it should be enough such that he's not a billionaire anymore
that's an actual start at addressing inequality
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Bill Gates call Warren's wealth tax too high; wouldn't directly answer who he'd vote for if it's Trump v Warren
- Thread starter Luminish
- Start date
that's an actual start at addressing inequality
I don't disagree, but that's not what Warren's plan would even do. I guess it'll take some baby steps to get to what you're talking about.
We can recognize/agree:
- That Bill Gates has actually done good philanthropic work with his money
- That he has actually advocated FOR higher taxes for the extremely wealthy, in terms of taxing actual wealth instead of income
- That along with those taxes, he'd like to have more transparency about where those tax dollars go, which could be very problematic
- There is no way to trust our current government would do anything good with that money
- In general, billionaires have literally comical amounts of money and reform needs to happen in some way that is actually beneficial to society
- Their billions were generated in very questionable ways by exploiting people and/or systems that are in place and need reform as well
People defending and protecting a group of people who don't care about them will never not be pathetic. You'll never be one of them ever lol
My response was more geared towards people claiming "Eat the Rich" and "If you are billionaire, you are evil" and "bring out the guillotine (this one is actually scary)". I support increasing taxes for the wealthy but not to that extreme. In the scenario you posed, Bill Gates would have to sell shares of his company to pay that $100 billion in which case he would lose actual ownership of his company. I don't know about you but having the government dictate that stuff doesn't seem like a good idea to me.
In your words, you think that helping american people was a better idea than the vaccinations in India.
"Eradicating diseases while people in the US are also suffering but won't do a damn thing for them "
You are angry because he preferred to help non-american people, that's what your words say.
Thank you, I wrongly used an italian calco :)
Bill Gates starts off believing he is entitled to having more of a say in how his tax dollars are spent than anyone else like a feudal lord.
It shouldn't be a conversation. He has one vote just like everyone else and he is using his money to drown out everyone else.
Philanthropy is upper-class ego and myth building horseshit. It's like Carnegie building and slapping his name on arts buildings so history forgets he killed 1000s in a flood and worked his employees to death.
Philanthropy is a retirement hobby like knitting. It isn't enough to be obscenely wealthy, exploiting poor people on your way to the top. You now get to use that ill-gotten money to parade around in veneration, feigning interests in the plights you contributed greatly to while becoming the person who gets to decide which causes or people get to live or die.
Because one rich guy is partial to saving dogs, the money goes to dogs rather than services for homeless people, housing, and care for people with addiction.
It's anti-democratic and it's an insult to present these people as anything other than people with a mixture of guilt and a god complex.
it's a pretext so bernie can sneak up behind him with a baseball bat and steal his wallet
If someone is struggling on a low wage and still paying taxes, they're contributing more than a billionaire who's actively spending money to lower their tax burden
A flat tax system is ridiculous and regressive, and that's what your logic is suggesting
The mask is finally off the good guy billionaires. Bill would have gotten away with it too if it wasn't for Trump, and people wanting him out with Warren and Sanders being a possibility that will correct the billionaires soaking up massive amounts of money while avoiding real tax. The philanthropy angle is them wanting to spend their tax however they feel, normal Americans can't do that why should the wealthy (Facebook guy putting a ton of his money in another piggy bank calling it a charity fund is nothing more than a tax free way for him to hold his money).
People wouldn't be pissed off enough to talk about guillotines and eating the rich if the system we lived under had ever once proved even slightly adequate at shrinking the disparity between the poor and middle-class, which is the overwhelming majority of people, and the disgustingly rich.
But the system as is has proven not only woefully incapable of doing that, it's actually designed such that that gap keeps growing. It's not a fissure, it's a canyon, and people are tired of dying on one side of it while a handful of ghouls live in unimaginable luxury that they didn't even begin to earn purely on their own merits.
