Simply having that amount of money is unethical. I even consider Gabe Newell unethical in this sense. There is absolutely zero reason to hoard that amount of wealth, even if you aren’t using it directly in nefarious ways.
When you look at the number of people in poverty, and the median wages of laborers, and then you look at the wealth these people have, it’s completely unacceptable. The only ethical way to use that absurd amount of wealth is by directly helping those without.
And even someone like Bill Gates who is ostensibly known for “philanthropy”, is not excused here in any way. The amount he keeps for himself versus the amount he gives back is not an acceptable ratio.
Moreover, you claim that investing is ethical when compared to being a CEO and directly overseeing exploitation of workers. I disagree wholeheartedly. All investing is is acknowledging that, due to someone else taking advantage of workers, you have an opportunity to make money. That is, you’re just one step removed, but your profit opportunities are due to the same exact exploitation as if you were zero steps removed. The fact that people can remove themselves one step and seemingly absolve themselves of guilt should not be a thing.
Obviously, the ideal situation for a platform like Steam (like pretty much everything else on the internet) is to be a big open source decentralized platform. But what we have now is really the second best thing you could ask for.
That doesn’t even have to be the case. It could continue operating to make profit, it’s just that Gabe shouldn’t be made a billionaire on its back, it should be distributed more fairly to workers of Valve.
If Gabe Newell truly wanted to hoard wealth he could easily turn Valve into a publicly traded company and likely 10x his net worth in a matter of months and cash out. But he hasn’t (and this is speculation obviously) but I imagine it’s because he would rather keep his company and do what he loves than sell it and have even more money than someone could ever need across a thousand life times.
“He could always be worse” is in no way an excuse for being bad. He could stop being a billionaire (or not become one in the first place), and still “do what he loves”. If he is doing it for the love of it, then the money shouldn’t matter, anyway.
Any time someone mentions the net worth of someone who still actively runs a company like Mark Zuckerberg, it really quite annoys me because it is very very true that Billionaires have more money than is needed but it’s not like The Zuck just has $100bn in cash locked away in a safe, and it’s not like stock is completely useless pieces of paper that entitle people to have money.
This is beating a dead horse and talking in circles. We know it’s not USD paper currency sitting in a safe, and yet nothing changes when you talk about what it actually is. As far as the point about “more money than is needed”, how can you possibly not think that billions of dollars is “more money than is needed”? I’m not even going to speculate how you think someone “needs” that amount of money.
Taxation of wealth is a very difficult issue to solve and when you see sensationalist posts like this one it makes it look like a much simpler issue than it actually is.
It’s not the simplest thing we’ve ever had to deal with, but it’s also not nearly as complex as you’re implying. It’s certainly not so complex that we shouldn’t make attempts. Somehow taxing already impoverished people is braindead-simple, yet taxing people with absurd amounts of wealth becomes some very complex issue. If we get it wrong by going “too hard” initially, they aren’t going to be destroyed; the amount of wealth they have is enough to not be crippled by that, and we can course-correct however we see fit. Waiting until there’s some perfect solution laid out on the table before making any attempt to address the issue only does a disservice to the needy, and greatly benefits the wealthy. Standing by idly works in their favor, not ours.
In general, your entire comment reads as flaky defense of the ultra-wealthy. You aren’t hardline defending their right to be disgustingly wealthy, but you are parroting their lies that would have you believe that attempting to change the status quo would be a bad thing for the average person.
Simply having that amount of money is unethical. I even consider Gabe Newell unethical in this sense. There is absolutely zero reason to hoard that amount of wealth, even if you aren’t using it directly in nefarious ways.
When you look at the number of people in poverty, and the median wages of laborers, and then you look at the wealth these people have, it’s completely unacceptable. The only ethical way to use that absurd amount of wealth is by directly helping those without.
And even someone like Bill Gates who is ostensibly known for “philanthropy”, is not excused here in any way. The amount he keeps for himself versus the amount he gives back is not an acceptable ratio.
Moreover, you claim that investing is ethical when compared to being a CEO and directly overseeing exploitation of workers. I disagree wholeheartedly. All investing is is acknowledging that, due to someone else taking advantage of workers, you have an opportunity to make money. That is, you’re just one step removed, but your profit opportunities are due to the same exact exploitation as if you were zero steps removed. The fact that people can remove themselves one step and seemingly absolve themselves of guilt should not be a thing.
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That doesn’t even have to be the case. It could continue operating to make profit, it’s just that Gabe shouldn’t be made a billionaire on its back, it should be distributed more fairly to workers of Valve.
“He could always be worse” is in no way an excuse for being bad. He could stop being a billionaire (or not become one in the first place), and still “do what he loves”. If he is doing it for the love of it, then the money shouldn’t matter, anyway.
This is beating a dead horse and talking in circles. We know it’s not USD paper currency sitting in a safe, and yet nothing changes when you talk about what it actually is. As far as the point about “more money than is needed”, how can you possibly not think that billions of dollars is “more money than is needed”? I’m not even going to speculate how you think someone “needs” that amount of money.
It’s not the simplest thing we’ve ever had to deal with, but it’s also not nearly as complex as you’re implying. It’s certainly not so complex that we shouldn’t make attempts. Somehow taxing already impoverished people is braindead-simple, yet taxing people with absurd amounts of wealth becomes some very complex issue. If we get it wrong by going “too hard” initially, they aren’t going to be destroyed; the amount of wealth they have is enough to not be crippled by that, and we can course-correct however we see fit. Waiting until there’s some perfect solution laid out on the table before making any attempt to address the issue only does a disservice to the needy, and greatly benefits the wealthy. Standing by idly works in their favor, not ours.
In general, your entire comment reads as flaky defense of the ultra-wealthy. You aren’t hardline defending their right to be disgustingly wealthy, but you are parroting their lies that would have you believe that attempting to change the status quo would be a bad thing for the average person.
Removed by mod