this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2024
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A Boring Dystopia

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[–] BestBouclettes@jlai.lu 149 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Billionaires are a political choice as much as homelessness. They are allowed to exist because nobody does anything about it.

[–] tiefling@lemmy.blahaj.zone 22 points 1 month ago (1 children)

They are allowed to exist because they can literally buy their own political system

[–] mPony@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago

they can literally buy their own political system

They already have.

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 105 points 1 month ago (5 children)

There was an article celebrating the fact that we're on our way to having the first trillionare.

I wanted to die. It's so insanely fucking disgusting

[–] Rubisco@slrpnk.net 74 points 1 month ago (10 children)
[–] bitjunkie@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago

Dis pos rel'van to beltalowda intres

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[–] abbadon420@lemm.ee 13 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Why would you go around celebrating untreated and ignored mental illnesses?

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[–] PrimeMinisterKeyes@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

On the other hand, if we all work really hard, go the extra mile, burn the midnight oil... we can make it happen faster for that special someone.

[–] pingveno@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago

Look at all our WONDERFUL job creators amassing their dragon hoards!

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[–] reallykindasorta@slrpnk.net 64 points 1 month ago

It’s almost seems like the main thing you need to make money is money

[–] jinarched@lemm.ee 54 points 1 month ago (1 children)

tail -n +2 listAbove | cut -f 2 > DeathNote.txt

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[–] HootinNHollerin@lemmy.world 46 points 1 month ago

And that’s just the wealth that we know about

[–] Fedizen@lemmy.world 46 points 1 month ago

kamala harris' proposed tax on unrealized gains seems like a great idea rn

[–] stormesp@lemm.ee 42 points 1 month ago (2 children)

A boring distopia is already even a single person having more than a single billion.

[–] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 13 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Yup, there was that post a while back, like you reach a billion, you get a plaque that says "congrats you won capitalism" and then they start at 0 again

[–] itslilith@lemmy.blahaj.zone 8 points 1 month ago (8 children)

Not even a billion, as soon as you're in 8 figures you have more than a reasonable person can spend in a lifetime. Cap it at 50 million, every cent more goes towards public infrastructure and welfare

Or we could do away with capitalism entirely. Just saying

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[–] stormesp@lemm.ee 6 points 1 month ago

For real, like Prestige in Call of Duty

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[–] ReallyActuallyFrankenstein@lemmynsfw.com 33 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

The overall average median lifetime earnings of $1,850,000 for men and $1,100,200 for women. Let's just take the average and say an average American earns $1,475,100 in their lifetime.

The important thing to remember is, in an unequal system where workers have most of the value of their work taken by a single person who the system disproportionately favors, that value is translatable to literal life. They are directly, inexorably going to die having had that value simply transferred to the other person or people who collect that value. Or put succinctly, they are giving up life, and the "owner" of the business is gaining the value of their life.

Another note is that even though most valuations are stock, stock valuations do not exist in a vacuum. The stock market is the realizable increase in productivity value that we all collectively have caused.

So based on that principle, just for fun, let's convert these fortunes to human lives, to better understand just how much (economically-valued) life force these people have taken from people:

Elon Musk: $262,000,000,000 = 176,259 American lives.

Jeff Bezos: $208,000,000,000 = 141,007 American lives.

Mark Zuckerberg: $203,000,000,000 = 137,617 American lives.

[–] thisfro@slrpnk.net 7 points 1 month ago

just for fun, let's convert these fortunes to human lives

Muh capitalism

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 6 points 1 month ago

To take that farther I wonder how many employees they have. How close is the ratio of workers to their life value obtained by the owner.

[–] bitjunkie@lemmy.world 24 points 1 month ago (5 children)

That's 18 people who own about a tenth of the US GDP. Something needs to be done, and soon.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 10 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

That’s 18 people who own about a tenth of the US GDP.

Okay, sure. But that's bad analysis. GDP is annual and net-worth is lifetime total. That's also global wealth, not US-domestic (four of them aren't even American).

Agree with the sentiment, but we should really be talking about global wealth not national income.