People are pissed, and with good reason. This anger didn't just develop out of thin air. It's not irrational, and it's not sudden. The slow path to reform has grinded down the bones and blood of the poor, and any notion of equality isn't even a distant dream right now. So yes, when people are poor and exploited and trodden upon for long enough while wealthy ogres continue to hoard unconscionable wealth and ignore the voices of the people they exploit, some people are going to come to the conclusion that slow reform is not that answer, and that guillotines are necessary.
Instead of admonishing people for these extremes, have some empathy and try to understand why we're angry and how we've been scorned by the promise of reform that is always on tomorrow's horizon. It'll do us all a hell of a lot more good than continuing to tut-tut people for being pissed off at a situation this system created by design.
Asked who he'd back in a hypothetical election between Warren and Donald Trump, Gates suggested but did not say outright that it would be Warren, saying that he'd cast a ballot for whichever displayed the "more professional approach" to the presidency, even if he disagrees with them.
If you're reading this and coming away thinking "Gates isn't sure if he'd support Warren or Trump," then you're searching for a narrative that isn't there. This is a very clear distancing from Trump without saying anything directly and then getting attacked by Trump and his minion of trolls on Twitter.
Mind you, Microsoft just inked a major cloud contract with the Pentagon after Amazon was considered a sure-fire vendor for the project over a year ago. It's clear that Trump pressured Pentagon officials to nix the Amazon contract because of his public spat with Bezos and the Washington Post (or Pentagon officials realized they'd fall into Trump's cross-hairs so they knew to avoid bringing the heat on themselves). While Gates has nothing to do operationally/day-to-day with Microsoft anymore, I'm sure Gates is aware that a public spat with Trump over a series of stupid hypothetical interview questions is not something that he's going to make Microsoft's current management team deal with the fallout for.
If you're reading this and coming away thinking "Gates isn't sure if he'd support Warren or Trump," then you're searching for a narrative that isn't there. This is a very clear distancing from Trump without saying anything directly and then getting attacked by Trump and his minion of trolls on Twitter.
Mind you, Microsoft just inked a major cloud contract with the Pentagon after Amazon was considered a sure-fire vendor for the project over a year ago. It's clear that Trump pressured Pentagon officials to nix the Amazon contract because of his public spat with Bezos and the Washington Post (or Pentagon officials realized they'd fall into Trump's cross-hairs so they knew to avoid bringing the heat on themselves). While Gates has nothing to do operationally/day-to-day with Microsoft anymore, I'm sure Gates is aware that a public spat with Trump over a series of stupid hypothetical interview questions is not something that he's going to make Microsoft's current management team deal with the fallout for.
People get into attack mode and are annoyed because it defaults with these guys deserving more influence because of their money.
It's true that he gets this, but there are a lot of people who look at him doing "good" with his money as a noble thing and gloss over everything else.
There are many people who wish to take off that gloss. Gates is a ruthless capitalist just like the CEO of Exxon. Being a tech guy who sells Xbox and Windows doesn't make him any different than other monopolists who use their money and power to exploit unearned influence.
Which candidate would provide Microsoft with the most professional defense contracts and regulate me less.
weird that he couldn't just, like, say that he's not voting for trump
Sorry I expanded on it with an edit:
"This is a very clear distancing from Trump without saying anything directly and then getting attacked by Trump and his minion of trolls on Twitter.
Mind you, Microsoft just inked a major cloud contract with the Pentagon after Amazon was considered a sure-fire vendor for the project over a year ago. It's clear that Trump pressured Pentagon officials to nix the Amazon contract because of his public spat with Bezos and the Washington Post (or Pentagon officials realized they'd fall into Trump's cross-hairs so they knew to avoid bringing the heat on themselves). While Gates has nothing to do operationally/day-to-day with Microsoft anymore, I'm sure Gates is aware that a public spat with Trump over a series of stupid hypothetical interview questions is not something that he's going to make Microsoft's current management team deal with the fallout for."
