Irrational 1% Jealousy

[Rassah]

tl;dr:  ITT bitcoin millionaires talk about why the 1% isn't bad

lol, you realise I have fuck all right in my Bitcoin wallet right now? either way, my opinion won't change on this, not until the people screaming about taxing the rich say it's okay to tax themselves as well.

You realize that outside of Ayn Rand books, the poor protecting the rights of the rich to get richer are just dupes to be laughed at, right?

You realize that many of the rich use the government (ie. the average taxpayer's money) in order to protect their wealth.  Right?

What's your point?

I guess: All poor support government + All rich use government to protect their rights to get richer = All poor support the rights of the right to get richer. Whether they realize it or not.

[luv2drnkbr]

tl;dr:  ITT bitcoin millionaires talk about why the 1% isn't bad

lol, you realise I have fuck all right in my Bitcoin wallet right now? either way, my opinion won't change on this, not until the people screaming about taxing the rich say it's okay to tax themselves as well.

Not that you specifically mentioned flat tax per se, but I'd still like to point out that taking $100 tax from somebody who makes $1000 a month might make it so they can't eat, while taking $1000 from somebody who makes $10000 a month will not put that same pressure on them.

[Rassah]

tl;dr:  ITT bitcoin millionaires talk about why the 1% isn't bad

lol, you realise I have fuck all right in my Bitcoin wallet right now? either way, my opinion won't change on this, not until the people screaming about taxing the rich say it's okay to tax themselves as well.

Not that you specifically mentioned flat tax per se, but I'd still like to point out that taking $100 tax from somebody who makes $1000 a month might make it so they can't eat, while taking $1000 from somebody who makes $10000 a month will not put that same pressure on them.

I think you may be forgetting that the $10,000 isn't just sitting in a money bag somewhere, but is likely being used to invest in something else, which in turn gives someone a job or a place to live. For example, my parents make about twice that a month, but only get to use about $1,000 of that on themselves, the rest going to pay for places for others to live in.

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tl;dr:  ITT bitcoin millionaires talk about why the 1% isn't bad

lol, you realise I have fuck all right in my Bitcoin wallet right now? either way, my opinion won't change on this, not until the people screaming about taxing the rich say it's okay to tax themselves as well.

Not that you specifically mentioned flat tax per se, but I'd still like to point out that taking $100 tax from somebody who makes $1000 a month might make it so they can't eat, while taking $1000 from somebody who makes $10000 a month will not put that same pressure on them.

I think you may be forgetting that the $10,000 isn't just sitting in a money bag somewhere, but is likely being used to invest in something else, which in turn gives someone a job or a place to live. For example, my parents make about twice that a month, but only get to use about $1,000 of that on themselves, the rest going to pay for places for others to live in.

Your rents make 20k & only get 1k to live on?  $1,000 a month?  $500/mo each?  You should help out your parents, bro, that's no way to live.

[Rassah]

Your rents make 20k & only get 1k to live on?  $1,000 a month?  $500/mo each?  You should help out your parents, bro, that's no way to live.

Why?

[Vandroiy]

"Control structure optimization"?  You start with the dubious assumption that since [partial] ownership increases a party's interest, and thus work performance (a doubly dubious notion:  Surgeons do not do surgeries on their family members, actors get stage fright during performances (in which they're fully invested), not rehearsals (in which they're not), etc., etc.).  As i pointed out earlier, incentivising work (oh, let's say a salary) improves performance, but the law of diminishing returns kicks in early, and, as i've pointed out, .1% of Google would be enough to keep me *riveted* -- at 50% my ego might get the better of me & i'd start treating the company as a toy (i wouldn't be able to spend that much money in my lifetime anyhow, so why not?)

There will always be examples of people doing crazy things just because they're people -- that's human nature. But rationally, there is no limit to the usable amounts of assets. You can pass them on to children, or use them to secure your future against increasingly unlikely problems.

