# The ultrawealthy (Bezos cashes out on Amazon shares)



## fantom (Aug 5, 2020)

I just saw that Jeff Bezos cashed out $3 billion in Amazon shares. He still sits on $170 billion worth of stock. And with the pandemic, he really doesn't have to worry about losing customers for now. That had me wondering, how do people feel about this?

To put this in perspective, he already had more than $3 billion in cash. There are 175k warehouse full-time employees. He literally could give them each $500k right now and still have half of his shares. The company employs about 850k people including part time workers. Even giving a $5k bonus to every employee, that's only $4 billion of $170 billion. It's literally a drop in the bucket for him.

Why is this ok as a society to let people hoard this many resources when people are worried about losing their houses and livelihood? What can we realistically do to balance things better? Call it the pandemic or BLM wake up (and my rant about capitalism in the Trump thread with Drew), but something is seriously broken.

Yes, this is a generic question about wealth and the 1%, but what are the options for the 99% to do something about it? I personally try not to use Amazon for other reasons, but at this point, they (with Target and Wal-Mart) really have a the best service to get necessities.


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## jaxadam (Aug 5, 2020)

I have no problem with him doing whatever he wants with his money, and others shouldn’t either.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

ya he earned it. 
and it's mostly stock. his liquidity isn't any more then a lot of billionaires.

don't like it. stop shopping at amazon and get of your computer that shit is chocked full of aws services.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 5, 2020)

Other than the fact he apparently takes advantage of a shit ton of tax breaks while his customer base has to pay a bunch in sales tax each year (and yet the states it goes to do not seem to improve much), I don't care.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 5, 2020)

No surprise that the resident Republicans say he can do whatever the fuck he wants. 

My personal belief is that we need to start recognizing the impact of these oversized corporations. How many jobs were lost to Walmart and now Amazon that undercut their competition and screw over the local businesses? Why would we allow these monopolies to be more powerful than any governmental body? Why would we have a tax code that allows 1 man to amass so much wealth in such a short period of time? 

These are the questions we should be asking, not “what should he do with his money?”

In my mind the right wing is just filled with “lotto winners who haven’t cashed their check.” They reinforce the wealthy because they believe they will be rich someday and are special but just haven’t caught their break yet. It’s not recognizing that we are building up a type of American aristocracy that is furthering itself from normal Americans more and more with every passing year.

What will the Republicans say? “Oh if we tax or regulate these people and businesses they will leave the country.” Wake up call, they already moved the jobs out but they themselves stay in the US because it is safe and allows them to get away with all this. 

What’s the solution? A basic progressive tax code, closing tax loopholes, breaking up monopolies, enacting anti competitive legislation, stop worshipping and pandering to the wealthy, and finally vote out Republicans and any Democrats that put big business ahead of middle class Americans.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> No surprise that the resident Republicans say he can do whatever the fuck he wants.
> 
> My personal belief is that we need to start recognizing the impact of these oversized corporations. How many jobs were lost to Walmart and now Amazon that undercut their competition and screw over the local businesses? Why would we allow these monopolies to be more powerful than any governmental body? Why would we have a tax code that allows 1 man to amass so much wealth in such a short period of time?
> 
> ...



lol that's me. hardcore republican. you know me better then I know myself.


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## jaxadam (Aug 5, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> No surprise that the resident Republicans say he can do whatever the fuck he wants.
> 
> My personal belief is that we need to start recognizing the impact of these oversized corporations. How many jobs were lost to Walmart and now Amazon that undercut their competition and screw over the local businesses? Why would we allow these monopolies to be more powerful than any governmental body? Why would we have a tax code that allows 1 man to amass so much wealth in such a short period of time?
> 
> ...



TLDR


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## SpaceDock (Aug 5, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> lol that's me. hardcore republican. you know me better then I know myself.



sorry, I wasn’t including you actually



jaxadam said:


> TLDR



yep, typical of your posts


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## jaxadam (Aug 5, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> lol that's me. hardcore republican. you know me better then I know myself.



SpaceDock thinks that if you aren’t voting for Che Guevara you’re a far right Republicrap Trumptard who doesn’t deserve to breathe.


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## narad (Aug 5, 2020)

Systems that optimize for efficiency and cost rarely do so without compromising on robustness. If anything, it should be immediately apparent today in covid times how optimization of product manufacturing and distribution has given Americans what they want -- low cost, convenient things -- while basically off-shoring all manufacturing, and having supply lines that can't withstand any perturbations. The poultry supply lines are so brittle that any delay creates a situation where tens of millions of birds are slaughtered to rot. 

This is what Amazon has done, and because this is in line with what Americans want, it has been very successful and profitable. If any situation occurred where we would actually need to rely on the more local shops that have all been wiped out through competition with Amazon, we'd be shit out of luck. That's the problem -- if you were top-down designing this structure, you'd be aware of the risks of big systems failing, and you'd probably diversify or take some precaution to help you out in a catastrophe. But within the context of capitalism, give me what I want when I want it, and we'll just not think of the negative consequences now, and if they come to pass, Amazon disappears but the people behind it are still rich. 

So I think it's funny in a sense to act like Bezos "earned" the money. His only contribution is being a figurehead in moving the needle a little further towards low-cost convenience and away from having robust systems, pushed there by American consumer interests.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 5, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> SpaceDock thinks that if you aren’t voting for Che Guevara you’re a far right Republicrap Trumptard who doesn’t deserve to breathe.



I am actually very moderate and do not agree with a lot of mainstream democrat ideologies, but I do believe the republicans have just become a terrible party of Trump that is just hell bent on dividing our nation and repeatedly bailing out the richest segments of our society.


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## vilk (Aug 5, 2020)

I say we build a guillotine and start chopping heads. I'll even pull the cord; I need the work. 

Proletariat mob executioner sounds like a gig I might feel passionate about. I wonder if you gotta know someone.


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## fantom (Aug 5, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I have no problem with him doing whatever he wants with his money, and others shouldn’t either.



If you think the point of my post had anything to do with how Bezos should spend his money, you really missed the point.



diagrammatiks said:


> ya he earned it



Did he? To make $170 billion, he has been making on average $350k every *hour* since the moment he was born, not including his expenses like losing a shitload of wealth in his divorce. Did he really earn it?! Hell no. Other people earned it for him. He probably worked his ass off, I won't discredit him for building a successful business, but no one is capable of earning that much without a lot of help.

For anyone who thinks this is a Republican vs. Democrat topic, please consider the scale of this amount of money. This isn't about trickle down economics. If we were talking millions of dollars and taxes and such, I would likely be arguing most Republican talking points (no more taxes, deregulate more, etc.). But we are talking about over $100 billion. Imagine having $850k in liquid assets and spending 1 *penny* on a decent house (something around $200-400k). That is literally how ridiculous the numbers are here. Most people will never have so much capital, let alone be able to buy assets for such a small amount compared to their worth.

Edit: fixed a math error


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## KnightBrolaire (Aug 5, 2020)

oh dis gon be gud


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> sorry, I wasn’t including you actually
> 
> 
> 
> yep, typical of your posts



already bought so many maga hats.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

fantom said:


> If you think the point of my post had anything to do with how Bezos should spend his money, you really missed the point.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



he only has like 6 billion in cash reserves.
stocks aren't real money man.


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## fantom (Aug 5, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> he only has like 6 billion in cash reserves.
> stocks aren't real money man.



Ya, they are actually better than real money because at the level of wealth it cuts your income tax liability in half. If you think liquid assets aren't real money, you likely just don't have any. And if you do, I will gladly take all of your stocks for some imaginary money.


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## fantom (Aug 5, 2020)

KnightBrolaire said:


> oh dis gon be gud



Ya I was generally curious... Starting to think that my judgment failed here lol.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

fantom said:


> Ya, they are actually better than real money because at the level of wealth it cuts your income tax liability in half. If you think liquid assets aren't real money, you likely just don't have any. And if you do, I will gladly take all of your stocks for some imaginary money.



sorry going to mcdonalds to directly exchange my stocks for a big mac.


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## jaxadam (Aug 5, 2020)

fantom said:


> If you think the point of my post had anything to do with how Bezos should spend his money, you really missed the point.



Ya I must have because your first line literally leads with Bezos cashing out 3 billion.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 5, 2020)

fantom said:


> Ya, they are actually better than real money because at the level of wealth it cuts your income tax liability in half. If you think liquid assets aren't real money, you likely just don't have any. And if you do, I will gladly take all of your stocks for some imaginary money.



oh shit i should actually do something else instead of shitposting.

it cuts your income tax liability because it's not income. 
you get taxes on capital gains when you exchange it directly for a big mac.


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## jaxadam (Aug 5, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> you get taxes on capital gains when you exchange it directly for a big mac.



:high five:

I think the real genius lies in exchanging those Big Macs for some iShares.


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## fantom (Aug 5, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> Ya I must have because your first line literally leads with Bezos cashing out 3 billion.



Fair enough. The only thing that relates to Bezos is that it seeded my thought for this post. I don't really care how he spends his money, I care that our society allowed people to amass so much money that, during a recession, someone literally made over 70% ROI on $100 billion in 6 months. People are worried about what to eat, if they will get evicted or foreclosed, if they will get fired. Someone casually "earning" $70 billion seems like a serious problem, regardless of how it is spent.

The main issue I'm raising for discussion is the scale of money here. We aren't talking $10 million dollars.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 6, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> SpaceDock thinks that if you aren’t voting for Che Guevara you’re a far right Republicrap Trumptard who doesn’t deserve to breathe.



This from a guy whose following the far-right playbook of pretending moderate candidates are “exactly the same” as authoritarian candidates to push a defeatist agenda of complacency amongst moderates and progressives.

Love that the Karl Rove playbook is still alive and well.


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## possumkiller (Aug 6, 2020)

Idk man. Jeff bezo is like the American dream personified. He's a decent, hard working white man. He's worked so hard that he became the richest guy in the world. That shows everyone else in the world just how awesome it is to be American. Any of us could do the same thing if we just weren't so lazy. Making a ton of money is a lot of work. Keeping a ton of money is even harder because you always have a bunch of lazy do nothing communist assholes trying to take your money for themselves. Freaking poor people want all the money but don't want to do any of the work to get it.


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## fantom (Aug 6, 2020)

Here's another interesting way to look at it... Again Jeff Bezos isn't intended to be a target. Just an example.

Bezos personally "earned" an estimated $74 billion in capital gains since the start of 2020. That is the equivalent of Bezos personally sending every household in USA that received a stimulus check another $600. That is insane.

And he is just one person... Just think of the other senior executives at Amazon and many other companies. Unemployment is at 14% and we have people making billions in 6 months. I just don't get it.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 6, 2020)

I am a hardcore republican, yo. Thanks for alerting me to this @SpaceDock


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 6, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> I am actually very moderate and do not agree with a lot of mainstream democrat ideologies, but I do believe the republicans have just become a terrible party of Trump that is just hell bent on dividing our nation and repeatedly bailing out the richest segments of our society.


Who bailed out the banks? I forget. We had to vote on it before we could read it if I remember... who said that? I forgot there as well. Pretty sure division started before Trump, but what do I know? I don't vote and shouldn't have a say at all.


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## Hollowway (Aug 6, 2020)

I don’t think Bezos should get $170 billion dollars of net worth. But I also don’t think he should be prevented from earning money. I just think that the whole system of what is being rewarded and what isn’t is messed up. It’s really interesting to see what we value and what we do not. 
I also think it’s useless for that money to be sitting there, unused. I love the idea of the giving pledge and other ways to get that money into circulation, as opposed to just have it passed from family member to family member through the generations. 
Anyway, I could go on and on about what I think should be done, etc, but basically I think that it’s just a system of messed up priorities that we’ve created a country where someone can build a business that can make him insanely wealthy, but we can’t get kids educated well, provide decent health care to everyone, etc. And that we are fascinated by the Kardashians, simply because they’re marketed to us as fascinating, but we have no desire to watch real artistic talent or learn from true geniuses. Everything is just backwards.


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## possumkiller (Aug 6, 2020)

https://imgur.com/gallery/WrvGMa6

Just take a look at this commie crap.


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## narad (Aug 6, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> https://imgur.com/gallery/WrvGMa6
> 
> Just take a look at this commie crap.



It is commie crap. We should stop redistributing wealth to billionaires.


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## possumkiller (Aug 6, 2020)

Don't you think we should leave it up to the billionaires to decide if they want to waste their hard earned money on handouts for people that are just too lazy or ignorant to become billionaires themselves?


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 6, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> https://imgur.com/gallery/WrvGMa6
> 
> Just take a look at this commie crap.


I love to say inane political bullshit in a Bernie type voice.


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## narad (Aug 6, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> Don't you think we should leave it up to the billionaires to decide if they want to waste their hard earned money on handouts for people that are just too lazy or ignorant to become billionaires themselves?



I mean, I feel like I shouldn't have a hard time telling if this is sarcasm or not, but still?


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 6, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> I don’t think Bezos should get $170 billion dollars of net worth. But I also don’t think he should be prevented from earning money. I just think that the whole system of what is being rewarded and what isn’t is messed up. It’s really interesting to see what we value and what we do not.
> I also think it’s useless for that money to be sitting there, unused. I love the idea of the giving pledge and other ways to get that money into circulation, as opposed to just have it passed from family member to family member through the generations.
> Anyway, I could go on and on about what I think should be done, etc, but basically I think that it’s just a system of messed up priorities that we’ve created a country where someone can build a business that can make him insanely wealthy, but we can’t get kids educated well, provide decent health care to everyone, etc. And that we are fascinated by the Kardashians, simply because they’re marketed to us as fascinating, but we have no desire to watch real artistic talent or learn from true geniuses. Everything is just backwards.



can we just make it really super clear that bezos does not have 170 billion dollars of money. 

please pleas eplease


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 6, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> can we just make it really super clear that bezos does not have 170 billion dollars of money.
> 
> please pleas eplease


Some don't get how that works...


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## Demiurge (Aug 6, 2020)

To be fair, $3B is only, like, 10 shares right now.


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## jaxadam (Aug 6, 2020)

I mean, who would have thought that with the whole world staying home, Amazon sales went up.

Really, the root of the problem with systems like Amazon is the consumers. We can start with my wife, who gets like three things a day from there.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 6, 2020)

Well I mean Bernie’s point about taxpayers subsidizing Walmart is accurate. 

Walmart (and other companies) lobby to keep the federal minimum wage flat. ~$7.75 since ‘09. 

Many citizens support this as well because they incorrectly believe “If wages stay flat then prices won’t go up!”

Basic misunderstanding of economics. See: how many people on this forum are confused as to why guitars cost so much more now and why “$1,500 only gets me a Korean/indo guitar?!” (Costs constantly go up, but wages don’t as employers don’t really have to compete outside of a handful of industries).

2%+ annual inflation is real with or without increasing wages. 

So Walmart lobbies to keep minimum wage down, lobbies states not to increase their minimum above the federal #. Then doesn’t give employees enough hours to qualify for healthcare. 

So a hardworking person who WANTS to work 40+ hrs a week cannot do so at one job, and must work two jobs with no healthcare from either. (Due to not enough hours).

They aren’t “lazy” they are just getting fucked by Walmart and Subway. 

So then the TAXPAYER has to subsidize their food/shelter/healthcare with the various government programs they need just to live. Because even working 40+ hrs a week they fall below basic poverty line measures. Hence the initial $600 increase over minimum wage. Minimum wage wasn’t enough to live. 

- I’m not kidding, this is something accounted for by equity analysts when making projections about future earnings. “How likely is your current regulatory environment going to allow you to take advantage of tax & revenue loopholes like not providing healthcare by cutting hours” needs to be accounted for. 

From a capitalist: If a company cannot be profitable without paying its employees enough to live without taxpayer subsidies then it’s not a profitable business. It should either go under or be regulated as a utility if deemed as important as energy or water. 

This shitty existence right here is what many rural (and urban) voters are mad about. Different people just reach different conclusions as to who/what is the root cause of this. And while voters argue about it, taxpayers as a whole keep subsidizing their employees.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 6, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> Well I mean Bernie’s point about taxpayers subsidizing Walmart is accurate.
> 
> Walmart (and other companies) lobby to keep the federal minimum wage flat. ~$7.75 since ‘09.
> 
> ...



yup. But every thing that Bernie said in those tweets is like a million times more coherent then the knee jerk blame billionaires bullshit I see regurgitated in my news feeds everyday. 

reasonable minimum wage. absolutely.

employ benefits and healthcare. yup.

making sure that corporations are taxed properly. super important.

increasing capital gain taxes. sure.

but none of that prevents someone like Bezos or a company with a big enough market cap from being worth hundreds of billions on paper.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 6, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> yup. But every thing that Bernie said in those tweets is like a million times more coherent then the knee jerk blame billionaires bullshit I see regurgitated in my news feeds everyday.
> 
> reasonable minimum wage. absolutely.
> 
> ...



Yeah I definitely see that a part of it is basically how people cling to soundbites of “Maga” plenty of people see “fuck the rich” as a good sounding rallying cry. It’s just bad-faith politics.

The flip side is that many people really don’t get what “rich” is.

Bezo’s wealth absolutely could support a 1% wealth tax Above the billion dollar mark. And so could maybe 8-10 other Americans.

A huge part of the industrial revolution was built on the backs of consumers making more than subsistence wages and thus spending it. And Ford/GM/etc all still became very wealthy.

The small business owner making $4mm/yr is not a bad guy that’s just the American Dream. Doctors and lawyers making $300k are not rich. They studied hard and work a hard job. That’s $300k of W2 income.