While Gates is on the board of Microsoft, he doesn't run the company anymore and isn't involved in day to day decisions, contract negotiations, etc. Of course he's still on the board, but I don't think he's signing contracts with anybody outside of, like, clear water contractors in Ethiopia for the Gates foundation
But, more-over, Gates knows that making public statements about Trump will hurt the company he founded and that the current execs at that company will have to deal with a mountain of bull shit if he expresses his opinion bluntly. The Pentagon just dropped that Amazon agreement almost certainly because Trump hates Jeff Bezos, exclusively because Bezos won't take over the editorial decisions of the Post and have them praise King Donald. It's also very out of character for Gates to be blunt, he usually makes thoughtful, but measured and careful, statements.
In this case, there's nothing to gain for Gates to say, bluntly, that he wouldn't vote for Trump, so he's cagey about it... being pretty clear to anybody whose not looking to make false narratives that he's not voting for Donald Trump.
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Bingo. It's also a great example of why billionaires should not exist. We're pandering to one guy and his ideas and VOTES are more important than everyone else's combined because of his wealth.
This keeps getting parroted, so let's just real quick point out how this is a false dichotomy. The government does engage in foreign aid. That's something that your tax dollars go towards. Also, a lot of medical and pharmaceutical research that ultimately benefits everyone is funded through tax dollars. So saying "if you think he should be taxed more, what you're really saying is people in India are worth less than Americans" is nonsense.
I mean that's a small point in the grand scheme of things, because not all of his philanthropy is even actual philanthropy. Some of it causes harm to others, as did some of the things he did to accrue his fortune (see earlier posts about his patent lobbying, for example). Also, some of that philanthropy is tax-deductible investing that grows his fortune. But really, I'm just aiming to dismantle the false dichotomy some people keep pushing.
Microsoft was known as the "Velvet workshop" because of how it exploited workers. Sure actual employees were paid well but like most tech companies they used "permenant temps" to keep workers from ever gaining full benefits. This resulted in a lawsuit that ended with a settlement payment (Vizcaino v Microsoft Corp) Not to mention the anti-trust lawsuits in both America and Europe.
And before you go "wait these are all a decade ago" Bill Gates quit being CEO of Microsoft in 2006 so I went to make sure to get information during he was working to avoid issues.
I'm not your gopher, and I'm not going to change your views for you. If you're a supporter of capitalists, just accept that you and I will never see eye to eye.
He wouldn't turn into one or is one, but can be said of most of america. But that doesn't stop them siding with it through inaction or rationlizing siding with it. America's default state is white sumprancy, it is what the country, laws, society, media, etc was built on. His charity work is activitly being made harder by this admin, but because of taxes he is still on the fence.
When he said he'd vote for the candidate with "the more professional approach", how could the interviewer not immediately follow up with "can you honestly say with a straight face that Trump has demonstrated an ability to be professional?"
Like, what the hell?
Also, a billionaire's opinion on this issue shouldn't have anymore weight than yours or mine, yet the media keeps assembling panels of old rich guys and asking them if they think they should pay more. The fuck do you think they're going to say?
Like, what the hell?
Also, a billionaire's opinion on this issue shouldn't have anymore weight than yours or mine, yet the media keeps assembling panels of old rich guys and asking them if they think they should pay more. The fuck do you think they're going to say?
I agree with Bill 100%. A wealth tax is a stupid idea and not the right way to go about tackling wealth/income inequality.
What do you mean by this?
What do you mean by this?
Bill Gates "retired" a while back, but has more money today than ever.
Philantropy aside, he's part of the problem today.
Billionaires shouldn't exist.
Philantropy aside, he's part of the problem today.
Billionaires shouldn't exist.
That's not what they are saying, they are saying that Gates is not better equipped to help impoverished people in other countries than the governments of those countries. It should be noted that Gates DOES spend a lot of money in the US as well, but he spends that money on things that are not exactly beneficial to impoverished people in the US. Some of the causes he supports domestically are anti-union causes and the privatization of K-12 education, both of which are actually really bad for poor Americans. He could spend that money addressing things like homelessness in the US, but he doesn't. And to be clear, I'm simply saying the money he already spends domestically could be used better, not even touching on the money he spends in impoverished countries.