It's hard to tell how to better organize things. Owning 0.1% of Google when it was a start-up wouldn't have motivated people much. The prospect of randomly losing one's share has the same effect. We don't know if full private ownership is the optimal solution, but it is a solution better than other plans people come up with. As for people wasting the funds or going nuts: remember they can do this exactly once, then other investors take over. The market systematically removes such actors and the problem with them.

It might fail at times but this is part of the competition -- and thus evolution -- amongst investors. If they have others conduct their business their job becomes ensuring the productivity of these executives. If they close one company to strengthen another in excess of the loss, this is still a net benefit.

Net benefit?  To whom?

To the total of any type of party involved... I don't get the question. If the total efficiency of the result is higher, society gets a net benefit. Since it's capitalist by assumption, the resulting company produces something people want. If the market pays more profit margin for the new company configuration, it seems that either many people or other companies find it more useful.

You realize that outside of Ayn Rand books, the poor protecting the rights of the rich to get richer are just dupes to be laughed at, right?

Quoting this too, because it is the core point I don't believe. IMO the correct statement would be "The poor who protect the rights of the corrupt and fight the productive rich are digging their own grave".

In being driven by jealousy instead of rational thinking, people think in categories of "rich" and "poor" instead of "productive" and "counterproductive". This clouds their judgement and produces major inefficiencies.

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"Control structure optimization"?  You start with the dubious assumption that since [partial] ownership increases a party's interest, and thus work performance (a doubly dubious notion:  Surgeons do not do surgeries on their family members, actors get stage fright during performances (in which they're fully invested), not rehearsals (in which they're not), etc., etc.).  As i pointed out earlier, incentivising work (oh, let's say a salary) improves performance, but the law of diminishing returns kicks in early, and, as i've pointed out, .1% of Google would be enough to keep me *riveted* -- at 50% my ego might get the better of me & i'd start treating the company as a toy (i wouldn't be able to spend that much money in my lifetime anyhow, so why not?)

There will always be examples of people doing crazy things just because they're people -- that's human nature. But rationally, there is no limit to the usable amounts of assets. You can pass them on to children, or use them to secure your future against increasingly unlikely problems.

It's hard to tell how to better organize things. Owning 0.1% of Google when it was a start-up wouldn't have motivated people much. The prospect of randomly losing one's share has the same effect. We don't know if full private ownership is the optimal solution, but it is a solution better than other plans people come up with. As for people wasting the funds or going nuts: remember they can do this exactly once, then other investors take over. The market systematically removes such actors and the problem with them.

I'm not talking about people going crazy -- merely that there is a point at which having greater stakes in a company ceases to add extra incentive, think in terms of law of diminishing returns.  Adding progressively more fertilizer yields better crops -- up to the point where adding more makes no difference, and past that -- kills the crop.  Another thing to keep in mind is you're playing a nearly zero-sum game -- by giving the uberboss total ownership, you're taking away potential incentive from his underlings, and their underlings, etc., etc.  Is it better for the captain to own the whole ship, or might it be safer for the crew to have a stake in it too?  They'd certainly be less likely to mutiny   The same thing holds for startups -- offer employees shares in the company they can't unload 'till the IPO -- you got a captive workforce.  Keep the whole nut?  you ain't.   

It might fail at times but this is part of the competition -- and thus evolution -- amongst investors. If they have others conduct their business their job becomes ensuring the productivity of these executives. If they close one company to strengthen another in excess of the loss, this is still a net benefit.

Net benefit?  To whom?

To the total of any type of party involved... I don't get the question. If the total efficiency of the result is higher, society gets a net benefit. Since it's capitalist by assumption, the resulting company produces something people want. If the market pays more profit margin for the new company configuration, it seems that either many people or other companies find it more useful.

People are not driven by dispassionate greed.  If lone leaders solely controlled large corporations, the world would be full of (Spruce Geese?  What an awkward plural), and almost no Cessnas.  Wealth would become even more concentrated -- elite making extraordinary toys for the elite, with 0 interest to make toilet paper. 
Of course, following your reasoning to its logical conclusion gives us a world of monopolies -- if economics of scale hold for some industries -- what's to prevent them?