But when someone making a measly $40k per year gets another $2k? They spend all of it. Home repairs, clothes, eating out, whatever it’s gone. And then it’s taxed at the point of sale. The. The vendor pays employees and pays payroll taxes. Then the employee spends it and it’s taxed again.

The government gets the funding it needs for public services like roads, schools, and libraries when money is flowing. And the fastest way to do that is to create an environment where wages cannot be held stagnant for decades. Reducing people’s purchasing power does not help anyone.

At a certain point if there is no competition to raise minimum wages to keep up with inflation then it needs to be regulated. Otherwise a majority of citizens suffer the erosion of their standard of living. Even $300k/yr doesn’t buy what it used to.


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## lurè (Aug 6, 2020)

$3 billions? He could buy at least 10 Fortin amps with that amount of money.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 6, 2020)

lurè said:


> $3 billions? He could buy at least 10 Fortin amps with that amount of money.


All of them with built in "standby mute" which doesn't work, but is apparently how it's meant to function.


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## Drew (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Other than the fact he apparently takes advantage of a shit ton of tax breaks while his customer base has to pay a bunch in sales tax each year (and yet the states it goes to do not seem to improve much), I don't care.


To be fair, Amazon fought that as hard as they could, and it took a few court cases before they began collecting sales tax. 

Not saying they were right or wrong to do so, either, just that if you have a problem with Bezos taking advantage of tax breaks at Amazon while still charging sales tax, that was hardly a business decision on his part.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

Drew said:


> To be fair, Amazon fought that as hard as they could, and it took a few court cases before they began collecting sales tax.
> 
> Not saying they were right or wrong to do so, either, just that if you have a problem with Bezos taking advantage of tax breaks at Amazon while still charging sales tax, that was hardly a business decision on his part.


I've always had to pay sales tax at Amazon.


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## Drew (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> I've always had to pay sales tax at Amazon.


Have they always collected it in their home state? They didn't outside of their state for a LONG time, and I think it was only within the last 5 years or so that got clarified and they legally had to.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 7, 2020)

Drew said:


> Have they always collected it in their home state? They didn't outside of their state for a LONG time, and I think it was only within the last 5 years or so that got clarified and they legally had to.



wasn’t that the Wayfair case?


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## fantom (Aug 7, 2020)

So it seems like Sanders is pushing a tax he mentioned in his tweets.

https://www.sanders.senate.gov/news...-wealth-gains-to-provide-health-care-for-all-

To me, taxing people is addressing the symptom and not the root cause. I personally don't think it is a great solution, but it's at least recognizing the issue. I think more needs to go towards raising wages of "essential workers" and putting more incentives for companies to pay more to their employees and communities.

This one is weird to me.. as I usually don't agree with Bernie Sanders, but I'm happy to see he is trying to do something about it.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

Expect to see more layoffs as a result.


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## fantom (Aug 7, 2020)

As a result of what? This is a tax on people, not businesses.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

fantom said:


> As a result of what? This is a tax on people, not businesses.


A lot of whom own businesses.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> A lot of whom own businesses.



It only affects the richest .001% from the month of March to August of this year.

That's it.

It would also only be on 60% of gains. Not even on total revenue.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 7, 2020)

Healthy people are more productive and less of a drain on society. When people who can’t afford early and often medical care/checkups they ignore their problems, then those problems worsen until they end up in the ER/much worse scenario needing much more expensive care.

Affordable medical care saves money and lives.

It costs less than letting people go broke, because everyone eventually gets ill and needs care.

Many people are accepting of the very definition of “socialism” in the form of pensions and social security, but when you apply the same idea elsewhere it often upsets people’s worldview.

Medicare for All is literally just “social security for everyone, with even less restrictions.”


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security are constantly on the verge of going broke, are they not? I've seen articles growing up that they're close to running out of money numerous times.

Also, the Affordable Healthcare Act was anything but affordable, and lots of people were not able to keep their doctors as promised.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security are constantly on the verge of going broke, are they not? I've seen articles growing up that they're close to running out of money numerous times.
> 
> Also, the Affordable Healthcare Act was anything but affordable, and lots of people were not able to keep their doctors as promised.



Social Security and Medicare are funded by payroll taxes. As wages remain stagnant, thanks in part to diminishing protections and organization of workers and minimum wage not raising relative to cost of living, there is a smaller relative pot of payroll taxes. Additionally the cost of providing care is also on the rise.

The AHA was more affordable than the alternative, which goes to show just how bad the alternative is.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 7, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Social Security and Medicare are funded by payroll taxes. As wages remain stagnant, thanks in part to diminishing protections and organization of workers and minimum wage not raising relative to cost of living, there is a smaller relative pot of payroll taxes. Additionally the cost of providing care is also on the rise.
> 
> The AHA was more affordable than the alternative, which goes to show just how bad the alternative is.




A) And automation increases over time, companies naturally lay off more staff or allow staff to leave via attrition without replacing the workers. Several major banks for example employ tens of thousands less people than they did a decade ago. They just don’t need that many. 

B) The original ACA was very different going in from the gutted/butchered version that came out. 

It’s the “starve the beast” playbook that has been used for decades. 

Step 1) Purposefully Cut funding to something that has social good, but doesn’t make political donations - public Parks and land, postal service, public transportation and rail, IRS/Regulatory bodies, public education.

This is presented as a “tax cut”. 

Step 2) Social service in question begins having issues due to lack of funding. This is used as justification that “the service is bad and a waste of tax dollars” in order to further cut or eliminate the service. 

Once the service is eliminated after years or even decades it is immediately privatized and the patents/rights/permits/land are sold to a private company that charges citizens far more for an inferior service. 

This is presented as “cutting government waste” and “saving tax dollars.

The entire plan was to destroy something that does good, and present it as a “win” for voters who philosophically agree with small government. But they are taken for a ride as well as the new private service now does not have to compete with a public alternative and thus can increase prices and decrease service or hours of operation. Because that’s how any for profit business maximizes profit. 


A public healthcare option is competition for the private insurance industry. That’s why they lobby so hard against it. 

And that’s why international insurance firms of all types love the US. US consumers are a treasure trove of low hanging fruit for insurance firms looking to grow. The EU ones in particular as there is public competition in the space there.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Social Security and Medicare are funded by payroll taxes. As wages remain stagnant, thanks in part to diminishing protections and organization of workers and minimum wage not raising relative to cost of living, there is a smaller relative pot of payroll taxes. Additionally the cost of providing care is also on the rise.
> 
> The AHA was more affordable than the alternative, which goes to show just how bad the alternative is.


Small businesses are struggling to survive, regardless of shutting down or not. They can't afford it. They'd have to raise prices even more, which would just result in hen closing shop for good.

Fining people for not buying into supposedly affordable anything is "better than the alternative"? Interesting.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Small businesses are struggling to survive, regardless of shutting down or not. They can't afford it. They'd have to raise prices even more, which would just result in hen closing shop for good.
> 
> Fining people for not buying into supposedly affordable anything is "better than the alternative"? Interesting.



1) They will raise prices anyways. Prices always go up. That is inflation. Our entire economy (capitalism) is based on inflation existing.

Holding back wages does NOT prevent price hikes.

Holding wages back forces people to cut more and more expenditures out of their budgets so that they only buy bare necessities.

Small businesses benefit from higher wages. Because people buy more stuff.

1) You can legislate exemptions for small businesses. Lawmakers just need to define what a small business is. “The lesser of 100 employees or $50million per year in revenue, whichever comes first.” Or whatever number is appropriate.

And then you don’t make it a cliff either, like if they hire their 101st employee then suddenly they pay way more. You make it so it’s marginal and scales fairly until they hit the full tax.


3) The employer would save costs on having to pay for and be the plan sponsor for private insurance. Private insurance is not free. It can cost $8k-14k per person to have an insurance plan in place.

They could literally take half and pay a higher salary and pocket the rest for other expenses.

No one wants to “screw” small businesses. The CURRENT system makes it hard for small businesses to compete. Who wants to work for less money and worse benefits when they can work elsewhere for more benefits?

A single payer system REDUCES a competitive advantage that global companies and chains have over small local businesses. The big companies can negotiate at scale versus the 10 man machine shop in Texas. 

I’ve said before that I’m a capitalist. I love small businesses. And small businesses aren’t the ones paying starvation wages, Walmart is.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 7, 2020)

Increasing wages will contribute to hyperinflation, as will printing endless amounts of money. Between getting in a higher tax bracket and goods/services going up, you really aren't getting ahead much, if at all. It is also possible they'll cut your hours back.

And lots of people want to screw small business.


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## Randy (Aug 7, 2020)

tl;dr - I'm less worried about 'raising taxes' on wealthy, uber wealthy and corporations, more concerned with getting them to pay any taxes at all.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 7, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Increasing wages will contribute to hyperinflation, as will printing endless amounts of money. Between getting in a higher tax bracket and goods/services going up, you really aren't getting ahead much, if at all. It is also possible they'll cut your hours back.
> 
> And lots of people want to screw small business.



No it won’t. Literally that’s not how “hyperinflation” works. Example: As of 2020 almost all banks are paying ~$20/hr to start. The world didn’t end.

Wage increases should roughly slightly outpace inflation in order for standards of living to improve. When they do not you enter an environment where businesses that sell “extras” cannot compete with businesses that sell “necessities”. And the small grocery story cannot compete on price with the mega chain, so first the middle-class independent grocer store with some nicer items goes out of business, then the small mom and pop grocer, then only the large chain is left selling the cheapest foods.

During all this, wages still haven’t gone up, causing the large chain grocer to not be able to increase prices, so what to THEY do? They sell smaller and smaller portions for the same price. So if your budget was $100/week you are now buying less food, or paying more than $100 for the same portions.

And the noose just keeps tightening. This often screws hard working rural people the hardest because where there’s less people there’s less jobs and businesses. So once the cycle starts it creates a negative feedback loop as people move away to larger areas.

Then they work two jobs at chains if they can get it with no healthcare either.

The fear of increasing wages leading to inflation stems from a misunderstanding of economics. This is abused by policitians who have been lobbied to vote against any and all taxes/regulations, emotional “fear” of “those less worthy getting more” is a great tool. Meanwhile the person that worked their ass of to make $45k after 8-10 years doesn’t realize that the company was paying $45k for that job 10 years ago. They’ve already been robbed once and don’t realize it.

Wages don’t drive prices. A lack of competition keeps wages down, but prices always go up.

Walmart still pays $7.75, but they charge more for a gallon of milk than they did in a decade ago.


Cost of living is relative to be sure, but wages have to move up regularly or people become unable to “work hard and ave and better themselves”.

The reason so many Americans desperately want manufacturing back in the US was because those were “unskilled” jobs that paid well. Because they could “bootstrap” and work hard and save.

That’s not a bad thing to want, but it’s going to come in a different manner.


A combination of single-payer healthcare to keep people productive and not a strain on services. Tying minimum wages to inflation in some manner to protect the bottom of the bell curve that still deserves the dignity of food & a place to rent/save to buy a home in the boonies, and further down the road? Some form of UBI, because automation is going to accelerate job loss over the next 20-30 years.

And the countries enjoying 1960’s economic booms are all emerging economies right now. China pulled more citizens into the middle class in 40 years than any other nation.

How? Via manufacturing with zero regulation because US company execs offshored all those good jobs decades ago and they aren’t coming back. As China gets expensive manufacturing will move elsewhere.

There are a lot of structural problems that need to be addressed and “wages increasing is bad” is not only incorrect but misses many of the larger points.

I also realize my answers are long AF, but hope that the like 1 person glossing over them finds them interesting.

TL;DR - Good policy designed with the intent of careful planning doesn’t hurt small businesses, it helps small businesses greatly and asks that Walmart and like 8 billionaires pay a % more than small businesses do.

This is prevented by partisan party-line politics that aggressively vote down any discussion of tax reform as “our team versus their team”.

And higher tax brackets don’t affect every previous dollar you make, it’s only higher on each additional dollar. Getting a $2,000 raise that is taxed at 30% instead of 26% is still $1400 more than what you used to take home. You aren’t taxed at 30% on all of it, just the amount above the breakpoint.

Also personally the personal income tax should cap at 30% and not hit that until ~$300k. It’s WAY to punitive to individuals.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 7, 2020)

@Mathemagician is doing the Lord's work.


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## narad (Aug 8, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> @Mathemagician is doing the Lord's work.



The people who need that info aren't going to take the time to read all that, unfortunately.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 8, 2020)

Randy said:


> tl;dr - I'm less worried about 'raising taxes' on wealthy, uber wealthy and corporations, *more concerned with getting them to pay any taxes at all*.




Good luck.


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## fantom (Aug 8, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Small businesses are struggling to survive, regardless of shutting down or not. They can't afford it. They'd have to raise prices even more, which would just result in hen closing shop for good.
> 
> Fining people for not buying into supposedly affordable anything is "better than the alternative"? Interesting.



You are arguing about small businesses when this thread is about fewer than 500 people that earned billions in the last 6 months. Can you make an argument that's relevant to the discussion? Small businesses will not be affected. Large business won't be affected either.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 8, 2020)

fantom said:


> You are arguing about small businesses when this thread is about fewer than 500 people that earned billions in the last 6 months. Can you make an argument that's relevant to the discussion? Small businesses will not be affected. Large business won't be affected either.



What? But conflating issues is how the right gets their consensus.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 8, 2020)

narad said:


> The people who need that info aren't going to take the time to read all that, unfortunately.



Yeah, it needs at least three fart jokes and a wrestling reference to hold attention.


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## fantom (Aug 8, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> Also personally the personal income tax should cap at 30% and not hit that until ~$300k. It’s WAY to punitive to individuals.



Personal income tax also needs to be adjusted to cost of living. Areas (usually urban Democrat areas) with high cost of living have higher income to deal with ridiculous local economy. It is really stupid that federal taxes treat someone paying $4k / month in rent the same way they treat someone paying $700 / month.


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## jaxadam (Aug 8, 2020)

narad said:


> The people who need that info aren't going to take the time to read all that, unfortunately.



Yeah, even the TLDR version was a little TLDR for me!


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## Drew (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Increasing wages will contribute to hyperinflation, as will printing endless amounts of money. Between getting in a higher tax bracket and goods/services going up, you really aren't getting ahead much, if at all. It is also possible they'll cut your hours back.
> 
> And lots of people want to screw small business.


Considering we're fighting _deflation_ right now because we're in the middle of a massive demand shock where federal stimulus has focused on keeping businesses surviving and people employed (i.e - supporting supply), I think we can probably afford to increase wages without tipping into hyperinflation. Anyway, inflation would only be a concern if wage growth exceeds productivity growth, and the reverse has been the case for the last decade or so (and, accordingly, inflation has persistently _undershot_ the Fed's stated 2% target). TL;DR - inflation has been stubbornly low for the last decade or so precisely _because_ wages are probably too low. 

Also, aside from some of the intricacies of AMT or benefit phase outs at the lowest tax brackets, there's no situation where getting into a higher tax bracket causes you to take home LESS money.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

Bezos is proof that capitalism is a complete shitshow. Bezos has enough money to solve a LOT of problems and decides to just sit on it like a fucking dragon guarding a hoard of gold.

My take is that once you get a billion dollars, you should get an award that says "You won at capitalism" and everything after that is evenly distributed to people who actually are in need. Eat the rich.

Edit: And for added clarity, I know a bunch of ancaps in here are gonna jump in reeing. Let me point out that Bezos pays NOTHING in federal income taxes. I know that's basically living the dream of every ancap out there, but keep in mind this dude pays nothing while everybody else has to pay an arm and leg in relation to what they make. He has what he has not through skill, but through exploiting tax loopholes that he lobbies and pays off members of congress to put there in the first place. Everyone wants to bitch and complain about poor people needing food stamps or w/e just to survive, but shitstains like Bezos are the biggest welfare queens imaginable by leeching all kinds of subsidies from Congress, and taxpayers are the ones that foot the bill. Bezos has billions partially through Amazon, and the rest from everybody's pocketbook. And we all slap him on the back as if the guy wrote the book on how to be rich.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> SpaceDock thinks that if you aren’t voting for Che Guevara you’re a far right Republicrap Trumptard who doesn’t deserve to breathe.



Imagine thinking that every socialist/ancom likes Gue Chavara. Some of us prefer people that WEREN'T batshit insane "freedom fighters" but actually DID shit, like Fred Hampton. (until they "mysteriously" died. You just know that had Edgar J. Hoover's hand all over that, like with Martin Luther King Jr.)


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## fantom (Aug 10, 2020)

Too hard to resist...



tacotiklah said:


> *Trump* pays NOTHING in federal income taxes. I know that's basically living the dream of every ancap out there, but keep in mind this dude pays nothing while everybody else has to pay an arm and leg in relation to what they make. He has what he has not through skill, but through exploiting tax loopholes that he lobbies and pays off members of congress to put there in the first place.



"That makes me smart" -- Donald Trump​


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

fantom said:


> Too hard to resist...
> 
> 
> 
> "That makes me smart" -- Donald Trump​


Also true. And I'm willing to wager that when people go through his tax records despite his best efforts to stonewall everyone on them, you'll find that he's Russia's bitch due to rich mob types with ties to Putin bailing Trump out.

Actually there's a really good documentary about the mob operating in New York City on Netflix and how they took dirty money and laundered it via construction in NYC. And guess which one of the buildings they had a hand in building? You guessed it, Trump Tower. To think, Rudy Guiliani made his name wiping out the mob as the lead NYC prosecutor, then jumped into bed trying to defend Trump from obvious criminal acts ranging from obstruction of justice to witness tampering. Rudy was never a good guy, but to basically sellout the one good thing you did with your life for whatever lame perceived grasp at power...


