a bank of Tesla chargers in Corio. Corio!!! The median weekly income in Corio is $449.

The Victorian government heavily subsidises new charger points. Ironically the new chargers are not far from the Tesla big battery that the Victorian government shelled out $160m for a big Tesla battery near Geelong. When it was switched on it was on fire longer than it was operational.

Tesla chargers in Victoria are mainly powered by electricity produced from brown coal.

Tesla vehicles is a failing business model. All car manufacturers in the US have to pay taxes on internal combustion vehicles then there are credits for producing electric vehicles. Tesla, that only makes EVs, can sell the credits to the other manufacturers and it so it appears that their car division makes a profit. But as the other manufacturers ramp up their EV production that will disappear.
 

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