Or
Trump is a lunatic and has ended government contracts with corporations because he doesn't get his balls tickled enough by the leaders of said corporations, and it's for the best to avoid the issue entirely in public.
It's pretty obvious what that means, no amount of labor produces that much wealth. The only way to generate that much wealth is through the exploitation of others and luck.
Okay, got it.
This is actually a bigger problem now in the US and I see it as the failure of the government that this issue hasn't been resolved. I know some workplaces that work the employee just under the amount of time that they would be considered full-time to avoid benefits.
The dude is making money off of residuals for stuff he used to do. Not to mention all of the people working for him that make a dime out of his dollar. How does he "earn" that? By being first?
And how would you otherwise deal with wealth and income inequality? If there are no regulations on how much people get, then they will take and take until the people below them have barely anything.
Holy shit you're right, 3 cents on every dollar over one billion is literally all his money, fuck you Warren!
It's also a failure of the corporations who engage in that exploitation and lobby government to prevent legislation from being passed to stop it.
That just makes him someone that gives in to fascism, don't know how that is a better look
Right, and the reason it's a bigger problem now is because the wealthy have continuously eroded regulations and lobbied against protections for workers for a very long time. This is what we mean when say billionaires are inherently immoral and that they did not earn their fortunes based purely on their own merits. They are the products of an economic system that corrupt down to its roots. They are just playing the system like a violin.
Like someone already said, scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds.
Why would companies not do it? Corporations have one goal: To increase profit and grow, no matter the cost.
Anand Giridharadas input is interesting because, while Giridharadas is an insufferable blowhard whose still right most of the time, he doesn't criticize Gates as much as he does other "billionaire philanthrophists." Kara Swisher was trying to get him to be critical of Gates when she interviewed him ~6mos ago or w/e that was, but he was reticent because he suggested philanthropy like Gates' can be more beneficial. The Gates' Foundation has mostly targeted philanthrophy around issues where there is a lack of current infrastructure: Clean water and basic health sanitation in places without governments. Giridharadas eire is more directed to philanthropic billionaires who try to have an outsized influence in places where democratic structures already exist, like for instance Mark Zuckerberg's insane multi-million dollar "donation" to New Jersey school systems which effectively gives him -- a person with less expertise in curriculum and school systems than even the average American -- an oversized, weighted influence over hundreds of thousands of children's education.
Here's the interview:
www.vox.com
I find Giridharadas mostly insufferable, his arrogant know-it-all personality gives me intense doucheshivers and I almost had to turn off this interview because of it, but I think he's right and makes a lot of excellent arguments.
Here's the interview:
Tech billionaires who donate millions are just "bribing society at large," Anand Giridharadas says
Zuckerberg, Bezos, and Gates shouldn’t have an outsize say in how we run our country, Giridharadas says on the latest episode of Recode Decode.
www.vox.com
I find Giridharadas mostly insufferable, his arrogant know-it-all personality gives me intense doucheshivers and I almost had to turn off this interview because of it, but I think he's right and makes a lot of excellent arguments.
That mysterious thing called "reading the original interview".
He said jokingly that he wouldn't pay 99% of his wealth.
It´s remarkable what information and tech did in the last century to keep people alienated and directing their anger towards fake enemies.
As a journalist, i feel ashamed that journalism was one of the biggest components in this process. The French Revolution would absolutely not happen in this day and age because people think their neighbor is the enemy. It´s unreal how much billionaires and millionaires have skewed the system, just look at the number of people in here defending Bill Gates like he is their relative or something.
If he donated 99% of his money, he'd still have roughly one billion left.
Why does anyone need a billion?
"The rich won when they convinced the poor to fight the poor for being poor".
How does one person "earn" a million times more money than the average worker? Or a billion times?
So does bill gates really think gay people being persecuted and brown people put in cages is comparable in terms of professionalism than him having less money. What a joke m after he gave an award to modi though I was done.