Something needs to be done

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_to_Be_Done

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[–] RattlerSix@lemmy.world 22 points 1 month ago (5 children)

If my math is correct and we taxed everything over 100 billion at 100% we'd get over 900 billion in taxes. Nearly a trillion bucks if we limited these assholes to a measly 100 billion.

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[–] Rivalarrival 20 points 1 month ago (1 children)

1% tax on all registered securities, payable in shares of those securities. The SEC just confiscates 1% of every position, and conveys them to an IRS liquidator. The liquidator sells them off in small lots over time, comprising no more than 1% of total traded shares. Securities with negative values are returned.

Once completely phased in, natural persons will be exempt on their first $10 million in registered securities. Corporate-owned securities will not be exempt: the are taxed from their first share.

We tax only the problematic portion of their wealth: their wealth-generating assets. We auction those assets off to the general public.

[–] Welt@lazysoci.al 8 points 1 month ago

You sound like you know what you're talking about, and convey it with spectrum-like precision. I throw my hat and my heart entirely to making your dream come true. Hoo, hoo (hoo-oo-hoo)

[–] Brosplosion@lemm.ee 18 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Is this inflation corrected? Cause an arbitrary line across 7 years of inflation is gonna be crossed....

[–] LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

No, thats a good point because its not inflation corrected its just an archived page. A dollar in 2017 is worth 1.28 today. So yes, in today's dollars there would have been 4 people above 100 billion in 2017.

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[–] Jimmyeatsausage@lemmy.world 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Hey, look, I found the thing the US is still number 1 at!

[–] psycho_driver@lemmy.world 19 points 1 month ago

There are probably several Russian Oligarchs missing from this list because their wealth is mostly dark money. Rumor has it Putin is the wealthiest man in the world and has been for some time.

[–] Gullible@sh.itjust.works 15 points 1 month ago (1 children)

How has musk maintained his companies’ valuations? Particularly Tesla.

[–] Captainvaqina@sh.itjust.works 26 points 1 month ago

Blatant fraud

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 13 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Eat the rich!

I'll take a #8, with fries please..

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[–] BilboBargains@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If only we could combine Jim, Alice and Rob into a single entity called The Waltronzoid, we could easily defeat all the other billionaires by creating a bazillionaire.

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[–] Clent@lemmy.world 10 points 1 month ago

Socioeconomic weeds choking out the rest of us.

Utter ignorance is how we find ourselves with so many morons admiring the thistle in the garden for its pretty purple flower. While economists stand around debating the merits of these weeds by divining dogma to give meaning to weeds natural stubborn deep roots.

[–] grrgyle@slrpnk.net 10 points 1 month ago

Wow! So things must have gotten a lot better for people over the last 7 years!

Right?

[–] taiyang@lemmy.world 9 points 1 month ago

Ugh, I hate ladderboards for games with cheaters and exploiters on top. Where are the moderarors?! I demand a refund.

[–] iknowitwheniseeit@lemmynsfw.com 7 points 1 month ago (7 children)

Didn't Bill Gates sign a pledge to give all of his money away? And he is billions richer than last year? Huh.

[–] Krono 27 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yes he signed up to give his money away. To a charitable trust. Which he and his family controls. And can withdraw from at any time.

It isnt a charity pledge, its a plan to avoid paying taxes.

[–] negativenull@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago

Adam Conover video on the "Billionaire Donation/Charity" scam:
https://youtu.be/0Cu6EbELZ6I

[–] Bluefalcon@discuss.tchncs.de 10 points 1 month ago

It's all bullshit and marketing so people will regurgitate this lie. Everyone that says that puts it into a charity that they or their friends run.

Their children get high positions that allow them to have high paying jobs from the start. They have huge political influence which helps them with their other companies.

We need to redo our tax system and increase the top brackets. We also need to redo what is considered taxable and what can be claimed as a tax benefit.

[–] Valmond@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago

Bill Gates a lying piese of shit? Who would have thought?

I went out in the rain yesterday and I got slightly moist. More at seven.

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[–] FabledAepitaph@lemmy.world 7 points 1 month ago

This is a list of people who's creations I'd like to avoid, if at all possible.

It's obvious for several people on this list, but how do I boycott someone like the Oracle guy? As a non-tech guy, it just seems impossible. I don't even recognize several of these people, tbh.

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)
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