You realize that outside of Ayn Rand books, the poor protecting the rights of the rich to get richer are just dupes to be laughed at, right?

Quoting this too, because it is the core point I don't believe. IMO the correct statement would be "The poor who protect the rights of the corrupt and fight the productive rich are digging their own grave".

No, i stand behind what i said.

In being driven by jealousy instead of rational thinking, people think in categories of "rich" and "poor" instead of "productive" and "counterproductive". This clouds their judgement and produces major inefficiencies.

I think they may be driven by something more naive, like infantile sense of fair play.  They are simpleminded & irrational enough to feel that it's not right for one baby to be born rich, while another's dirt poor.  They feel that it may be nice to share, if only amongst babies.  Do you sort-a understand, or does it take a sharp pitchfork to get such commie faggot  notions through to you? 

[NewLiberty]

The problem of poor people is how well they can get out of poverty, not how the high-level part of society distributes wealth. Any redistribution in just Europe or the USA that decreases overall efficiency would just starve more people in poor countries. I don't remember seeing protest banners reading "We speak for the 1.29 billion", the people below the poverty line who are likely to die from lack of food and medicine. Is it not hypocrisy to call some exact distribution near the top "unfair" while neglecting over a BILLION people elsewhere?

Absolutely.  "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."  And "cast the first stone," and all that stuff.  99-percenters are just as rotten as 1-percenters.  And some are whinier.

Many of the 99% are in the 1% globally.  When we see our burden as tormenting those above rather than aiding those below...jealousy is greed.

Magnanimous people have no vanity, they have no jealousy, and they feed on the true and the solid wherever they find it. And, what is more, they find it everywhere.   
-Van Wyck Brooks

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The problem of poor people is how well they can get out of poverty, not how the high-level part of society distributes wealth. Any redistribution in just Europe or the USA that decreases overall efficiency would just starve more people in poor countries. I don't remember seeing protest banners reading "We speak for the 1.29 billion", the people below the poverty line who are likely to die from lack of food and medicine. Is it not hypocrisy to call some exact distribution near the top "unfair" while neglecting over a BILLION people elsewhere?

Absolutely.  "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."  And "cast the first stone," and all that stuff.  99-percenters are just as rotten as 1-percenters.  And some are whinier.

Many of the 99% are in the 1% globally.  When we see our burden as tormenting those above rather than aiding those below...jealousy is greed.

Absolutely.  Ideally, the 99% should not only take from the 1%, but distribute to those below them.

Magnanimous people have no vanity, they have no jealousy, and they feed on the true and the solid wherever they find it. And, what is more, they find it everywhere.   
-Van Wyck Brooks

Those are saints, very rare both in the 99% and the 1%.  Being poor is no assurance of sainthood -- people are poor by birth, through circumstance & all sorts of personal shortcomings.  Being wealthy, otoh, nearly precludes sainthood -- a (Christian) saint who happened onto wealth gives it away.  This is in no way a sermon, i don't advocate sainthood or shoot for it myself -- simply an analysis:  If you want to find a saint, looking among the 1% is impractical.

[CasinoBit]

The problem of poor people is how well they can get out of poverty, not how the high-level part of society distributes wealth. Any redistribution in just Europe or the USA that decreases overall efficiency would just starve more people in poor countries. I don't remember seeing protest banners reading "We speak for the 1.29 billion", the people below the poverty line who are likely to die from lack of food and medicine. Is it not hypocrisy to call some exact distribution near the top "unfair" while neglecting over a BILLION people elsewhere?

Absolutely.  "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."  And "cast the first stone," and all that stuff.  99-percenters are just as rotten as 1-percenters.  And some are whinier.

Many of the 99% are in the 1% globally.  When we see our burden as tormenting those above rather than aiding those below...jealousy is greed.

Absolutely.  Ideally, the 99% should not only take from the 1%, but distribute to those below them.