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## Ordacleaphobia (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> Let me point out that Bezos pays NOTHING in federal income taxes. I know that's basically living the dream of every ancap out there, but keep in mind this dude pays nothing while everybody else has to pay an arm and leg in relation to what they make. He has what he has not through skill, but through exploiting tax loopholes that he lobbies and pays off members of congress to put there in the first place. Everyone wants to bitch and complain about poor people needing food stamps or w/e just to survive, but shitstains like Bezos are the biggest welfare queens imaginable by leeching all kinds of subsidies from Congress, and taxpayers are the ones that foot the bill. Bezos has billions partially through Amazon, and the rest from everybody's pocketbook. And we all slap him on the back as if the guy wrote the book on how to be rich.



The thing that's infuriating about Bezo's fuckhuge pile of gold is the knock-on effect it's got on other people, most notably how everyone seems to be willing to look the other way to get a quick piece of the pie. For instance, wasn't there just some big kerfluffle about an Amazon office opening in New York? But they wanted major tax breaks to set up shop there that they didn't get? So instead they went somewhere that would give them huge tax breaks in exchange for all of those sweet sweet employment numbers that whatever jurisdiction gets to flex about? It's bullshit, dude. They make enough money that they can employ people _*and*_ pay their taxes. Not joshin', I promise. But they never will, because they have leverage and the whole world knows it.

Even someone like me who tends to lean right, reads the 'well he worked for it, he had a vision, ran the risk to push his business, and it paid off. It's a free country' argument, and thinks: "I don't care dude; the company is too big. The door is closed. It's the same argument against Google, you can't just go out and make a competing Amazon." These industry supertitans are untouchable and it's infuriating to watch. Jeff Bezos isn't 9 figures smarter and more hardworking than today's entrepreneurs; he was just a smart and hardworking entrepreneur in the right place, at the right time, and was able to take over the fucking world. I'll never say he didn't earn his money and that he doesn't deserve to be filthy rich- he absolutely does- but there should be some sort of limiting factor. SOME kind of resistance. Accumulating more money than you could possibly spend in your entire lifetime is just an obscene amount of wealth. I look at the doctors I cut checks for and routinely try to imagine how I would spend that much money and struggle. I can't even imagine the tier above that, and that tier is literally not even _*comparable *_to someone like ol' Jeff.

It's a tricky philosophical problem for sure, but I agree that the clear first step is tightening down on all of the ridiculous tax shenanigans.



fantom said:


> Too hard to resist...
> "That makes me smart" -- Donald Trump​


Which was also infuriating, because at the time, I loved that answer, because it's true. Yeah, if the option exists, obviously a savvy businessman is going to take advantage of it- whether or not they believe they rightfully owe those taxes.

What I was led to believe was that that shit was going to stop. Part of his whole pitch. Didn't follow through on it. Now I'm upset. I really wanted to give him a chance, I really wanted to see good things come from his presidency because I desperately wanted to see someone that wasn't a career politician come in and, for lack of a better term, drain the swamp. And while I certainly don't think he's done as poor of a job as a majority of this board would have you believe, I am *definitely* not happy with it.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> Bezos is proof that capitalism is a complete shitshow. Bezos has enough money to solve a LOT of problems and decides to just sit on it like a fucking dragon guarding a hoard of gold.
> 
> My take is that once you get a billion dollars, you should get an award that says "You won at capitalism" and everything after that is evenly distributed to people who actually are in need. Eat the rich.
> 
> Edit: And for added clarity, I know a bunch of ancaps in here are gonna jump in reeing. Let me point out that Bezos pays NOTHING in federal income taxes. I know that's basically living the dream of every ancap out there, but keep in mind this dude pays nothing while everybody else has to pay an arm and leg in relation to what they make. He has what he has not through skill, but through exploiting tax loopholes that he lobbies and pays off members of congress to put there in the first place. Everyone wants to bitch and complain about poor people needing food stamps or w/e just to survive, but shitstains like Bezos are the biggest welfare queens imaginable by leeching all kinds of subsidies from Congress, and taxpayers are the ones that foot the bill. Bezos has billions partially through Amazon, and the rest from everybody's pocketbook. And we all slap him on the back as if the guy wrote the book on how to be rich.


You know what's a complete shitshow? Having to wait in lines for moldy bread.


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## narad (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> You know what's a complete shitshow? Having to wait in lines for moldy bread.



Well I don't mind stealing bread if it's from the mouths of decadence.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> You know what's a complete shitshow? Having to wait in lines for moldy bread.



I find that the hyperbolic, black/white arguments like this are part of why we are failing as a country to deal with our issues. Yes, having ultra wealthy with no taxes are bad. Yes, devolving into some Soviet communism would also be very bad. We should not let perfect get in the way of better.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 10, 2020)

narad said:


> Well I don't mind stealing bread if it's from the mouths of decadence.



Im going hungry! Yeah!


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 10, 2020)

I just don't get the white knighting of the super rich.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> I find that the hyperbolic, black/white arguments like this are part of why we are failing as a country to deal with our issues. Yes, having ultra wealthy with no taxes are bad. Yes, devolving into some Soviet communism would also be very bad. We should not let perfect get in the way of better.


Doesn't surprise me you took issue with something I had to say.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I just don't get the white knighting of the super rich.


Yeah that's totally what I did.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Yeah that's totally what I did.



I didn't quote you, but you go ahead keep being you. 

Shine on you crazy diamond.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Doesn't surprise me you took issue with something I had to say.



If you can’t tell, I am trying to find common ground and move away from the type of rhetoric that drives us farther apart. I don’t think that moldy bread lines is a measured response to people questioning the excess of Bezo’s wealth. I also don’t think that “eat the rich” or “off with their heads” is either.


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I just don't get the white knighting of the super rich.



Ask 100% of the Republican Party and 51% of the Democratic Party.


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## vilk (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> You know what's a complete shitshow? Having to wait in lines for moldy bread.


https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/cia-rdp84b00274r000300150009-5


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> If you can’t tell, I am trying to find common ground and move away from the type of rhetoric that drives us farther apart. I don’t think that moldy bread lines is a measured response to people questioning the excess of Bezo’s wealth. I also don’t think that “eat the rich” or “off with their heads” is either.


I think the idea of wage caps is essentially what is being requested oftentimes, and I'm not sure I'm fond of the idea. Mainly because the wage caps will mostly apply to the working schmucks the elite look down on, and will include all assets, thus meaning if you have too much nice shit, good luck maintaining a living.

Also, I am not now, nor will I ever be in the future, convinced that the government or any other person/persons can oversee spending and not dip their sticky fingers into the till.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> I find that the hyperbolic, black/white arguments like this are part of why we are failing as a country to deal with our issues. Yes, having ultra wealthy with no taxes are bad. Yes, devolving into some Soviet communism would also be very bad. We should not let perfect get in the way of better.



Almost as infuriating is that the first thing people think of when socialism is mentioned is the tankie shitshow that was the Soviet Union. For anybody that wants to know how the political compass works, asshats that defend the Soviet Union, China, and North Korea are up in the top left corner. The pejorative for them are "tankies". They're basically fascists that love the socialist aesthetic and are fucking nerds that love reading Marx and other theory, but convenient forget how Lenin and Marx were pretty clear that theory without praxis is bad. (for the record, people like me are deep in the bottom left quadrant and are firmly in the camp of worker's rights and co-opts. Dumbass tankies TALK about worker's rights, but really are just authoritarians that want to "lead the vanguard" in order to have power over other people, whereas ancoms want the eventual complete annihilation of hierarchies altogether)

Secondly, another infuriating thing is that people think everything is going to instantly go to bread lines and all that shit under socialism. But here's the tea (and segues back into the main topic)...

Take a look at the shitshow that late-stage capitalism is that we're seeing here in the states. Yeah the GDP is up, but this pandemic has basically wiped out meaningful employment, people and small businesses (under PPP) are basically having to live off of the government anyways and this was all because the highest levels of leadership in both the legislative and executive branches screwed the pooch on preventing a mass breakout of this nightmare plague.

And dumbfucks like Bezos and Musk don't have to feel the effects of it at all because they have enough money to ride it out. But they're more than happy to send regular workers off to risk dying and/or having crippling effects of this crap, all in the name of record profits to boast about while they laugh at the pleb working class. It's going to get worse and worse too. In the end, unless there's a MASSIVE shift in the way we look at how businesses are run, this downward spiral of wealth inequality and ass-fucking of the working class/wages is going to end up with more protests. And if those voices are heard, I fear looting and rioting will follow. Add in other factors like climate change going past the point of no return (which will inevitably lead to wars and other bullshit over dwindling resources) and it's recipe for disaster.

Honestly, the only thing that can save capitalism at this point is if we get another FDR and other new deal. But I don't have my hopes up for it (and also I'd like to see that shitshow of an economic system die anyways)


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

vilk said:


> https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/cia-rdp84b00274r000300150009-5


Ah yes, the CIA and their very "reliable" information about the Soviet Union that is in NO WAY at all tainted by the cold war. Reminds me of their coup backing in Bolivia last year, ousting a very popular socialist president in favor of a hated fascist one. Because of course the US would keep overthrowing democratically elected governments in favor of fascists/dictators sympathetic to US interests. We've only been doing that since the 50s after all, and the CIA is behind all of it.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I just don't get the white knighting of the super rich.



not any better then people who think that Bezos literally has 170 billion actual dollars in a scrooge mcduck vault.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> not any better then people who think that Bezos literally has 170 billion actual dollars in a scrooge mcduck vault.


If I did, I would swim around in it.


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## jaxadam (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> not any better then people who think that Bezos literally has 170 billion actual dollars in a scrooge mcduck vault.



I heard he keeps it all in a free checking account at Bank of America.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 10, 2020)

Deleting my comments. Not sure why I enter political threads. Apologies for walls of text.


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> not any better then people who think that Bezos literally has 170 billion actual dollars in a scrooge mcduck vault.



Distinction without a difference though, isn't it?


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> So, I understand that this is a fear many voters have. But I like numbers, so let’s do back of the napkin math.
> 
> A 1% wealth tax on all assets above $1,000,000,000 is not a wage cap.
> 
> ...


They get more than enough money as is. Washington state gets online sales tax on everything, and I have not seen a single improvement at all. I guess Governor Ineptlee sure is making out well from allowing that shit, though. Our roads look like shit and we're taxed enough as is.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 10, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I heard he keeps it all in a free checking account at Bank of America.



Sort of. For clients like that with concentrated positions the client posts up $100,000,000 as collateral. Then the bank writes them a check for 95-99% of the value of the securities. 

The bank takes a super low % fee, like sub 1% Per year. And because this is not “income” the client does not pay ANY tax on this. 

The client can then spend their $99,000,000 however they wish, even investing it into other opportunities. 

So no only does the underlying asset ($100,000,000 of Amazon stock) increase in value, but so does the $99,000,000 “Borrowed” amount.

Client pays a 1% fee to the bank in order to leverage up and make more than the fee in gains elsewhere. 

At the end of the period. Say one or two years. The client returns the principal amount borrowed after only paying the 1% annual interest. Client keeps the original shares (collateral + any capital appreciation + dividends if applicable) and the gains on the invested loaned cash. 

So they can 100% get liquid with zero effort and often do. That’s how they have “spending money”.

Because it’s cheaper to borrow from a bank at 1% than pay anything resembling a tax to the government and society that made it possible with a rule of law and legal system that makes America such a great place to start businesses. 

Sometimes it’s just a good thing to toss a penny into the jar for the next person, is all I’m saying.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> They get more than enough money as is. Washington state gets online sales tax on everything, and I have not seen a single improvement at all. I guess Governor Ineptlee sure is making out well from allowing that shit, though. Our roads look like shit and we're taxed enough as is.



I agree with you. You, a regular person, are disproportionately taxed at too high a rate.

I agree with this statement.

I am not proposing taxing you more, but holding it flat and ideally taxing you a regular American taxpayer - less.

However those funds have to come from somewhere correct? Hence the proposal of a wealth tax on assets above $1 billion.

Hell, make it $5 billion. The major point is that it would affect a few people in the us. In total. Your taxes would ideally drop.

And with a single payer healthcare system funded by no longer requiring companies to buy private healthcare employers would be able to keep more money for themselves AND citizens would get healthcare.

Change doesn’t have to be bad if people negotiate in good faith instead of catchy sound-byte attacks like our politicians do.

I mean I’m here defending CEO’s, pretty clear I’m not saying “unicorns will fix everything via magic”.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 10, 2020)

The problem is that they claim they want to "tax the rich," give the real rich people a tax break, and saddling the middle class with more burden. Frankly, more money for them to mismanage is almost always a NO from me.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> not any better then people who think that Bezos literally has 170 billion actual dollars in a scrooge mcduck vault.



Come-on dude, this is semantics at best.
Most of it is in stock or stashed in off-shore tax havens, like basically all of corporations do (Thank you Panama Papers). Just because it's not liquidized doesn't mean that he doesn't have that much money. Nobody with that kind of net-worth is gonna let Uncle Sam come anywhere near it, which actually reinforces my point and the point of this thread.

Edit: As an added point to consider, ultra-wealthy people like Bezos are enjoying the lowest tax rates in US history for that tax bracket (74-75% IIRC) whereas in the past under Ike, they were taxed at around 95%. And even with the lowest taxes for that tax bracket in US history, they STILL keep trying to dodge paying their fair share. Compare the wealth inequality and cost of living standards of the 50s to now. Noticing a pattern?


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## vilk (Aug 10, 2020)

Lol nevermind


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

Randy said:


> Distinction without a difference though, isn't it?



trump is the hero of the right who have no idea how any of this works.

bernie is the hero of the left who have no idea how any of this works.

the world is pretty fucked.

I guess I should actually write an explanation out?

maybe after I put on some pants.


----------



## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

vilk said:


> Wait, so we do or don't think that people in the Soviet Union ate normal healthy meals?



My bad, I misread what you said and thought you were stating that people over there were malnourished and/or ate moldy bread.


----------



## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> trump is the hero of the right who have no idea how any of this works.
> 
> bernie is the hero of the left who have no idea how any of this works.
> 
> ...




And for some, Bernie was the compromise for the left because they know EXACTLY how this works and how this is playing out and also know that the radical enlightened centrists tend to aid and abet fascism via inaction and obfuscation.


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## vilk (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> My bad, I misread what you said and thought you were stating that people over there were malnourished and/or add moldy bread.


Ok I thought that had to be the case because I was like wtf lol


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> Come-on dude, this is semantics at best.
> Most of it is in stock or stashed in off-shore tax havens, like basically all of corporations do (Thank you Panama Papers). Just because it's not liquidized doesn't mean that he doesn't have that much money. Nobody with that kind of net-worth is gonna let Uncle Sam come anywhere near it, which actually reinforces my point and the point of this thread.
> 
> Edit: As an added point to consider, ultra-wealthy people like Bezos are enjoying the lowest tax rates in US history for that tax bracket (74-75% IIRC) whereas in the past under Ike, they were taxed at around 95%. And even with the lowest taxes for that tax bracket in US history, they STILL keep trying to dodge paying their fair share. Compare the wealth inequality and cost of living standards of the 50s to now. Noticing a pattern?



Do you understand what a valuation is?

Bezos is worth a lot because he owns a lot of Amazon stock. 

What do you want the government to do? Nationalize a portion of Amazon?

There's no way to directly tax that valuation.

Like I said before there's a whole host of structural changes that are fine to implement. I'm all for them.

The government needs to get its shit together.

But hurr durr tax the rich is the dumbest way to go about it.

In fact, Jeff Bezos probably won't ever have more about 10 billion in cash. Ever. 

It's pretty much impossible for any one entity or even reasonable group of entities to purchase more amazon stock then that from him.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> And for some, Bernie was the compromise for the left because they know EXACTLY how this works and how this is playing out and also know that the radical enlightened centrists tend to aid and abet fascism via inaction and obfuscation.



you sound like you the read the summary of a critical theory course in college. I salute you sir.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> you sound like you the read the summary of a critical theory course in college. I salute you sir.



Nope, tbh my theory is very limited. I prefer to work with pragmatism/praxis over theory purism.
Also, not a sir.


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## jaxadam (Aug 10, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> Sort of. For clients like that with concentrated positions the client posts up $100,000,000 as collateral. Then the bank writes them a check for 95-99% of the value of the securities.
> 
> The bank takes a super low % fee, like sub 1% Per year. And because this is not “income” the client does not pay ANY tax on this.
> 
> ...



Do you think he has a custom picture on his debit card?


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> Do you understand what a valuation is?
> 
> Bezos is worth a lot because he owns a lot of Amazon stock.
> 
> ...




Not nationalize, but reinstate former US policies that broke up massive monopolies/pseudo-monopolies like what Amazon is growing into. We had a lot of anti-trust laws that Congress has been overturning left and right. I mean, if people want a free and healthy market (like the right proselytizes all the time), it makes sense for the government to step in and break up "too big to fail" banks and corporations that basically put a jackboot on the throats of competition the way that Amazon tends to. There's more than just taxation to keep people like Bezos from essentially being dragons in human form.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> The problem is that they claim they want to "tax the rich," give the real rich people a tax break, and saddling the middle class with more burden. Frankly, more money for them to mismanage is almost always a NO from me.



