• BestBouclettes@jlai.lu
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    8 months ago

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

    • Tiefling IRL
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      8 months ago

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

  • Asafum@feddit.nl
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    8 months ago

    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

  • stormesp@lemm.ee
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    8 months ago

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

    • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      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
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        8 months ago

        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

        • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Capitalism does have some uses, like which TV you want to buy, but it needs to be heavily regulated.

              • itslilith
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                7 months ago

                The fact that we live under capitalism today? People can grow crops without feudalism as well, but it’s not up to the individual serfs to decide if they want farm for themselves and their community, or for their liege lord. But the very same factories that produce consumer goods with a profit incentive today, can do the same for the benefit of the people tomorrow.

                • deafboy@lemmy.world
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                  7 months ago

                  very same factories that produce consumer goods with a profit incentive today, can do the same for the benefit of the people tomorrow.

                  Yes. Until everyone ends up in poverty, because over time, nobody knows what to make and how much. The longer the supply chain the stronger the effect will be.

    • grrgyle@slrpnk.net
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      7 months ago

      It’s inherently antisocial. You no longer have to play by the social contract with that kind of wealth/power.

      It’s a grave failure with our economic system that billionaires have been permitted to come about

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      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

      • bitjunkie@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Well yeah it’s not apples to apples, I was just going for another massive dollar amount that was recognizable to give a sense of scale.

      • Kallioapina@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        8 months ago

        How many security guards can one of these assholes have on duty at any one time?

        Dont y’all have assault rifles and semiautomatics on you at all times and you are all about being against tyranny? WHAT GIVES?

        • PixellatedDave@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          My thought too. Don’t they have slogans like ‘don’t tread on me’ and such? I am pretty convinced you don’t get that kind of wealth without standing on everyone you can.

        • bitjunkie@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          That is a gross generalization. As I’m writing this, I am at least 30 feet from both my AR and my sidearm.

    • chonglibloodsport@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      A trillion bucks, but not in cash; in shares of those companies. Try to sell it all for cash and you tank the share price. People lose their jobs, pension funds that own shares in those companies lose value.

      That’s the trouble with taxing wealth. It’s not liquid like income. All that net worth is tied up in the companies and not easily accessed.

      • ebc@lemmy.ca
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        8 months ago

        I’d be okay with the govt owning shares, honestly. That way the public would get a voice in how these megacorps operate, and that voice would get bigger the larger the company becomes.

        • deafboy@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          govt owning shares, honestly. That way the public would get a voice

          How would a public get a voice? The government would have a voice.

          • ebc@lemmy.ca
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            7 months ago

            In theory, the government is elected by the public. Not a given these days, I know.

    • TammyTobacco@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      I think it should be legal to murder a billionaire. They either have to pay for private security they can’t fully trust and always worry about being killed, or they can give away their money until they’re under a billion.

  • Brosplosion@lemm.ee
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    8 months ago

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

    • itslilith
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      8 months ago

      I don’t think we had 250% inflation in the last 7 years

      We certainly didn’t have a 250% increase in wages or median wealth in the last 7 years

      They are parasites and criminals

      • Brosplosion@lemm.ee
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        8 months ago

        These sorts of stats are misleading and can erode the footing of the argument you are making. Showing the numbers adjusted for inflation is damning enough.

        We’ve had around 60% inflation over the past seven years, does it explain all their increases? No.

        But not including that information and saying “but number is bigger!” Just makes your argument look weak when it could be statistically sound.

    • LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world
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      8 months 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.

  • grrgyle@slrpnk.net
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    7 months ago

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

    Right?

  • Clent@lemmy.world
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    8 months 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.