Magnanimous people have no vanity, they have no jealousy, and they feed on the true and the solid wherever they find it. And, what is more, they find it everywhere.   
-Van Wyck Brooks

Those are saints, very rare both in the 99% and the 1%.  Being poor is no assurance of sainthood -- people are poor by birth, through circumstance & all sorts of personal shortcomings.  Being wealthy, otoh, nearly precludes sainthood -- a (Christian) saint who happened onto wealth gives it away.  This is in no way a ceremon, i don't advocate sainthood or shoot for it myself -- simply an analysis:  If you want to find a saint, looking among the 1% is impractical.

Rather look among the narcissistic wretched filth that takes upon themselves the role of God.

Scammers, addicts, liars, the streets are full with them, I think that what makes you either a good person or a bad one depends on your personality traits rather than your financial status.

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The problem of poor people is how well they can get out of poverty, not how the high-level part of society distributes wealth. Any redistribution in just Europe or the USA that decreases overall efficiency would just starve more people in poor countries. I don't remember seeing protest banners reading "We speak for the 1.29 billion", the people below the poverty line who are likely to die from lack of food and medicine. Is it not hypocrisy to call some exact distribution near the top "unfair" while neglecting over a BILLION people elsewhere?

Absolutely.  "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."  And "cast the first stone," and all that stuff.  99-percenters are just as rotten as 1-percenters.  And some are whinier.

Many of the 99% are in the 1% globally.  When we see our burden as tormenting those above rather than aiding those below...jealousy is greed.

Absolutely.  Ideally, the 99% should not only take from the 1%, but distribute to those below them.

Magnanimous people have no vanity, they have no jealousy, and they feed on the true and the solid wherever they find it. And, what is more, they find it everywhere.   
-Van Wyck Brooks

Those are saints, very rare both in the 99% and the 1%.  Being poor is no assurance of sainthood -- people are poor by birth, through circumstance & all sorts of personal shortcomings.  Being wealthy, otoh, nearly precludes sainthood -- a (Christian) saint who happened onto wealth gives it away.  This is in no way a sermon, i don't advocate sainthood or shoot for it myself -- simply an analysis:  If you want to find a saint, looking among the 1% is impractical.

Rather look among the narcissistic wretched filth that takes upon themselves the role of God.
Scammers, addicts, liars, the streets are full with them, I think that what makes you either a good person or a bad one depends on your personality traits rather than your financial status.

Not sure what point you're trying to make.  "The world is full of lousy people"?

[NewLiberty]

tl;dr:  ITT bitcoin millionaires talk about why the 1% isn't bad

lol, you realise I have fuck all right in my Bitcoin wallet right now? either way, my opinion won't change on this, not until the people screaming about taxing the rich say it's okay to tax themselves as well.

Not that you specifically mentioned flat tax per se, but I'd still like to point out that taking $100 tax from somebody who makes $1000 a month might make it so they can't eat, while taking $1000 from somebody who makes $10000 a month will not put that same pressure on them.

Most every flat tax I've seen proposed had a minimum level below which no tax is extorted.

[NewLiberty]

Those are saints, very rare both in the 99% and the 1%.  Being poor is no assurance of sainthood -- people are poor by birth, through circumstance & all sorts of personal shortcomings.  Being wealthy, otoh, nearly precludes sainthood -- a (Christian) saint who happened onto wealth gives it away.  This is in no way a sermon, i don't advocate sainthood or shoot for it myself -- simply an analysis:  If you want to find a saint, looking among the 1% is impractical.

And yet in the .0001% is where you find most of the funding for our enduring charitable foundations.  More so in the US than elsewhere though.
Andrew Carnegie, a century ago, declared it disgraceful to die rich.  Benjamin Franklin, perhaps the founder of modern philanthropy in the USA, wrote in 1740, the goal of philanthropic giving is to change society so as to do away with the need for charity.
Some examples
George Soros has devoted $10 billion—half of his total fortune over the last 20 years—to helping dissidents in Central Europe, financing drug-rehabilitation programs in Baltimore, and educating the persecuted Roma people of Hungary.
Bill and Melinda Gates give $4 billion annually to develop African agriculture and to eradicate malaria.
Matched by Warren Buffet (who is leaving less than 1/10000th of his wealth to his heirs and the rest to charity).
New York financier John Paulson gave $100 million for the upkeep of Central Park,
Stephen Schwarzman, a Wall Street investor, donated $100 million to renovate the New York Public Library and another $100 million to finance scholarships for American students in China.