The accuracy here is painfully true. To this I can only propose political activism regardless of party identification, a focus on candidates who attempt to remove money from politics, and implement term limits, and then continue maintaining a pulse on what is happening in your area. No team sports, just “Might this policy proposal better than what we currently have?”



jaxadam said:


> Do you think he has a custom picture on his debit card?



Not even a question. Only a matter of time until he has a whole bank with his name on it. You don’t think he’d want to IPO a cryptocurrency and pay people in Amazon magic-bux? The conversion rate to stanley nickels is amazing.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> Sort of. For clients like that with concentrated positions the client posts up $100,000,000 as collateral. Then the bank writes them a check for 95-99% of the value of the securities.
> 
> The bank takes a super low % fee, like sub 1% Per year. And because this is not “income” the client does not pay ANY tax on this.
> 
> ...




It's also worth noting that banks LOVE to have people with deep pockets keep that cash stored in the bank. It's due to how the banking system in and of itself works. The money you store in the bank gets used to give loans to people, which said bank makes a tidy profit off of interest on. The more money stored in the bank, the more they can make money OFF of said money stored via car/home loans and other banking services.

Because of this, they're MORE than happy to waive fees for people that essentially make said bank a LOT of, well... bank. If you wanna see this in practice, just check out the terms of your own bank and notice how they really reduce fees and other things if you meet a certain threshold of money stored there. The threshold is higher for businesses IIRC, but they have this even for personal checking accounts. Last time I was with them, Bank of America waived all fees if you kept more than $500 in your account at any time. I imagine people like Bezos will stare at you blankly like you're speaking a foreign language if you mention the words "banking fees" to him.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 10, 2020)

Deleted.


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> trump is the hero of the right who have no idea how any of this works.
> 
> bernie is the hero of the left who have no idea how any of this works.
> 
> ...



You assume any of us are waiting for you to lecture us because we somehow self identify with either of your dismissive generalities.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> If you can’t tell, I am trying to find common ground and move away from the type of rhetoric that drives us farther apart. I don’t think that moldy bread lines is a measured response to people questioning the excess of Bezo’s wealth. I also don’t think that “eat the rich” or “off with their heads” is either.



Well tbf, I'm willing to work with anybody provided I can agree with them on solutions. But just agreeing on problems doesn't mean anything in practicality. Two people can look at something, agree said something is a problem, but have wildly different interpretations of how to go about solving that problem.

Case in point (and tangential so my bad, but worth mentioning as it illuminates my point here):
People on the far left and right will see crime rates in poor black neighborhoods and think it's a problem. But people on the left will see it as being chalked up to socio-economic problems that when addressed properly, will lower those crime rates. People on the far right will see this as black people being genetically predisposed to violence (because of skull shapes and low-IQs and whatnot) and think the best solution is to kick out all black people and form a white ethnostate.

More to the point of the thread, people on the left see wealth inequality and think that ultra-wealthy people are under-taxed (by a wide margin)/storing money in tax havens and want to fix that as well as breaking up super-corporations that horde money and abuse workers. The right either completely denies there's any kind of wealth inequality or for the ones that do recognize it, will blame economic problems on "those immigrants taking jobs" and poor people living on welfare that "just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps".

Yes, I'm steel-manning arguments here and these are the typical attempts at solutions people on either side of the aisle use as their main talking points. I bring this up because just agreeing with people that there's problems isn't enough and just kinda leads to a weird circle-jerk of "everything is fucked, let's bitch about that for a while" while nobody can ever actually agree on solutions and this leads to a perpetual stalemate.

If people want to meet me somewhere in the middle on pragmatic solutions, then I will work with them.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

Randy said:


> You assume any of us are waiting for you to lecture us because we somehow self identify with either of your dismissive generalities.



if people were actually self aware enough to self identify the world would be fixed already.


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## jaxadam (Aug 10, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> Not even a question. Only a matter of time until he has a whole bank with his name on it. You don’t think he’d want to IPO a cryptocurrency and pay people in Amazon magic-bux? The conversion rate to stanley nickels is amazing.



You think when he goes in on Friday night and asks for “the usual” they say big bills or small?


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> The problem is that they claim they want to "tax the rich," give the real rich people a tax break, and saddling the middle class with more burden. Frankly, more money for them to mismanage is almost always a NO from me.



That's a pretty harsh criticism of people. Just curious, do you like the trickle down economics approach by any chance?

Because from where my perspective is, a bottom up approach would do more to benefit both the working class and by proxy, corporations due to people being able to buy random shit that allows companies to get a profit margin while also improving living standards of people in lower and middle classes.

Assuming by your logic people are dumb morons that mismanage money (I have higher opinion of people than that, but I guess I'll go by the nihilistic/misanthropic framework you've set up here), what do you propose to fix that problem?


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> if people were actually self aware enough to self identify the world would be fixed already.



Okay, so how much actual cash does Bezos have access to that somehow makes him incredibly relatable?


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 10, 2020)

Randy said:


> Okay, so how much actual cash does Bezos have access to that somehow makes him incredibly relatable?



I'd say he has 10 billion max. 
But after about 150 million it's all the same form a life style perspective.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

Randy said:


> Okay, so how much actual cash does Bezos have access to that somehow makes him incredibly relatable?



I find people that act like temporarily-embarrassed billionaires to be the most amusing thing ever to witness. Tbf, it's definitely been a US pastime for decades, if not centuries. People will defend the ultra-wealthy because they think that their big billion dollar check is coming in the mail soon™.

Edit: I should add that I get where people will see me come out of nowhere (I've been gone from these forums for a while) and start kinda coming off as a smarmy dick. I wanna point out that I'm not attacking people personally, just their ideas/positions because I think they're very bad and/or have been debunked by people smarter than me.


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I'd say he has 10 billion max.
> But after about 150 million it's all the same form a life style perspective.



Ah right, okay. So $10b isn't ultrawealthy, Scrooge McDuck money, gotcha. Thanks for setting things straight.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 10, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> I find people that act like temporarily-embarrassed billionaires to be the most amusing thing ever to witness. Tbf, it's definitely been a US pastime for decades, if not centuries. People will defend the ultra-wealthy because they think that their big billion dollar check is coming in the mail soon™.



Ha! I said the same thing on page 1. It is 100% true. So many people believe they are above the crowd and just haven’t hit their stride or whatever metaphor you want there. They believe their normal life is temporary.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> Ha! I said the same thing on page 1. It is 100% true. So many people believe they are above the crowd and just haven’t hit their stride or whatever metaphor you want there. They believe their normal life is temporary.



It comes from the old protestant "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" work ethic. Said mentality absolutely crumbles when you see a single mom holding two or more jobs while trying to raise the kids and juggling god knows what else at the same time. People like that have run out of bootstraps to pull themselves up by, but somehow still get lectured to about how they need to work even harder to obtain "the good life". It's super cringe, and completely detached from reality.


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## Randy (Aug 10, 2020)

It's the Joe the Plumber paradox. Agitate against policies that help you now because one day you might go from working for a business to owning the business. But other than the fact that day will likely never come, there's also the fact having no help to get there (social safety nets) ensures that it stays out of reach.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 10, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> Ha! I said the same thing on page 1. It is 100% true. So many people believe they are above the crowd and just haven’t hit their stride or whatever metaphor you want there. They believe their normal life is temporary.



Also, sry for the double post, but I did want you to see this. I went back and read your response on the first page. Mad props for your proposed solutions because I 100% back those. Thanks to a lot of passed legislation around the FDR days we had laws that did a lot of that and for decades we saw a hell of a big dip in wealth inequality. However, slowly but sure, all that shit started getting overturned and deregulated (largely by congresspeople on the right). All that massive deregulation lead to the 2008 economic oopsie that cost a LOT of people their jobs.

And proof that we haven't learned our lesson since then, take a wild look at the deregulation of industries under the Trump administration. Between that and Covid-19, we're overdue for another (if not worse) economic oopsie. Actually, we technically had that already recently. IIRC, we had a 33% dip in GDP, which was about twice that of the Great Depression and about 12% more than in 2008's oopsie. Really weird that MSM hasn't been harping on that more. I can only assume that's because of Trump's prodigial ability to gish-gallop from one blunder to the next, keeping people distracted from more serious shit going on.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 11, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> Ha! I said the same thing on page 1. It is 100% true. So many people believe they are above the crowd and just haven’t hit their stride or whatever metaphor you want there. They believe their normal life is temporary.



I mean don't conflate defending billionaires with saying billionaires aren't the problem.

There are very few multi-billionaires that got there from actual salaried cash.

Musk is kind of an edge case but most of of the highest paid executive positions are at 50 to 100 million a year. Which means it would take 10 years to generate 1 billion dollars of individual income.

Now, most of these salaries are structured to deliberately avoid taxes. That's a problem sure but that's also fixable.

The majority of the richest people are rich because they have significant stock ownership in super large corporations.

Amazon is worth over a trillion dollars right now. Bezos owns a little over ten percent of amazon which makes his worth over a hundred billion.

Does that mean amazon is hoarding a trillion dollars. nope.

Amazon's never even seen a trillion dollars at one time. The valuation is based on a whole bunch of people deciding that's what it should be traded it. 

On top of that 40 percent of amazon is owned by mutual funds, retirement plans, and individual investors. 

Does that mean that Bezos is hoarding a 180 billion dollars. no. He would never be able to liquidate that much at one time without severely impacting the valuation.

Blaming billionaires doesn't get you anywhere. Understanding all the different parts that contribute to that net worth and implementing policy that effects those components is what we need to do.

Tax the shit out of the them. Tax the crap out of corporations too. There's still a lot of other things to fix.

so many sound bites of oh if we only taxed some of the 180 billion we could feed all these people or give people money. That's not how this works. That money doesn't exist.


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## Randy (Aug 11, 2020)

Eh, sort of. A lot of people targeting billionaires support taxing transactions. In a sense that *would be* a tax on this sum of money that doesn't physically exist somewhere as cash.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 11, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I mean don't conflate defending billionaires with saying billionaires aren't the problem.
> 
> There are very few multi-billionaires that got there from actual salaried cash.
> 
> ...




I think you're really missing out on a lot of what's being said if you think that's the ONLY thing people want. There's a hell of a lot more that can be done and anyone with an IQ higher than freezer temperature can recognize that. The point is that there are places like raising the tax rate on the ultra-wealthy to start out and work from there. Or hell, a better and more immediate fix would be to bring back anti-trust laws and other shit that republicans gutted and deregulated the hell out of. That would probably do even more than taxing/eating the rich, but I'm for both.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 11, 2020)

Randy said:


> Eh, sort of. A lot of people targeting billionaires support taxing transactions. In a sense that *would be* a tax on this sum of money that doesn't physically exist somewhere as cash.



they'd have to realize the gains first. then tax it. that's fine. So we force him to sell shares?


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## Randy (Aug 11, 2020)

@tacotiklah The irony of the US wanting to ban TikTok and force a sale to Microsoft, after they forced Microsoft to split in half 20 years ago isn't lost on me. There's a number of obscene telecom mergers being allowed to go on that would've never happened in previous decades.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 11, 2020)

Randy said:


> @tacotiklah The irony of the US wanting to ban TikTok and force a sale to Microsoft, after they forced Microsoft to split in half 20 years ago isn't lost on me. There's a number of obscene telecom mergers being allowed to go on that would've never happened in previous decades.




twitter might buy it. the resulting app would just be the antichrist.


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## narad (Aug 11, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> twitter might buy it. the resulting app would just be the antichrist.



I wouldn't mind seeing Trump threaten to nuke North Korea in the form of song to the melody of "Rocket Man"?"


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 11, 2020)

Randy said:


> @tacotiklah The irony of the US wanting to ban TikTok and force a sale to Microsoft, after they forced Microsoft to split in half 20 years ago isn't lost on me. There's a number of obscene telecom mergers being allowed to go on that would've never happened in previous decades.


Fuck Microsoft. Tired of their near monopoly. I'm not super pro Apple, but I prefer Mac over Windows. I'd much rather just have Linux on my devices, though. I don't see Microsoft keeping any data safe on TikTok or elsewhere. Even if they don't outright hand it over, it'll be hacked and leaked.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 11, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> twitter might buy it. the resulting app would just be the antichrist.


"TwitTok" can fuck off.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 11, 2020)

Randy said:


> @tacotiklah The irony of the US wanting to ban TikTok and force a sale to Microsoft, after they forced Microsoft to split in half 20 years ago isn't lost on me. There's a number of obscene telecom mergers being allowed to go on that would've never happened in previous decades.


And by the way, the idea that a dickhead like Gates, who chastised a community that was mostly open source, will ethically run medical practices (testing, administering, etc.) is absolute lunacy. He can have my dose of his vaccine.


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## fantom (Aug 11, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> I'd much rather just have Linux on my devices, though





Spaced Out Ace said:


> the idea that a dickhead like Gates, who chastised a community that was mostly open source


Linus Torvalds dick-o-meter is off the charts next to Bill Gates. And I'm pretty sure he chastised the open source community far worse than Gates ever has.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 11, 2020)

fantom said:


> Linus Torvalds dick-o-meter is off the charts next to Bill Gates. And I'm pretty sure he chastised the open source community far worse than Gates ever has.


And the Linux community said, "yeah, that's cute, Linus, but fuck you." 

My teacher/advisor in college would pronounce "linux" pretty weirdly compared to everyone else. I eventually asked why (though I don't think many others bothered), and apparently it was based on how Linus Torvald pronounced his name. Only to later find out that Linus has to further correct people that it isn't "Lye-nus" or "leenus," or some shit like that. I told him, "if I ever meet him, I'm going to tell LYE-nus to shut the hell up." He got a laugh out of that.

And Gates' dick-o-meter far surpasses his opinions on the open source community.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 11, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> And the Linux community said, "yeah, that's cute, Linus, but fuck you."
> 
> My teacher/advisor in college would pronounce "linux" pretty weirdly compared to everyone else. I eventually asked why (though I don't think many others bothered), and apparently it was based on how Linus Torvald pronounced his name. Only to later find out that Linus has to further correct people that it isn't "Lye-nus" or "leenus," or some shit like that. I told him, "if I ever meet him, I'm going to tell LYE-nus to shut the hell up." He got a laugh out of that.
> 
> And Gates' dick-o-meter far surpasses his opinions on the open source community.



it's clearly pronounced like the peanuts character.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 11, 2020)

Mostly related to the topic via the worship of meritocracy, youtuber Vaush does a damn good takedown of it via shitting on Tim Poole (alt-right dude that lies and claims to be a lefty) and Tim's claim that because he's a millionaire, anyone can be. Worth listening to:


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## Drew (Aug 11, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> I just don't get the white knighting of the super rich.


Not being above tilting at a few windmills on my lunch break, I'll take the bait.  I think it's a question of misplaced priorities.

I have no problems at all with the "super rich." Ignoring for the sake of discussion the problem of defining "rich" vs "super rich," I don't think there's anything inherently evil with having a ton of money, be that one million, one billion, or one trillion dollars.

I have a HUGE problem with anyone in America being unable to put a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs, and food on their table. I think we as a country need to take aggressive policy steps to address these problems and ensure that all Americans, and residents of America, have access to at least the bare necessities to live an acceptable life. No one should go hungry, no one should be exposed to the elements, no one should be denied healthcare - you know, the basics.

I think a problem that the American left has, speaking as an American liberal, is that oftentimes we confuse the first with the second. Poverty SHOULD be eradicated. If "ultra-wealth" has to be eradicated to get that done, then so be it. But, eradicating "ultra wealth" isn't necessarily a _necessary precondition_ of eradicating poverty, yet pretty consistently the left - and especially the progressive left - makes eradicating "ultra wealth" an end unto itself, not a means. Handy example:



tacotiklah said:


> My take is that once you get a billion dollars, you should get an award that says "You won at capitalism" and everything after that is evenly distributed to people who actually are in need. Eat the rich.


Why? Do we NEED to do this to eradicate poverty? Would just broadening the tax base and raising the currently-low levels of progressive taxation while simplifying the process and elininating a lot of deductions that are out of reach of the poor (for example, I think it's ludicrous I can deduct my mortgage interest, but my neighbor can't deduct her rent) somehow _demonstratably_ not be enough to address poverty in America? Or maybe slightly curtail military spending or, god forbid, our bloated police budgets? None of these are any less realistic solutions than seizing any dollar over the first billion, before you try telling me this is just a pipe dream. Listening to a lot of the left talk about income inequality, you could come away with the impression that eradicating wealth is the policy goal, not eradicating poverty. That, to me, is a problem.

I'm saying this not out of any self-interest - I do well enough but I'm hardly "rich" - or any belief I'm a temporarily inconvenienced billionaire, or out of any particular sympathy or sycophantic attraction to the "ultra rich." I just think we as liberals and as progressives spend WAY to much time attacking wealth, when we should be attacking poverty, and I think missing the distinction here makes it a lot easier to caricatures progressive politics on the right as mere forced redistribution that's bad for the country, rather than a desire to ensure the basic survival of all Americans, which is something that's undeniably _good_ for the country. You're never going to convince a moderate that wealth is bad, but you probably CAN convince them poverty is bad, and that's where our focus really needs to be.

If at the end of the day after increasing and fixing our tax code we've ended homelessness and hunger and we've instituted universal access to health care, and every working American is earning a living wage, and we _still_ have billionaires, I mean, you'd have to be crazy to call that a policy failure, is my take. And yet, most of the progressive left's rhetoric is that we START by eliminating billionaires. I think we've got that backwards.