Private giving underwrites almost all American cultural institutions and major universities. By contrast, in Europe, such institutions rely on public money more commonly.

I remember the disaster relief giving for tsunami and such, how there would be lists circulated about what countries gave what money.  Folks were calling the US stingy because the government money was not considered high enough.  But in the US more was given by private donation than any single nation, including the US, but that doesn't make the papers internationally.  Folks like their stereotypes.

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Those are saints, very rare both in the 99% and the 1%.  Being poor is no assurance of sainthood -- people are poor by birth, through circumstance & all sorts of personal shortcomings.  Being wealthy, otoh, nearly precludes sainthood -- a (Christian) saint who happened onto wealth gives it away.  This is in no way a sermon, i don't advocate sainthood or shoot for it myself -- simply an analysis:  If you want to find a saint, looking among the 1% is impractical.

And yet in the .0001% is where you find most of the funding for our enduring charitable foundations.  More so in the US than elsewhere though.

In other words, "enduring charitable foundations" were not started by beggars?  You understand that when you have nothing, it's metaphysically ... difficult to give?   As far as charity amongst the poor, since sharing crumbs of bread (or crack) is neither tax-deductible or newsworthy, such sharing seldom makes it into the annals of history.

Andrew Carnegie, a century ago, declared it disgraceful to die rich.

The unfortunate man died in utter disgrace, unable to turn himself into a pauper.  Let's show some largesse & not draw attention to his failings.

Benjamin Franklin, perhaps the founder of modern philanthropy in the USA, wrote in 1740, the goal of philanthropic giving is to change society so as to do away with the need for charity.

His poor grasp of logic (philanthropy *is* charity) was corrected for by communists and socialists, who pointed out that in an ideal society there is no need for charity or philanthropy -- both are products of class disparity.

Some examples
George Soros has devoted $10 billion—half of his total fortune over the last 20 years—to helping dissidents in Central Europe, financing drug-rehabilitation programs in Baltimore, and educating the persecuted Roma people of Hungary.

...leaving him with a measly 10 billion dollars.  How does he manage on such a pittance?  Is there a way we can help?

Bill and Melinda Gates give $4 billion annually to develop African agriculture and to eradicate malaria.

...their selflessness should be a lesson to us all.  Did you know that Bill saves the remains of soap bars, wadding them together into balls which he later reuses?  Melinda never tires of finding new & creative ways to stretch the Gates family dollar, upgrading her private fleet to thrifty Gulfstream G650s.

Matched by Warren Buffet (who is leaving less than 1/10000th of his wealth to his heirs and the rest to charity).

You don't know how inheritance works, do you?     No matter, help me with my math:  Would 1/10000th of 60 billion dollars make me a pauper?

New York financier John Paulson gave $100 million for the upkeep of Central Park,
Stephen Schwarzman, a Wall Street investor, donated $100 million to renovate the New York Public Library and another $100 million to finance scholarships for American students in China.

Private giving underwrites almost all American cultural institutions and major universities. By contrast, in Europe, such institutions rely on public money more commonly.

I remember the disaster relief giving for tsunami and such, how there would be lists circulated about what countries gave what money.  Folks were calling the US stingy because the government money was not considered high enough.  But in the US more was given by private donation than any single nation, including the US, but that doesn't make the papers internationally.  Folks like their stereotypes.

No matter how many times i hear this argument, it never loses its freshness or fails to entertain.  If your logic works for the rich, it works equally well for taxes:  let the government tax the shit out of you, and in return you'll get some of it back in "charities" like better roads, schools, libraries & aht mooseums.