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## Ordacleaphobia (Aug 11, 2020)

Drew said:


> I have no problems at all with the "super rich." Ignoring for the sake of discussion the problem of defining "rich" vs "super rich," I don't think there's anything inherently evil with having a ton of money, be that one million, one billion, or one trillion dollars.


I think it's a classic correlation =/= causation situation. If you ask me, the reason why most people instinctively lash out against the "super rich" is because it's very, very difficult to find someone in that tier that didn't get there without taking advantage of people in some way. The closest I can come up with off the top of my head is Warren Buffet and others that made their fortune trading. But if you take the thread's namesake as an example, Bezos is a pretty ruthless businessman and doesn't have an issue with underpaying employees and throwing his weight around to get what he wants.

He's an easy target because he's the rich guys' rich guy, but better targets would be the folks on the board of all of our various megacorporations that are all ridiculously wealthy yet insist on paying their employees the minimum amount that they possibly can without getting sent to court, in terrible working conditions, inconsistent, inadequate hours, with no benefits, time off, or upward mobility. Sure- most of these are entry level jobs, and those people made an agreement to work this job with these terms for this pay, but folks are increasingly running out of alternative options BECAUSE these titanic corporations have such a stranglehold on the economy. These people are _*absolutely*_ taking advantage of and exploiting MILLIONS of Americans, and I'd say that is certainly not banking them any positive karma. Technically, legally, their behavior is perfectly a-ok, but there's a reason most people judge rich guys.

I harp on it all the time, but I work in payroll and thus see salaries all the way up and all the way down, and it is absolutely disgusting how many people will cut themselves biweekly checks for 5 figures while paying their 6 staff $0.50 above minimum wage. It's difficult to reward ambition and risk-taking without incentivizing this kind of behavior. They went to medical school, they risked their livelihood to chase an idea, they were cunning enough to see where the market was headed- I get it, these are very efficient and diligent people, and they _DO_ deserve a handsome reward for their efforts. I just with that, you know, instead of paying themselves $25,000 every two weeks they trimmed that down to a paltry $20,000 and paid their employees a living wage.

So I guess not all rich people are dicks. But it's really, really easy to make that assumption; and no, you can't hold some legally liable for 'being an asshole.'


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## Drew (Aug 11, 2020)

Ordacleaphobia said:


> So I guess not all rich people are dicks. But it's really, really easy to make that assumption; and no, you can't hold some legally liable for 'being an asshole.'


But that's kind of what I'm getting at - again, speaking as a liberal, if you listen to the left talk about taxation, you'd think the problem we were trying to sove was the existence of billionaires. It's not - it's the existence of people living below the poverty line, working multible jobs that combined don't tally to a living wage. And if you're focused on the wrong problem, then you're not going to be able to solve it. 

I'm saying this more in the spirit of devil's advocacy than as any sort of a defense of the "ultra rich" and I hope it doesn't come across as them - if anything, I'm pretty agnostic. I don't care one way or another how much money someone at the top of the income spectrum has, as long as at the bottom no one is forced to choose between paying their rent and eating dinner this week.


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## Ordacleaphobia (Aug 11, 2020)

Drew said:


> But that's kind of what I'm getting at - again, speaking as a liberal, if you listen to the left talk about taxation, you'd think the problem we were trying to sove was the existence of billionaires. It's not - it's the existence of people living below the poverty line, working multible jobs that combined don't tally to a living wage. And if you're focused on the wrong problem, then you're not going to be able to solve it.
> 
> I'm saying this more in the spirit of devil's advocacy than as any sort of a defense of the "ultra rich" and I hope it doesn't come across as them - if anything, I'm pretty agnostic. I don't care one way or another how much money someone at the top of the income spectrum has, as long as at the bottom no one is forced to choose between paying their rent and eating dinner this week.



I know, I'm agreeing with you. Those are just my thoughts on why 'anti-rich' verbiage seems to be more prevalent than 'anti-poor'. If someone attributes poverty to the behavior of the extremely wealthy (which in and of itself is an understandable perspective), its easy to think "well if we didn't have any of them, they wouldn't be creating poverty," thus sending you off in the wrong direction. BECAUSE you can't legislate 'not being an asshole,' your only viable option is to build a framework to prevent people with resources from being able to exploit said resources, which would be a great way to work the 'anti-poor' problem.


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## Randy (Aug 11, 2020)

Drew said:


> But, eradicating "ultra wealth" isn't necessarily a _necessary precondition_ of eradicating poverty, yet pretty consistently the left - and especially the progressive left - makes eradicating "ultra wealth" an end unto itself, not a means.



Beep beep, backing the truck up here for a second.

I don't think the left attack ultra-wealthy (it doesn't need quotes BTW, I think billions of dollars is objectively wealthy beyond the general status of wealthy) as an end point. Think of it like talking to other people on a guitar forum, you enter assuming you have some common understanding or experience prior to the discussion you're having, so you don't start every conversation by explaining what a chords are or what pickups are or something. The only reason ultra-wealthy come up so early in the conversation is that there's some consensus that ultra-wealth IS an indicator of an unfair society.

We're in a new golden age of mega companies. Amazon skated by on 20 years of basically just saying brick and mortar retail is dead/outdated and they're only as big as they are because they're more saavy than the old guard. At this point, how much of the actual retail industry and discretionary spending of the American economy as a whole that Amazon controls would have gotten them broken up at any other time in history.

A billionaire, or billionaire hundreds of times over again, doesn't happen within a vacuum.

If Jeff Bezo's income was not related to the proverty in the US, then the spinoff industries/jobs would be doing well. Production, shipping, servicing, etc. and the jobs that come with it. Yet the people who buy from Bezos and work for him and the spin-off industries all bounce along the poverty line while his value skyrockets. The two things are not unrelated.


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## jaxadam (Aug 11, 2020)

I think Amazon should give everyone a $600 credit every month.


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## Randy (Aug 11, 2020)

Back when the US broke up Microsoft, the whole argument revolved around the fact they could use their size to either buy out competiton or put them out of business, or both. Now in the 2010s - 2020, it's evolved into "well, Amazon is only doing as well as they are because nobody is big enough to compete", like those are two disparate things.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 11, 2020)

Randy said:


> Back when the US broke up Microsoft, the whole argument revolved around the fact they could use their size to either buy out competiton or put them out of business, or both. Now in the 2010s - 2020, it's evolved into "well, Amazon is only doing as well as they are because nobody is big enough to compete", like those are two disparate things.



There was a fundamental shift in the way we viewed the danger of anti trust and monopolies in the new millennium. We went from the traditional stand point to one where “if it is good for the customer it is good for the country.” Congress has fully stated that as long as prices stay low and and we don’t have some type of “kill competition, raise prices” agenda, they will allow monopolies to take all market share. I do not agree with this at all because this ideology has allowed Amazon, Facebook, Google to become so ubiquitous in their market space that they are too big to fail, too big to rival, to big for the government to reign back in. Just like Chinese junk products and Walmart, we allow a low price to sucker us into selling out our communities.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 11, 2020)

@Drew
Well my ultimate aim is the total abolition of all hierarchies, and this includes the removal of the bourgeoisie class. But that's more of a "way down the line, probably after I'm long dead" goal, so in the meantime I'm willing to start by moving policy more left and doing what I can to make things equitable. From that framework other leftists from future generations can take and run with that.

As far as attacking wealth over poverty, I guess it comes down to ideological differences. From my perspective, wealth is largely accumulated from the exploitation of the working class under a capitalist system. Hyper-exploitation of the working class while removing even basic social safety nets and the busting/breaking up of collective bargaining leads to serious outbreaks of poverty due workers being severely underpaid and with no recourse to address that. One predictable outcome of poverty is a rise in crime as people turn to illegal means to feed themselves.
Starting with poverty and trying to push your way up from that seems to me like trying to fight against the current of a fast moving river. I mean, other leftists are probably more forceful than I am in pushing for the abolition of the current working system in favor of things like co-opts. But given how much push-back that gets from even liberals, I'm willing to just start with strengthening unions and pushing for worker's rights.

I mean, ffs, watch a training video for new Amazon workers. It's anti-union/union-busting 101. You're encouraged to narc on anyone that even hints at unionization, and those people suddenly find themselves out of a job.

Edit: As far as talking to moderates and making a convincing case, well it all comes down into presentation. Everybody and their mother has worked a shit job that has fucked them over on pay and/or forced them to work through things like Christmas or funerals under threat of termination. You don't start with "get the guillotine", you start with "wouldn't you like to be able to advocate for better pay and better working conditions at your job and without threat of retaliation for doing so?"


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 11, 2020)

Yeah, only under a capitalist system are workers exploited. What a take.


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## vilk (Aug 11, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Yeah, only under a capitalist system are workers exploited. What a take.


Did someone say that? I don't see it....

You wouldn't be making logically fallacious arguments on purpose, would you? It's just an accident? Because you sure do it a lot...


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## fantom (Aug 12, 2020)

Ordacleaphobia said:


> I think it's a classic correlation =/= causation situation. If you ask me, the reason why most people instinctively lash out against the "super rich" is because it's very, very difficult to find someone in that tier that didn't get there without taking advantage of people in some way. The closest I can come up with off the top of my head is Warren Buffet and others that made their fortune trading. But if you take the thread's namesake as an example, Bezos is a pretty ruthless businessman and doesn't have an issue with underpaying employees and throwing his weight around to get what he wants.
> 
> He's an easy target because he's the rich guys' rich guy, but better targets would be the folks on the board of all of our various megacorporations that are all ridiculously wealthy yet insist on paying their employees the minimum amount that they possibly can without getting sent to court, in terrible working conditions, inconsistent, inadequate hours, with no benefits, time off, or upward mobility. Sure- most of these are entry level jobs, and those people made an agreement to work this job with these terms for this pay, but folks are increasingly running out of alternative options BECAUSE these titanic corporations have such a stranglehold on the economy. These people are _*absolutely*_ taking advantage of and exploiting MILLIONS of Americans, and I'd say that is certainly not banking them any positive karma. Technically, legally, their behavior is perfectly a-ok, but there's a reason most people judge rich guys.
> 
> ...



I fail to see how investments are any different than being a CEO or board member for the sake of the wealth discussion. They are coupled together. An investor gives money to a company that is willing to, as you describe, screw over employees for profit. In return the investor gets a more lucrative ROI. If the company were to put employees first, the earnings wouldn't look as attractive and drive up valuation.

Just as an example since you brought up Berkshire Hathaway, the dude has like 10% of its portfolio in Apple and maybe another 2% in Amazon. Pretty much all the companies in the portfolio are profiteering in some way over low wages.


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## Hollowway (Aug 12, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> can we just make it really super clear that bezos does not have 170 billion dollars of money.
> 
> please pleas eplease



You keep bringing up this point, but he most certainly does have $170 billion dollars. It’s invested, of course. And no, he can’t liquidate it all at one time (though I’m not sure why he would ever want to). But it’s most certainly all his. You don’t measure net worth based on liquid cash. If you did that no one would be worth more than a few million dollars, because no one in their right mind is going to have that sitting, uninvested, in a savings account. If I own a million dollar house and have $5000 in the bank, my net worth is not just $5000. Yet, it’s going to take me a lot longer to sell my house - and I’d have to sell the whole thing - than it would take Bezos to cash out a few billion. Even if I had money in a CD, I can’t get to it for years. If I had my money in a retirement account, I can’t get into it until I’m older. But in all those situations, it’s still mine. And if someone was ludicrous enough to put $100 million in their bank account, they likely couldn’t get that all at once anyway, because banks only need to have 3% to 10% in reserve. 
Secondly, he doesn’t even need to have the amazon shares converted to cash to use the money. He can trade, donate, or otherwise move the shares to someone else. No conversion to cash is even needed. So it’s disingenuous to say that he doesn’t have that money, simply because it’s invested in a company stock. In a stock his money is way more liquid than it is for people who have their net worth toed up in assets like houses, businesses, retirement accounts, or property. His is about as liquid as you can reasonably get with that amount of net worth. Whether you think it’s ok or not for an individual to have that worth is something that can be debated, but you cannot say that he doesn’t have $170 million dollars. That’s just semantics.


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## possumkiller (Aug 12, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> You keep bringing up this point, but he most certainly does have $170 billion dollars. It’s invested, of course. And no, he can’t liquidate it all at one time (though I’m not sure why he would ever want to). But it’s most certainly all his. You don’t measure net worth based on liquid cash. If you did that no one would be worth more than a few million dollars, because no one in their right mind is going to have that sitting, uninvested, in a savings account. If I own a million dollar house and have $5000 in the bank, my net worth is not just $5000. Yet, it’s going to take me a lot longer to sell my house - and I’d have to sell the whole thing - than it would take Bezos to cash out a few billion. Even if I had money in a CD, I can’t get to it for years. If I had my money in a retirement account, I can’t get into it until I’m older. But in all those situations, it’s still mine. And if someone was ludicrous enough to put $100 million in their bank account, they likely couldn’t get that all at once anyway, because banks only need to have 3% to 10% in reserve.
> Secondly, he doesn’t even need to have the amazon shares converted to cash to use the money. He can trade, donate, or otherwise move the shares to someone else. No conversion to cash is even needed. So it’s disingenuous to say that he doesn’t have that money, simply because it’s invested in a company stock. In a stock his money is way more liquid than it is for people who have their net worth toed up in assets like houses, businesses, retirement accounts, or property. His is about as liquid as you can reasonably get with that amount of net worth. Whether you think it’s ok or not for an individual to have that worth is something that can be debated, but you cannot say that he doesn’t have $170 million dollars. That’s just semantics.


I thought it was 170 billion though?


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## _MonSTeR_ (Aug 12, 2020)

He’s doing ok for a chap with a website that sells books!


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## narad (Aug 12, 2020)

_MonSTeR_ said:


> He’s doing ok for a chap with a website that sells books!



Yea, and not even selling any young abducted girls like that furniture company.


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## iamaom (Aug 12, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> You don't start with "get the guillotine", you start with "wouldn't you like to be able to advocate for better pay and better working conditions at your job and without threat of retaliation for doing so?"


If your not familiar with it, look up the "protestant work ethic". I've tried this pathway with many people and it often doesn't work; there are a lot of Americans who think that teens working a shitty abusive job is just part of growing up, and if you can't find a way out of that job (regardless of circumstances like poor education) then you're lazy and deserve a shitty life.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 12, 2020)

iamaom said:


> If your not familiar with it, look up the "protestant work ethic". I've tried this pathway with many people and it often doesn't work; there are a lot of Americans who think that teens working a shitty abusive job is just part of growing up, and if you can't find a way out of that job (regardless of circumstances like poor education) then you're lazy and deserve a shitty life.



Oh I'm very familiar with it. And yes, it's a problem that people tend to struggle with. But if you can't get people to move towards very small steps like strengthening collective bargaining, then there's just no way in hell you'll ever get them onboard with actual socialist ideas. I feel like empowering workers is the very base baby step towards getting anybody to being open to critically re-thinking what they know about socialism and what it means.


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## Ordacleaphobia (Aug 12, 2020)

fantom said:


> I fail to see how investments are any different than being a CEO or board member for the sake of the wealth discussion. They are coupled together. An investor gives money to a company that is willing to, as you describe, screw over employees for profit. In return the investor gets a more lucrative ROI. If the company were to put employees first, the earnings wouldn't look as attractive and drive up valuation.
> 
> Just as an example since you brought up Berkshire Hathaway, the dude has like 10% of its portfolio in Apple and maybe another 2% in Amazon. Pretty much all the companies in the portfolio are profiteering in some way over low wages.



That's a very slippery slope, because if we're going with that line of reasoning, you're just as guilty as all of them are because you purchase products and services from these companies that are actively exploiting people - directly supporting them. And don't even tell me that you don't, because there's no way around it; which is the crux of the whole argument. Guilt by association is a terrible, terrible trend in modern society and I really wish it would stop being normalized. If the ticket to good boy heaven is to be completely unassociated with industry supertitans, none of us are getting there. 

I certainly see what you're getting at though; definitely lends some credence to the "they're everywhere, you can't escape it" point.



iamaom said:


> If your not familiar with it, look up the "protestant work ethic". I've tried this pathway with many people and it often doesn't work; *there are a lot of Americans who think that teens working a shitty abusive job is just part of growing up*, and if you can't find a way out of that job (regardless of circumstances like poor education) then you're lazy and deserve a shitty life.



That's me! 
I know I personally didn't understand the value of meaningful employment until I found myself stuck at a super shitty dead-end job, and it's pretty easy to tell who among your coworkers did their time in the fast food / retail gulag without ever asking them. The second part of that statement is the key though, and that's the hard thing to convey....yes, awful dead-end nothing jobs have a place, yes, they should exist because again, yes, they do serve an extremely important purpose; the issue is that currently, right now, those positions act almost like a trap. Once you're in, it's EXTREMELY difficult to get out.


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## tedtan (Aug 12, 2020)

Hollowway said:


> You keep bringing up this point, but he most certainly does have $170 billion dollars.



I don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, but I think the point is that stock ownership isn't taxable; it only becomes taxable when a capital gain is realized, and even then, the tax rates on capital gains are significantly lower than the tax rates on income.

So he owns $170B of something, but it is not income (income tax), being used to purchase items (sales tax), purchase property (property tax), etc. It may increase or decrease in value for Bezos, but it is not contributing to society as a whole.


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## Drew (Aug 12, 2020)

Randy said:


> Beep beep, backing the truck up here for a second.
> 
> I don't think the left attack ultra-wealthy (it doesn't need quotes BTW, I think billions of dollars is objectively wealthy beyond the general status of wealthy) as an end point. Think of it like talking to other people on a guitar forum, you enter assuming you have some common understanding or experience prior to the discussion you're having, so you don't start every conversation by explaining what a chords are or what pickups are or something. The only reason ultra-wealthy come up so early in the conversation is that there's some consensus that ultra-wealth IS an indicator of an unfair society.
> 
> ...


To be fair, there's a WIDE range of critiques of socioeconomic inequality in America, and as far as the folks around here, I think yours is one of the more nuanced and sophisticated takes. I'm not saying YOU personally are saying we need to tackle the problem of ultrarich people, rather than tackle the problem of poverty... but there are other posters in this thread who are unironically saying we should just do away with rich people. That, I think, is a problem. 

Zero argument that a little more anti-trust litigation would go a long way here, though I think Jeff Bezos would still be a very, very, very rich man even if we had forced Amazon to divest their cloud business, for example.


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## Randy (Aug 12, 2020)

Drew said:


> To be fair, there's a WIDE range of critiques of socioeconomic inequality in America, and as far as the folks around here, I think yours is one of the more nuanced and sophisticated takes. I'm not saying YOU personally are saying we need to tackle the problem of ultrarich people, rather than tackle the problem of poverty... but there are other posters in this thread who are unironically saying we should just do away with rich people. That, I think, is a problem.
> 
> Zero argument that a little more anti-trust litigation would go a long way here, though I think Jeff Bezos would still be a very, very, very rich man even if we had forced Amazon to divest their cloud business, for example.



I'm not spiteful enough to say he shouldn't be. You build a better mouse trap, you sell more, you make more money.

That's a world apart from an operation like Amazon that distributes literally everything a person consumes (hard goods, food, television, music, even web services) and leaves no oxygen for anyone else. Microsoft had an antitrust lawsuit against them because you couldn't fuckin uninstall Internet Explorer ffs, and meanwhile there are millions of people who couldn't get toilet paper or peanut butter during a pandemic without paying Amazon's excessive rates. And shades of that dynamic existed and continue to exist without COVID.

The idea of a guy that gets mega rich because people need stuff and he's the only place most people can get that stuff is like, Jay Gould shit. I think I'd have less trouble with Bezos being a billionaire because he makes porn movies or throws a football than I do with him making that money on peeling a piece off of literally everything people need to survive, especially people shopping on price or convenience out of necessity. Tenfold in the context of a pandemic.


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## tacotiklah (Aug 12, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Yeah, only under a capitalist system are workers exploited. What a take.



Under a tankie system, workers are 100% exploited and I've been pretty clear in that in my takes. Not all forms of socialism are equal, and it rustles my jimmies when people can't approach it with nuance.

A crass, but apt rhetorical/hypothetical at how workers under a capitalist system I've heard that gets at the heart of why things like ultra wealthy are the product of late-stage capitalism:

Say you were on a plane and the plane crashed. Everyone but you and one other person survived but everyone else died. You both end up on an tiny, uninhabited island with no indigenous wildlife and no source of food except a coconut tree. As a result of the crash, you were knocked unconscious. While you were unconscious, the other person went and gathered up every single coconut from that one tree. You wake up in pain and hungry. The other person says to you "I'll give you some of the coconuts, but you have to suck my dick for one."

Would you consider that a form of egregious exploitation of both resources as well as you?


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## Drew (Aug 12, 2020)

Randy said:


> I'm not spiteful enough to say he shouldn't be. You build a better mouse trap, you sell more, you make more money.
> 
> That's a world apart from an operation like Amazon that distributes literally everything a person consumes (hard goods, food, television, music, even web services) and leaves no oxygen for anyone else. Microsoft had an antitrust lawsuit against them because you couldn't fuckin uninstall Internet Explorer ffs, and meanwhile there are millions of people who couldn't get toilet paper or peanut butter during a pandemic without paying Amazon's excessive rates. And shades of that dynamic existed and continue to exist without COVID.
> 
> The idea of a guy that gets mega rich because people need stuff and he's the only place most people can get that stuff is like, Jay Gould shit. I think I'd have less trouble with Bezos being a billionaire because he makes porn movies or throws a football than I do with him making that money on peeling a piece off of literally everything people need to survive, especially people shopping on price or convenience out of necessity. Tenfold in the context of a pandemic.


I think how you regulate an internet business - where network effects matter MUCH more than they do in the brick and mortar world - is a thorny challenge that I haven't set seen a good solution to, and I'm not sure how we best handle that. Those network effects are what makes services like Amazon and Facebook useful in the first place, so you don't want to entirely restrict them, but it's tricky.

But, this is still well short of Microsoft forcing users to not uninstall IE. In the depth of the pandemic, if you didn't want to order toilet paper from Amazin, you could order it from Walmart, you could order it from Costco, you could order it from Target, you could order it from Shaws, etc. Amazon is the largest American e-commerce platform, but they're hardly the only e-commerce platform and they have a number of large competitors.

This is't a defense of Bezos personally, just an observation that he's nowhere near operating with a monopoly. His company has done well in a pandemic, but so too have a lot of his competitors.


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## Randy (Aug 12, 2020)

You're not wrong, the issue is that, just like the days of the robber barons, there's price fixing, collusion, etc that mean you either have a choice between four flavors of bad or no choice at all.

Getting back to the original discussion on this, okay, so you have your choice between four or five mega rich people/corporations to spend your money with on essential items, and that creates an entirely new class of wealth consolidation. That's entirely unrelated to the poverty that shoe horns people into spending their money with them?


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## Randy (Aug 12, 2020)

That battle with Uber over categorizing their drivers as 'employees' is actually a distillation of this.

The idea that either you're driving for Uber and enriching them but not entitled to employee-like benefits and protections, or you're driving Uber as a 'side gig' because the job market sucks so much that you need to take on a second or third job to tread water. Just like Apple and Amazon, these are companies that are seeing wealth previously unheard of in this country but they're confounded on how or why to pay their workers living wages. You have whole tranches of the American economy that were basically founded on the concept of operating within the margins and blindspots in the laws as they're written, and they've been allowed to consolidate wealth with this continued 'yeah but it's legal'-ism.

Again, Bezos et al's wealth isn't the disease, it's a symptom. But the consolidation of wealth then becomes so great that it DOES become the disease. This is, in a lot of ways, end stage outcomes of capitalism even when it works at it's best because 'competition drives down costs' means a race to the bottom on price, and ultimately a direct correlation with a race to the bottom on wages.

How can you pay someone living wage when you're selling burgers for a dollar or 72" 4K Smart-TVs for $150, or offering free 2-day shipping and exclusive premium TV/movie programs for $10/mo? Impossible! Prices will go through the roof! Except somehow those low prices leave enough meat on the bone for their ownership to make tens of billions of dollars a year.


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## jaxadam (Aug 12, 2020)

Randy said:


> 72" 4K Smart-TVs for $150



Boy I’d like to know about that deal because mine was almost $8k.


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## Randy (Aug 12, 2020)

Not that much of an exaggerations. I got a 65" 4K Smart TV at BJ's Wholesale two years ago for $250. Not the floor model either.


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## jaxadam (Aug 12, 2020)

Randy said:


> Not that much of an exaggerations. I got a 65" 4K Smart TV at BJ's Wholesale two years ago for $250. Not the floor model either.



Holy motherfuckin macaroni... I gotta stop shopping at the Best Buy Magnolia stores! Cost me almost $14k for two fucking TVs that only play Paw Patrol and Cops.


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## Hollowway (Aug 13, 2020)

tedtan said:


> I don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, but I think the point is that stock ownership isn't taxable; it only becomes taxable when a capital gain is realized, and even then, the tax rates on capital gains are significantly lower than the tax rates on income.
> 
> So he owns $170B of something, but it is not income (income tax), being used to purchase items (sales tax), purchase property (property tax), etc. It may increase or decrease in value for Bezos, but it is not contributing to society as a whole.



Ah, yeah, I didn’t realize that was the issue. That’s a good point. The average person with mutual funds or stocks is buying them AFTER taxes, but Bezos (or anyone else with options) doesn’t have to pay unless he sells them. That’s a really good point.


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## possumkiller (Aug 13, 2020)

Who the fuck even spends that kind of money on a TV? 

I don't get it. Trashy ass people living in a trailer dump getting food stamps with their kids running around the yard butt ass naked apart from some mud and a koolaid mustache, but they got a $70k lifted truck and a new mustang in the front yard and a TV that cost more than my car.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 13, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> Who the fuck even spends that kind of money on a TV?
> 
> I don't get it. Trashy ass people living in a trailer dump getting food stamps with their kids running around the yard butt ass naked apart from some mud and a koolaid mustache, but they got a $70k lifted truck and a new mustang in the front yard and a TV that cost more than my car.



Because they buy it on credit and when they default they hide the truck and car and they're not repo'n a TV.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 13, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> Who the fuck even spends that kind of money on a TV?
> 
> I don't get it. Trashy ass people living in a trailer dump getting food stamps with their kids running around the yard butt ass naked apart from some mud and a koolaid mustache, but they got a $70k lifted truck and a new mustang in the front yard and a TV that cost more than my car.



I dunno. tv's are dirt cheap now unless you really just want the newest oled with the highest resolution.

80 inch tv is like 400 bucks now.

Remember that a machine makes the screens and workers are just as exploited. so buy the biggest tv you can fit.


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## jaxadam (Aug 13, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> Who the fuck even spends that kind of money on a TV?
> 
> I don't get it. Trashy ass people living in a trailer dump getting food stamps with their kids running around the yard butt ass naked apart from some mud and a koolaid mustache, but they got a $70k lifted truck and a new mustang in the front yard and a TV that cost more than my car.



Hell yeah doggie. This is like literally my life, give or take a few things. Lifted truck, kids running around butt ass naked with some mud and popsicle shit all over them. No mustang, though.



MaxOfMetal said:


> Because they buy it on credit and when they default they hide the truck and car and they're not repo'n a TV.



Hell yeah doggie.


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## jaxadam (Aug 13, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I dunno. tv's are dirt cheap now unless you really just want the newest oled with the highest resolution.
> 
> 80 inch tv is like 400 bucks now



I got what I thought AT THE TIME was the latest and greatest from Sony which was the 940D at around $7k. Literally their flagship FALD (full array led display). Well, those assholes turn around and release the Z9D two months later at the CES in Europe for a little over $11k and at that point me and about 1000 other people on the AVS forums felt like we’d been had.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 13, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I got what I thought AT THE TIME was the latest and greatest from Sony which was the 940D at around $7k. Literally their flagship FALD (full array led display). Well, those assholes turn around and release the Z9D two months later at the CES in Europe for a little over $11k and at that point me and about 1000 other people on the AVS forums felt like we’d been had.



you're one of those people that care about the viewing experience.

I just need the biggest screen to paw patrol on to shut the kids up.


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## jaxadam (Aug 13, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> you're one of those people that care about the viewing experience.
> 
> I just need the biggest screen to paw patrol on to shut the kids up.



It's a 75" so it's not bad, but the 98" is $60k and I'm stupid but not that stupid. Honestly the only thing I watch on it is the Tennis Channel and the news. And Cops.


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## Ordacleaphobia (Aug 13, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> latest and greatest from Sony



Well there's your problem


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## StevenC (Aug 13, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> It's a 75" so it's not bad, but the 98" is $60k and I'm stupid but not that stupid. Honestly the only thing I watch on it is the Tennis Channel and the news. And Cops.


Man, I think 75" of 4k Tim Deegan is enough for me!


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## jaxadam (Aug 13, 2020)

StevenC said:


> Man, I think 75" of 4k Tim Deegan is enough for me!



UHD 3D bro. But two of the anchors are my neighbors, so sometimes I can’t tell if I’m watching TV or not.


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## fantom (Aug 13, 2020)

And related to this thread, Trump is considering cutting capital gains tax by 6% if re-elected. So people who made a ton of money that would have paid like 20% on millions (which would be 40% it salary), now can wait and cash out at 15%. This one is about as dumb as the death tax cut, but will be far more costly to the budget.


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## possumkiller (Aug 13, 2020)

Idk man. I just keep getting 90s black plastic box fishbowl screen TVs for nothing off Craigslist. Plays cartoons just fine. Is too heavy for the kid to push off the entertainment center. If I want to watch something in hd I'll look at it on the computer or my phone. If I want to watch something on a big screen I just go to the movies.


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## wankerness (Aug 13, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> If I want to watch something on a big screen I just go to the movies.



Where do you live that you can do that?


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## possumkiller (Aug 14, 2020)

wankerness said:


> Where do you live that you can do that?


Poland.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 14, 2020)

Here’s an excellent informative doc about Besos.



Btw Eat the Rich! Or guillotines... 

(whichever comes first) 

Absolutely not one or the other, but the historical precedent of this bloated pig necessitates such long overdue comprise for this delicious sort of binary duality!

All or nothing! All for one and one for all!


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 15, 2020)

In regards to Bezos' wealth as a stark contrast to American/Worldwide suffering via Pandemic or in general cases poverty in normal times is a weird notion in the first place. Pretending that it's not directly the government allowing these mega corporations to operate on low or tax free assumptions shows how short sighted some people are in their criticisms of capitalism in the first place. The goal not even 5 years ago was to lobby for 15 an hour for workers as a minimum wage because that is a solid number for employees to be able to at the VERY least come home with enough to live without working several jobs.

Amazon is nearing the million employee count, with the next and only other company being Walmart with 2mil+ employees. There is absolutely more to it than I am laying down, but considering the amount in taxes being paid through income tax on employees alone with their much higher starting wage, where is the line?

How much do employees need to make with benefits in proportion to Bezos' wage?
Should it remain the same if they do end up being made to pay Corporate Tax?
Will doing either of these be enough, or is both the only path to correcting the course?

Hilariously enough, through sheer laziness and with an influx of wealth to correct poverty and balance things, Bezos' net worth doubling or tripling isn't an impossibility. People spend money and support Amazon because they believe they offer some sort of convenience in a world where pretending to stand for worker's rights while expecting their packages in 2 days. The amount of crossover in people who then call up Amazon and demand a refund for a shipment being late and have these altruistic viewpoints is guarunteed to be high.

I think it's ridiculous to think that Amazon has some sort of unstoppable monopoly in the market for essentials. The toilet paper/purell shortage was cut off *by Amazon *due to how predatory it was to sell those products at several hundred times it's original cost, and for the most part the listings were made by 3rd party sellers in the first place. Condemning Amazon for supporting a "monopoly of essentials" when very little of it had anything to do with them is kind of ridiculous. Being a retailer that sells a variety of items including essentials is a flooded floorspace pretty much just Albertson's and K-Mart dropping off the map for not being competitive enough with other big names.

While I can't speak for rural America, which may have very limited resources in terms of an in-person retail experience. Amazon still primarily operates online, which every other major retailer also does while still holding thousands of locations across the US to represent their business. People pretend that waiting 3 extra days for shipments is some excruciating existence, when that benefit has been reduced due to majority 3rd party presence on the market in the first place. We were getting 2 day shipping on first party products by reputable sellers years ago, nowadays your searches are flooded with dropshipped crap rebranded as a different product by budding tik tok entrepreneurs.

Even for name brand shit, I was looking for some QParts guitar knobs way back when. Selection is garbage, none of them offer the revered prime shipping, and none of the available options are the type that I need for my guitar.







Bought it straight from the Manufacturer for far less money even paying a $6 shipping charge to get exactly what I wanted.

The Amazon monopoly is bred by the sheer laziness of it's consumers who pay annually for a benefit on future purchases. I think most subscriptions are shit in the first place, but if anyone will defend their Prime Subscription by saying that their video service or anything else that's "included" makes it worth it is delusional.

Amazon offers no value other than forcing competitors to offer free shipping in a similar fashion to Amazon's non membership "free" shipping ($35 and up).


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 15, 2020)

USPS needs to tell Amazon to take a hike with regards to their "free 2 day Prime shipping."


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## StevenC (Aug 15, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> USPS needs to tell Amazon to take a hike with regards to their "free 2 day Prime shipping."


Why?


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## Randy (Aug 15, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> In regards to Bezos' wealth as a stark contrast to American/Worldwide suffering via Pandemic or in general cases poverty in normal times is a weird notion in the first place. Pretending that it's not directly the government allowing these mega corporations to operate on low or tax free assumptions shows how short sighted some people are in their criticisms of capitalism in the first place. The goal not even 5 years ago was to lobby for 15 an hour for workers as a minimum wage because that is a solid number for employees to be able to at the VERY least come home with enough to live without working several jobs.
> 
> Amazon is nearing the million employee count, with the next and only other company being Walmart with 2mil+ employees. There is absolutely more to it than I am laying down, but considering the amount in taxes being paid through income tax on employees alone with their much higher starting wage, where is the line?
> 
> ...



FWIW, I don't subscribe to Prime, I haven't bought a single product from Amazon amidst he pandemic and I have had the same experience with getting the same (or better items) from other distributors cheaper and faster. One of the things I like least about Amazon on a personal level is how cute they get with the shipping and what 2-day applies to or doesn't, or getting something with 'free' shipping they estimate at a week+ and it sits in the warehouse for five days and spends two days in transit anyway. So fuck 'em.

But still, bringing up Walmart (Drew did it too) isn't exactly a high mark for Amazon. Before Bezos was such a force in retail, Walmart was the gold standard for shitty employers. My data might be 10 years old so I dunno how true it was but it used to be well documented places like Walmart and McDonald's were the biggest drain on social safety-net spending because their employees majority qualified for some type of assistance (food stamps, rent or utility assistance, Medicaid, etc). I don't know if that's still true or if it applies to Amazon, but the sweatshops most of their products come from would indicate they don't mind exploiting workers to become wealthy (excuse me, ultra-wealthy).