[J603]

Long quote

It's true that all of those people did have a lot to give away, but if you had billions of dollars, would you want to part with it? Also, if I remember correctly, Bill Gates convinced dozens of the richest people in the world to give away half of their fortunes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Giving_Pledge

Would you give away half of your money? No, of course not. Not all of the 1% are greedy money hoarders. 50% is much more than anyone would agree to be taxed... And this was 50% of their total wealth.

[Lethn]

Giving away or taxation really does actually fuck all to help people, maybe it's because I'm British ( we live in a country filled with charity muggers who are basically con artists that guilt trip you into giving money where only a tiny percentage goes to helping their causes ) but I think if you want to make a difference in the world it's far better to set up your own organisations rather than just give it away to extremely shady people. I think a better spend of money would be giving people knowledge. You can't do much in warzones because anything people build is going to get blown up, but teaching them survival skills or how to actually build pipework, filters and even generate basic electricity is going to do a lot more than just giving them useless paper or building them a well that will eventually break down because none of them know how to fix it.

[Rassah]

Ideally, the 99% should not only take from the 1%, but distribute to those below them.

Lol! Sure, instead of growing the pie, let's just keep it as is and spread it all around. Let's ALL be poor! 

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Long quote

It's true that all of those people did have a lot to give away, but if you had billions of dollars, would you want to part with it? Also, if I remember correctly, Bill Gates convinced dozens of the richest people in the world to give away half of their fortunes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Giving_Pledge

Would you give away half of your money? No, of course not. Not all of the 1% are greedy money hoarders. 50% is much more than anyone would agree to be taxed... And this was 50% of their total wealth.

In all honesty, it's hard for me to think in terms of having or giving away billions -- i never had that much money, and don't personally know anyone worth more than ~45 mil.  What's more, i'm not even sure that i'm a nice guy -- certainly not an ideal for others to aspire to  So the answer is a definite "maybe."

I'm betting that when you say "of course not," you're simply not scaling correctly.  To put things into terms plebes like us could comprehend, imagine sitting at a diner with a crate of 100 toasted English muffins next to your cup of coffee when 50 starving people walk in.  Would you give up half of those hot buttery English muffins to feed 50 total strangers?  I would, though i like English muffins

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Giving away or taxation really does actually fuck all to help people, maybe it's because I'm British ( we live in a country filled with charity muggers who are basically con artists that guilt trip you into giving money where only a tiny percentage goes to helping their causes ) but I think if you want to make a difference in the world it's far better to set up your own organisations rather than just give it away to extremely shady people. I think a better spend of money would be giving people knowledge. You can't do much in warzones because anything people build is going to get blown up, but teaching them survival skills or how to actually build pipework, filters and even generate basic electricity is going to do a lot more than just giving them useless paper or building them a well that will eventually break down because none of them know how to fix it.

I'm not arguing *how well* charity or taxation helps people.  Optimising rewards of charity & taxation is an entirely different topic. 
If the guy in charge of divvying up delicious caek is

a)giving it to lardasses,
b)eating too much of it himself in the process, or
c)dropping big delicious slices on the ground & wasting it,

does it mean he should just keep all the delicious caek to himself? 

[Rassah]

I see some people are still making the mistake of thinking that when someone has $10billion, they have that as just bags of money sitting in a pile somewhere.
A better analogy would be you sitting at a diner with a machine that is worth 100 muffins that makes English muffins at a rate of 18 an hour (3 every ten minute), and which only you know how to operate. If you had 50 starving people walk in, you could only feed 18 of them every hour. If you just give them your machine, then you have nothing, and they have no muffins because they don't know how to operate the machine.
Owning lots of money (even if just cash) is also similar to owning a machine: if you don't know how to operate that money, all you'll have is that money (like having a muffin machine without knowing how to use it), which you can at most just keep trading for something until it's gone. On the other hand, someone who knows how to operate the money will be able to keep making (creating) more and more. That's really the main difference between rich and poor - rich know how to operate the money to make more of it, while poor only know how to spend it. Good example of this is the so-called "Millionaire's Curse," where lottery winners who win millions of dollars often soon find themselves even more broke, destitute, and in debt than they were before they won the lottery.