No idea why you feel incensed enough to rush to the guy's defense or namelessly attack people (you're free to address me directly) for criticizing Bezos and Amazon's predatory, monopoly-like practices.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 15, 2020)

Pretty simple to me:

Workers (and pretty much everybody-whole world almost-) don’t need no stinking Billionaires

Billionaires _totally need_ stinky workers and everyone else (to exploit)

We have anti trust laws, designed to prevent monopolies like Google Amazon and Facebook, yet... free trade, global economy, de-regulation, global hegemony, sweat shops, military industrial complex, citizens united, miles of toxic lakes in China, destroying sacred indigenous lands for profit and greed...yadyada... overpopulation...

Guys like Bezos are biggest “corporate welfare queens” in the entire world, come on!

Bottom line I think Amazon should pay higher taxes and higher wages

Why would anyone defend a billionaire? I’d like to see what yer made of on a cellular level, like are you same DNA? lol

“End times” these guys 1%- most don’t care about population and want to leave the planet.

Look at Bezos eyes- is he human? Lol... Can you really believe anything he says?


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 16, 2020)

Randy said:


> FWIW, I don't subscribe to Prime, I haven't bought a single product from Amazon amidst he pandemic and I have had the same experience with getting the same (or better items) from other distributors cheaper and faster. One of the things I like least about Amazon on a personal level is how cute they get with the shipping and what 2-day applies to or doesn't, or getting something with 'free' shipping they estimate at a week+ and it sits in the warehouse for five days and spends two days in transit anyway. So fuck 'em.
> 
> But still, bringing up Walmart (Drew did it too) isn't exactly a high mark for Amazon. Before Bezos was such a force in retail, Walmart was the gold standard for shitty employers. My data might be 10 years old so I dunno how true it was but it used to be well documented places like Walmart and McDonald's were the biggest drain on social safety-net spending because their employees majority qualified for some type of assistance (food stamps, rent or utility assistance, Medicaid, etc). I don't know if that's still true or if it applies to Amazon, but the sweatshops most of their products come from would indicate they don't mind exploiting workers to become wealthy (excuse me, ultra-wealthy).
> 
> No idea why you feel incensed enough to rush to the guy's defense or namelessly attack people (you're free to address me directly) for criticizing Bezos and Amazon's predatory, monopoly-like practices.



Didn't mean to attack you or anyone else, and I don't think anything I said was an attack really so my bad if I did word something that way.

I pointed out things I felt were not strong critiques towards Amazon, the pandemic and toiletries had little to do with Bezos/Amazon and more to do with media coverage spreading panic over potential unwiped bums. Greedy third party sellers saw an opportunity and attempted to take advantage of people's worries and concerns, which is something Amazon took a stance on and quelled on their own platform.

That's not a defense of Amazon, it's just the truth behind those events. Very few other retailers did much to handle their third party price gouging.

My point about bringing up the jobs provided by Amazon is that while in contrast to Walmart, it may be the same value (minimum wage at 2mil+ employees vs double that or more for just about 1mil employees). But the effect is that Amazon created numerous jobs and pays what many demanded be the new minimum not even 5 years ago while the minimum is still well below their starting wages, with benefits, perks, at even the warehouse level.

I actually watched that video linked above over dinner, and I can 100% see the malicious outlook on Amazon's end. But is it wrong of me to see it for what it really was? As far as I saw it, they seemed to corner top level companies in markets like the book publishing market and work their way up to challenge competitors that use *Amazon *to sell their products. Like mentioned in the documentary, negotiations when service and labor contracts are up aren't roses and a box of chocolates, each party is seeking for benefit from their relationship with one another and even on the level of business I interact with. We are handed proposals and changes that are equally as harsh as demanding a larger cut of the overall pie, especially in distribution. The Amazon dilema is that it isn't a true monopoly, if Amazon has a monopoly then so does eBay and Reverb in the context of musicians reselling instruments. They have a large install base and by that effect of course you want your products on their platform, even if it is voluntary. It's hard to not just see a guy with a desire to shake up the retail industry and the world and is aggressively making businesses follow the tide or be left behind while Amazon offers a platform for all businesses to actively sell their products and gain visibility and presence.

This will happen in any industry when there is a platform for distribution of any kind of product, it's why I don't look at Spotify with the hate that many musicians do. Being paid pennies might leave a sour taste in people's mouths, but people seem to forget that CD sales dropped off with the internet's widespread ability to spread music illegally, people will always lean towards cost effectiveness and convenience. So I think the harsh reality is that Youtube/Spotify/Streaming/etc are extra sources of revenue that only exist through demand, you may be getting an 8 dollar check for a few month's worth of plays but the alternative is not receiving anything at all. And yes, I do believe Spotify should largely increase their pay rate per play to artists and reform their business model especially when artists can't even perform and sell their merch to fans locally right now.

People only enjoy small businesses as a concept, because if you climb to any level that is far above your competitor through no other reason that it's customer's supporting it, then you're left with a world where wealth is resented as a concept. Mom and Pop's are a lovely idea, and they still exist but consumers have proven time and time again that they will sacrifice them for the positive change to their shopping experience. In the same way that I could drive to H-Mart and shop for my groceries there, or I can contact one of my local farms and join their weekly delivery of dairy/meat/produce to support local farmers especially during a pandemic like this. One supports a corporation, and one supports the small guy trying to be competitive and make ends meet during a pandemic.

Back when me and my family ran out PC Repair shop, we had inventory in stock for several different pc parts & accessories. Well over 95% of it was sold on Amazon even when we decided to close up shop and go by appointment only/shift gears to security. The fire sale produced little to no sales from active foot traffic, and I sure as hell prefer the sales I made on Amazon to having to put all that merchandise in a storage unit or keep it in our homes.

I'd just like to see people discuss in application how you implement a cutoff and stunt the growth of businesses moving forward to support some of the changes discussed in this thread. What's the plan?


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 16, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> .What’s the plan?



Jeff Bezos pays everyone 600 $ a week for 100 years and sends it in a thanks for the laughs here’s some dumpster’d Tim Horton’s donuts inna greasy box...


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 16, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> Jeff Bezos pays everyone 600 $ a week for 100 years and sends it in a thanks for the laughs here’s some dumpster’d Tim Horton’s donuts inna greasy box...



ya..Jeff could do that...one time.


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## MFB (Aug 16, 2020)

Randy said:


> FWIW, I don't subscribe to Prime, I haven't bought a single product from Amazon amidst he pandemic and I have had the same experience with getting the same (or better items) from other distributors cheaper and faster. One of the things I like least about Amazon on a personal level is how cute they get with the shipping and what 2-day applies to or doesn't, or getting something with 'free' shipping they estimate at a week+ and it sits in the warehouse for five days and spends two days in transit anyway. So fuck 'em.



I ordered a new Kindle at the beginning of the pandemic, since with the rest of the world in lockdown, what better time to get back into reading? But aside from that, I've kept it to a minimum besides the one order I placed this past week for something I thought would work and straight up is not in stores locally, but alas, it wasn't worth it and I should have stuck to my gut. But I'm moving in a more anti-Amazon stance, like trying to find something online, and then going through the actual manufacturer instead of through Amazon who's now going to take their part for being the distributor. I'm sort of wrestling with whether or not keeping my Prime status for the streaming portions offsets how little I order from them, since besides watching content on Prime Video, my only real purchases on Amazon are hot sauce bundles.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 16, 2020)

Prime was their biggest spur in profits, and I still wholly stand that perks on shipping speeds is damn near pointless. And in a real world scenario where I need something immediately, I can just opt for the one day paid shipping option as necessary depending on urgency.





The amazon screenshot is in an incognito browser just to see what it costs a non-subscriber to buy something from them, so I have to hit a balance of $25 before tax and shipping to qualify for free shipping. And it takes 5 - 8 days to be delivered if I want to buy something available on Amazon, not the worst compromise all things considering. But like above, you shop around because other online retailers still very much exist, you can probably find the same price/better deal elsewhere. I bought the Oak Grisby and that CTS Pot and it arrived in 4 days, July 13th - 17th I could have qualified for free shipping by buying two CTS pots on Amazon and hit the marker of $25 for free shipping. Products on Amazon actually tend to sit at a higher price overall if you don't spend enough to make it worth it for them to ship you it for free.

But this is where they win, and why my focus remains consistent. It's the consumer and the government's lack of regulation at fault for building up Amazon.

Combo meals sell, you don't need a large drink and fry but you are getting a "value" instead of buying just the sandwich. Buying just enough to get free shipping feels good, because you only paid for the products you *wanted*, not the freight charge that doesn't deserve to be considered a cost. If you're buying what you need then there is nothing wrong with your purchase, more often than not people are overbuying in order to save money, and that's exactly why I think forking $120 (Non Student/Discounted) a year annually just to get things faster is a sham of a service that people are convinced is worth it.

It's wild to me that as I grow older and my career shifts my inclination is to steer towards being frugal, but not frugal in the regular sense like buying rice/beans in bulk and buying whole chicken and stretching everything to maximize my paychecks. I still spend on shit, but how much of it is even in a vague sense necessary? The only subscription I even have is Youtube Premium because it removes ads and includes the music streaming services where I can upload my own collection of tracks. Not much else is necessary and if I weren't part of a household Amazon account I wouldn't willingly pay for it either.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 16, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> ya..Jeff could do that...one time.


 
b4 or after the guillotine?
Happy to hear you’re on board!
it’s only like a billion and change no big deal...
(American company so US citizens only duh! 
I mean why help anyone else?)


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 16, 2020)

MFB said:


> I ordered a new Kindle at the beginning of the pandemic, since with the rest of the world in lockdown, what better time to get back into reading? But aside from that, I've kept it to a minimum besides the one order I placed this past week for something I thought would work and straight up is not in stores locally, but alas, it wasn't worth it and I should have stuck to my gut. But I'm moving in a more anti-Amazon stance, like trying to find something online, and then going through the actual manufacturer instead of through Amazon who's now going to take their part for being the distributor. I'm sort of wrestling with whether or not keeping my Prime status for the streaming portions offsets how little I order from them, since besides watching content on Prime Video, my only real purchases on Amazon are hot sauce bundles.


Of all of the streaming platforms, and all of the money Amazon makes, their streaming service has to be the least advanced, with next to no effort put into it.


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## Drew (Aug 20, 2020)

Randy said:


> But still, bringing up Walmart (Drew did it too) isn't exactly a high mark for Amazon. Before Bezos was such a force in retail, Walmart was the gold standard for shitty employers. My data might be 10 years old so I dunno how true it was but it used to be well documented places like Walmart and McDonald's were the biggest drain on social safety-net spending because their employees majority qualified for some type of assistance (food stamps, rent or utility assistance, Medicaid, etc). I don't know if that's still true or if it applies to Amazon, but the sweatshops most of their products come from would indicate they don't mind exploiting workers to become wealthy (excuse me, ultra-wealthy).


Walmart actually got their shit together in recent years. When the fight for a higher minimum wage started to gain momentum again back in 14-15 or so, they were one of the first large companies to voluntarily go to a $10 minimum, which I believe they've hiked a few times since and may now be $15. They've also been very transparent about the results - they've had far better employee retention and satisfaction, productivity is up, and they're saving a lot of money on the new hire and training processes. They also offer health plans, 401k plans and matches, maternity and paternity benefits, and I believe employee stock purchase plans for _all_ employees, which is unusual. It makes sense, too - again, better wages and benefits translate into significantly lower employee turnover and reduced hiring-related costs, and they have the clout to make it work so it gives them a competitive advantage against their smaller peers. They're still hardly perfect, but they're a great example of ways where better labor practices can also make strong business sense.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 20, 2020)

Eh. Walmart, as elsewhere, typically has 1-2 lanes open (out of what, 15?), while there is about 50 people trying to check out. Walmart is also the only place I can go to if I want to be sure to hear a child screaming bloody murder at the absolute top of of their lungs because they didn't get a toy or some inane bullshit. I mean, that is a side issue, but I'd rather not go into Walmart unless it is convenient or the only/closest option.


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## broj15 (Aug 20, 2020)

Imo Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, or any other absurdly rich individual could still draw a fairly health salary that they'd never completely spend (if they had any sense) AND could afford to pay all thier employees a liveable wage, top to bottom.
It really just boils down to greed. No one needs as much money as Jeff Bezos. It's simply not necessary. There's people that make a fraction of what Jeff clears and still have more assets than any one person could ever need. And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with having a bunch of cool stuff. But there comes a point where it reaches an excess that becomes another form of gluttony for the few and results in a large portion of the world's population being deprived of basic needs.
It's not even an economic issues at that point. It's a moral issue. Is it morally ok to let one person excel knowing that in order for that to happen so many people will be forced to go without?


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## Nick (Aug 20, 2020)

broj15 said:


> Imo Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, or any other absurdly rich individual could still draw a fairly health salary that they'd never completely spend (if they had any sense) AND could afford to pay all thier employees a liveable wage, top to bottom.
> It really just boils down to greed. No one needs as much money as Jeff Bezos. It's simply not necessary. There's people that make a fraction of what Jeff clears and still have more assets than any one person could ever need. And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with having a bunch of cool stuff. But there comes a point where it reaches an excess that becomes another form of gluttony for the few and results in a large portion of the world's population being deprived of basic needs.
> It's not even an economic issues at that point. It's a moral issue. Is it morally ok to let one person excel knowing that in order for that to happen so many people will be forced to go without?



This is similar to my thoughts on this. Besos is now at the point personally where money is an abstract concept to him. His personal wealth is so vast that it has become irrelevant, he can simply have anything that requires money and he will never not be in that situation now. So why is he not in the news acting like santa clause for the 364 days santa has off? He coukd hire someone to do good things with his money and just take the credit.

Sadly I think the answer is he has likely lost touch with reality and is probably spending a lot of time worrying about cryogenics or "the search for a new earth" and other insane shit when he could actually be doing a fuckload to tackle real issues facing the planet and all the people on it right now.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 21, 2020)

broj15 said:


> Imo Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, or any other absurdly rich individual could still draw a fairly health salary that they'd never completely spend (if they had any sense) AND could afford to pay all thier employees a liveable wage, top to bottom.
> It really just boils down to greed. No one needs as much money as Jeff Bezos. It's simply not necessary. There's people that make a fraction of what Jeff clears and still have more assets than any one person could ever need. And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with having a bunch of cool stuff. But there comes a point where it reaches an excess that becomes another form of gluttony for the few and results in a large portion of the world's population being deprived of basic needs.
> It's not even an economic issues at that point. It's a moral issue. Is it morally ok to let one person excel knowing that in order for that to happen so many people will be forced to go without?



Amazon starting wage is 15 an hour, Facebook's starting wage falls between 18 - 22 an hour depending on state for contractors, Microsoft's salary info falls at just above 16 an hour for CS Representatives at the lowest.

So what is a livable wage? Because like I mentioned prior, the push seemed to target $15 an hour starting, which all the businesses owned by those individuals seem to pay at or above? Can we loop some reality into the discussion, because AFAIK these generalizations of absurdly rich not covering their employee's basic needs isn't true today and hasn't been in recent years. It just seems like people want to scale worker's wages based on how successful it's executives are, which is unrealistic and doesn't support the redistribution of *ultra wealth* that people are convinced will resolve poverty top to bottom.

Howard Schultz has a net worth of 3.9 Billion, starting wage is around $11 an hour to prepare coffee and beverages. Is that fair, and if it isn't how much should starting wages at Starbucks be? How are you going to enforce wealth redistribution across the board? All the focus seems to be on the biggest names possible, but are we forgetting that you become part of the 1% when you make around 450k a year? 30 - 40% of which is is tossed into Income Tax?

I'd like to keep altruism out of the talks, everyone who is at least a decent person wants others to be able to live and work with their basic necessities covered throughout their life.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 21, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Amazon starting wage is 15 an hour, Facebook's starting wage falls between 18 - 22 an hour depending on state for contractors, Microsoft's salary info falls at just above 16 an hour for CS Representatives at the lowest.
> 
> So what is a livable wage? Because like I mentioned prior, the push seemed to target $15 an hour starting, which all the businesses owned by those individuals seem to pay at or above? Can we loop some reality into the discussion, because AFAIK these generalizations of absurdly rich not covering their employee's basic needs isn't true today and hasn't been in recent years. It just seems like people want to scale worker's wages based on how successful it's executives are, which is unrealistic and doesn't support the redistribution of *ultra wealth* that people are convinced will resolve poverty top to bottom.
> 
> ...



Hourly wage is a poor metric. It doesn't take into consideration benefits, total work hours, or cost of living. 

That's not to say that federal minimum wage shouldn't be raised, because it definitely should.

But to put $15/hr into perspective, that's not even going to net you an average 2/br apartment in all but five states, and just barely. 

https://www.statista.com/statistics/203384/us-two-bedroom-housing-wage-by-state/

Also, not to nitpick, but someone isn't being taxed at "30 - 40%", the US has progressive taxation. You cap out at 37% above around $500k and it's for every dollar after that hit with 37%. 

To put it in perspective, someone working 40 hours a week at $15/hr is being taxed at 12%, but there's a floor here. There's quite a gap of quality of life between ~$300k a year net and ~$28k net.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 21, 2020)

MaxOfMetal said:


> Hourly wage is a poor metric. It doesn't take into consideration benefits, total work hours, or cost of living.
> 
> That's not to say that federal minimum wage shouldn't be raised, because it definitely should.
> 
> ...



Fair enough on the taxation, but everyone should pay taxes if they're due. It's just that the claim was being made that a livable wage wasn't being supplied top down by the companies of the respective owners wasn't true. Bringing up the low end of the 1% spectrum was to illustrate that taxation hits us all, and if we're really targeting "ultra wealth" then it should be a far smaller percentage of people if you're considering billionaires alone.

Logistically anyone should perform dozens of hours to plan where they will live, and make their money work for their situation. Rent sits at 1600ish for a decent 2br/ba where I'm from, low end can be about 900 a month for a 1br/ba, and upwards of 2.2k for a 2br/ba in a nice spot. But even making good money I still live with a roommate and heavily budget in order to save.

Everyone's situation is different, but I recall tight budgeting making 13hr and paying $1200 into rent being perfectly feasible. Even with luxuries like a vehicle/insurance/internet. I couldn't just order ubereats twice a week and ignore how much money I bring in, (2 Meals @ $20ish from Uber Eats = 1/3 of my monthly grocery budget back then) because I'd be overdrafting left and right. Cut out the pointless spending, like paying in advance to receive future purchases quicker where the goal is ultimately to pad orders with shit you don't really need.

I'm just not going to pretend it's not possible, you definitely don't need a 2br apartment as a bare minimum. And if you desire a pair of rooms or the extra square footage, sharing the space is something millions of Americans live with. I certainly didn't need to make 28 an hour to make it work, how are more working Americans not homeless if you basically need 4k a month net to afford a 2br apartment in the top few states?

Not to mention, that this is all considering a starting wage. You're not going to sit at 13 an hour if that's your starting wage for years unless you're complacent and not putting in any effort, or at least searching for a better job at the same time.

When I moved up north awhile back I ended up working contracts for just about years and while I interviewed for jobs that would pay me my worth for my experience. I took a job literally packing medicine for 3 weeks over the holidays paying $11 an hour I think, until I was offered a contract in my field paying 19 an hour. Steadily rose over the course of a few 3/6 month contracts with different businesses and I landed full time job soon after.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 21, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Fair enough on the taxation, but everyone pays taxes if they're due. It's just that the claim was being made that a livable wage wasn't being supplied top down by the companies of the respective owners wasn't true. Bringing up the low end of the 1% spectrum was to illustrate that taxation hits us all, and if we're really targeting "ultra wealth" then it should be a far smaller percentage of people if you're considering billionaires alone.
> 
> Logistically anyone should perform dozens of hours to plan where they will live, and make their money work for their situation. Rent sits at 1600ish for a decent 2br/ba where I'm from, low end can be about 900 a month for a 1br/ba, and upwards of 2.2k for a 2br/ba in a nice spot. But even making good money I still live with a roommate and heavily budget in order to save.
> 
> ...



You have done well for yourself, worked hard, made smart decisions, shown discipline, and that's great. Really it is. I don't mean to diminish your experience in any way. I've been there too. My first job was busing tables for $20 _a night.
_
But the reality is, as much as we've worked to make our lives what they are, a lot of it was luck and privilege.

So I don't buy into the idea that all anyone needs to do to live a better life is to just work a little harder or grind a little more or hustle a little more. The barrier to reaching financial stability in this country is incredibly hard to overcome and is made especially more difficult due to systemic issues like our horrible healthcare system, predatory lending, poor public education, financial redlining, and the prison industrial complex.

It certainly doesn't help that most jobs that were traditionally capable of allowing upward mobility have been trending down for years. Good manufacturing and union jobs are dwindling, and it's just going to get worse as automation and globalization continue. It's an inevitability.

Just because there are success stories like you and I doesn't mean there isn't a bigger problem.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 21, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Fair enough on the taxation, but everyone should pay taxes if they're due. It's just that the claim was being made that a livable wage wasn't being supplied top down by the companies of the respective owners wasn't true. Bringing up the low end of the 1% spectrum was to illustrate that taxation hits us all, and if we're really targeting "ultra wealth" then it should be a far smaller percentage of people if you're considering billionaires alone.
> 
> Logistically anyone should perform dozens of hours to plan where they will live, and make their money work for their situation. Rent sits at 1600ish for a decent 2br/ba where I'm from, low end can be about 900 a month for a 1br/ba, and upwards of 2.2k for a 2br/ba in a nice spot. But even making good money I still live with a roommate and heavily budget in order to save.
> 
> ...



You said it yourself: nobody needs to be wealthy! Everybody can make it on 15$ an hour!

Take all that extra money and make either:

1) National Waterslide/Asian Massage parlor/Hot Wings/Juice Bar 

-or-

2) Colonize the Moon for the Ultra Wealthy!


Who needs Universal Basic Income anyway, it’s like so easy to do that already, how boring, duh...


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 21, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> You said it yourself: nobody needs to be wealthy! Everybody can make it on 15$ an hour!
> 
> Take all that extra money and make either:
> 
> ...



i'm all for eminent domaining all of jeff's stocks and giving all 300 million + people in the states 600 dollars exactly one time.


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## MaxOfMetal (Aug 21, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> i'm all for eminent domaining all of jeff's stocks and giving all 300 million + people in the states 600 dollars exactly one time.



The crazy thing is, if that ever happened, he'd still be in the top 30% by AGI and top 1% (damn close to 0.1%) by total compensation. 

He could lose 99.9991% of his net worth and still be better off than at least 70% of the country. 

Regardless of anyone's opinion on that, it's just crazy to think about just how much money that all is.


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## fantom (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> So what is a livable wage? Because like I mentioned prior, the push seemed to target $15 an hour starting, which all the businesses owned by those individuals seem to pay at or above? Can we loop some reality into the discussion



So how about you start this instead of throwing a vague argument out there? Run some numbers, shall we?

Assume someone with a spouse and 2 kids. Keep in mind if you make minimum wage then a nanny or daycare might not be financially much different. How much do you need to make per hour for a 2 bedroom apartment, cell phones, 1 car, insurance policies, food, entertainment, etc.?

Let's assume a family of 4 in a cheaper state like Florida can get by on:
1200 for rent
150 for utilities (moderate ac usage)
20 for entertainment (netflix or hulu)
50 for a family cell plan
40 for internet
400 for food
80 for car insurance (1 car)
150 for gas
_____
2090

Btw, I think some of these numbers are low and missing basic things like the ability to go to a zoo with your kids. But feel free to disagree.

There are about 22 workdays. So without taxes, that's about 12 / hr on basic needs with no side money. No medical insurance. No 401k. No college fund. No new clothes or toys for kids. No vacation. No emergency fund. No new guitars or amps. Oh, and this assume you are working consistently 40 hrs a week.

Now let's consider someone in California

2700 for rent
200 for utilities
20 for entertainment (netflix or hulu)
50 for a family cell plan
40 for internet
500 for food
100 for car insurance
200 for gas
_____
~3700

That works out to about 22 / hr. Again, this is basic needs.

So ya, maybe work out some numbers yourself and ask whether or not 10-15 / hr is fair before making an assumption that it is. The worst part is that "just getting by" prevents people from saving money to improve themselves (down payment for a house, go to college, send kids to college, etc.). This is why it is a big deal for many families when the first generation graduates college, because they know the door is wide open for their grandchildren.

I was making 17 / hr in florida working average about 30 hrs a week while in college (I luckily didn't have to pay for the college, so no expenses there). I maybe saved 5k per year as a single person trying to live reasonably (going to concerts and such, no partying, no hotels, no flights, no medical bills or perscriptions). It still would take me 8 months or longer to save up for gear. I don't think it would be feasible or comfortable to do that with a family.


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

$400 for food?!?


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

fantom said:


> So how about you start this instead of throwing a vague argument out there? Run some numbers, shall we?
> 
> Assume someone with a spouse and 2 kids. Keep in mind if you make minimum wage then a nanny or daycare might not be financially much different. How much do you need to make per hour for a 2 bedroom apartment, cell phones, 1 car, insurance policies, food, entertainment, etc.?
> 
> ...



I didn't "start" because I wasn't the one making the claim that people are somehow being paid less than they require to live from the individuals mentioned in this thread.

Lets address your example, if you're mapping this out with a family of 4 why are you accounting for the money brought in by only one of the adults living in that household? Yeah if the father wants to be the primary breadmaker and let his wife stay home and take care of and raise the kids then yeah he would need to be making 22 an hour.

You know what I call that? A luxury. If I make enough to be able to tell my wife that she can stay home and not have to work fulltime, or start her own home business/whatever she wants to do, that's fantastic and all but how is that a *basic* need? This is my point, the internet and entertainment are not basic needs, they are commonplace because of general privilege in first world countries. So for good measure, lets cut that budget for Florida down to a realistic number, since we're talking about "basic" needs.

My family came from Brazil when I was 4, and my regular life was a 1 room apartment with my parents for a long time before we upgraded to a 2 room as we could afford it. But we were a family of 3, so lets set the bar at least for the kids to be able to share a single room together. I'll use Coconut Creek/Boca Raton as examples, where I used to live so I can speak with certainty that I have real world experience looking for and paying my 1/3rd of the rent with my parents. We paid 1150 a month at the lowest for a 2 room, to 1400 at the highest accordingly.

1300 - Rent
200 - Utilities
__ - Entertainment (If you can afford, and AFTER all those great goals you mentioned)*
__ - Internet (Same as above)
80 - Phone Plan for 2 (I paid for my first phone with my first job's savings)
500 - Food
150 - Car Insurance (2008 - 2015 avg rate that I paid)
300 - Car Payments (Same as above)
50 - Costco/Sams/BJ's (Annual, no reason not to if you're feeding 4 and drive regularly)
120 - (Weekly Fillups, 10 - 20 mile drive daily/efficient vehicle)
_______
$2700 - Total

So your cost of living in Florida falls at just around ($2700), for a family of FOUR people. We've addressed that having the opportunity to be a stay at home partner is a privilege, so axe that.

Assuming an adult who has two kids (24 - 26 years old), is still making 12 an hour for whatever reason, a single working adult brings in $480 gross, $429 net. A household with a single full time worker and a part time worker with the same rate brings (Same payrate/28 Hours), bring home $3254 gross, $2956 net. The rest of the math is below, just to illustrate my point.

Single Worker Monthly Income (1FT)
Gross: 1920
Net: 1716
Savings: 0

Dual Worker Monthly Income (1FT/1PT)
Gross: 3254
Net: 2956
Savings: 256

Dual Worker Monthly Income (2FT)
Gross: 3840
Net: 3432
Savings: 732

Dual Worker Monthly Income (2PT)
Gross: 2644
Net: 2480
Savings: None

Now lets factor in all those goodies you mentioned.

No medical insurance. No 401k. (Full time job should provide both)
No new clothes for kids. (You can get both kids two new outfits for about 80 at Old Navy, they always have sales)
No new toys for kids. (I'm pretty sure kids don't need new toys monthly as a "basic" need, luxury)
No college fund. No vacation. No emergency fund. (If both adults are working, then allocate savings appropriately.
No new guitars or amps. (Why even mention this? Why is buying a new guitar and amp monthly a basic need? Luxury)

So you can't afford to live in Florida with a family of 4, if you expect only 1 adult to work. You also can't afford it if you both work part time jobs collectively, and even then how far you can stretch income on a very strict budget becomes a necessity. I appreciate your attempt to lay that out, but I used some of your numbers and even added cost because I know what it actually costs to live in Florida in 3 different counties to understand the real cost of living there.



jaxadam said:


> $400 for food?!?



If you want a fully stocked pantry with snacks, drinks, and candy I guess so 

I spent $190 at Costco this past weekend and bought enough protein to freeze and cook for 2 months (Ground Beef/Pork & Beef Ribs/Cheese/Eggs). Then I buy my produce and perishables weekly at Giant/Hmart based on sales prices. I basically cook for 1 for under $200 a month, and that's not trying to be frugal with the types of food I'm buying. I ate monthly at $120 at my most aggressive budgeting.


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## budda (Aug 22, 2020)

When the simple solution is less people at the top and more people actually able to live, and people argue against that, I find it very odd. "I had to be exact and worry about every penny and I got out, so you can too!" Is the point not to make it better for everyone? :Scratch:.

@Jonathan20022 now add in daycare costs so that both parents can work.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

budda said:


> When the simple solution is less people at the top and more people actually able to live, and people argue against that, I find it very odd. "I had to be exact and worry about every penny and I got out, so you can too!" Is the point not to make it better for everyone? :Scratch:.
> 
> @Jonathan20022 now add in daycare costs so that both parents can work.



Lets just be clear, I'm not just saying saying what you think I'm saying. And the notion of having more people rising to the top, bringing up those around them is a far greater "simple solution".

If you make minimum wage and choose to live in California without a support structure to fall on or lift some of your cost of living, then you're doing it wrong. I see discussions keep assuming you need shit you don't need, and that you're somehow making a stagnant minimum wage for a decade or longer.

The running assumption that every household needs to at a bare minimum, to have a single worker making enough to support a family of 4 with a stay at home partner, and all of these luxuries is ridiculous.

I'm also not sure what daycare runs to be honest, my secondary family helped lift the load of raising me and supervising me as a kid.


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

Daycare is about $1000 per kid per month.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> Daycare is about $1000 per kid per month.



Jesus Christ


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Jesus Christ



Yes, so I need to get you to go grocery shopping for me!


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## budda (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Jesus Christ



Now run your numbers.

You seem very bent on making sure it's survival not living that justifies a shitty wage, which is baffling.


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

budda said:


> Now run your numbers.
> 
> You seem very bent on making sure it's survival not living that justifies a shitty wage, which is baffling.



Well, if you factor in lap dances, you can easily be over $10k a month. That’s why my wife has two jobs!


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## fantom (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> If I make enough to be able to tell my wife that she can stay home and not have to work fulltime, or start her own home business/whatever she wants to do



So I can't speak for Florida since I didn't have kids when I lived there. In California, daycare for a toddler ranges from $1800 to $3500 per month. So I completely disagree that both parents can work full time at minimum wage without one parents income going completely to childcare. Oh, and don't forget that more income means more taxes. Assuming it is financially sound (it isn't), the parents need to offset schedules, which a lot of jobs won't be as patient about saying "I need to work when my spouse isn't".

Also, childcare is 100% a basic need. By law, a child cannot be unsupervised. If you ever hang out with a toddler, let me know how much work you can get done.



Jonathan20022 said:


> No medical insurance. No 401k. (Full time job should provide both)



An hourly job won't. If you are single, a salary job might cover just you. I work a salary job and have to pay about $100 / month out of my paycheck for insurance. So no, this isn't free. I'd also argue it isn't a basic need. (See the Democrat primary thread of you want to see how poorly that was received). And the 401k comes out of your paycheck. The company won't just give you money. They might match your contribution, but you need to make a choice of you can afford a contribution.

Also, things like internet at home are not basic needs according to standards 20 years ago, but they kind of are important now if you want kids to be able to not fall behind in school.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

budda said:


> Now run your numbers.
> 
> You seem very bent on making sure it's survival not living that justifies a shitty wage, which is baffling.



Most people's definition of survival and living is drastically leaning towards first worlds standards and luxuries, which is the entire point of breaking down the real cost of living which no one seemed to do.

The claim is that Bezos/Zuckerburg/Gates don't pay a "living" wage, their starting wages are ($15/$18/$16) in order of names. I ran my numbers at $12 an hour. Stop conflating my argument and what point I'm trying to make.



fantom said:


> So I can't speak for Florida since I didn't have kids when I lived there. In California, daycare for a toddler ranges from $1800 to $3500 per month. So I completely disagree that both parents can work full time at minimum wage without one parents income going completely to childcare. Assuming it is financially sound, the parents need to offset schedules, which a lot of jobs won't be as patient about saying "I need to work when my spouse isn't".
> 
> Also, childcare is 100% a basic need. By law, a child cannot be unsupervised. If you ever hang out with a toddler, let me know how much work you can get done.
> 
> ...



Fair enough on the childcare, but if you're telling me all families are dumping all of that money into childcare and not leaning into family care (Which is where most infants from low income families spend their first 2 - 3 years at anyways) then I simply don't believe you.

By all of the costs you guys are laying out the entire country should be in shambles if a household makes less than a combined 60k a year.

Health Insurance is a basic need, and the only jobs I've worked that didn't cover me and if I had any, my dependents were contract jobs. My mom's career at Whole Foods covered her & and me up until I turned 25, back when she was cutting fruit in the produce department over a decade ago. 

And I included a cellphone plan into my budget and upped the cost, because if you "need" internet, then you also "need" a computer to do anything more than any modern phone can do. I consider those luxuries if you cannot afford them, you can apply for work and enjoy free entertainment on your phone.


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

Yeah, but you're leaving out:

-Golf
-Pool Service
-Lawn Service
-Pet Grooming Service
-Housecleaning Service
-Pest Control Service
-Window Washing Service
-Exterior Powerwashing Service
-Drycleaners Delivery Service
-Lapdances


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## fantom (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> if you're telling me all families are dumping all of that money into childcare and not leaning into family care (Which is where most infants from low income families spend their first 2 - 3 years at anyways) then I simply don't believe you



By your own logic, having "familycare" (a spouse to take care of the kids the first 5 years) is a luxury. Or do you mean aunts/uncles/grandparents should drop their minimum wage jobs to help you out instead? Lol.

Also, not everyone has a family that can help. Ours is mostly deceased or has to work 1-2 jobs just to take care of their own finances. I can't imagine what is like for people with only 1 adult, orphans, or whatnot. I think you are assuming a much better family structure than the average person actually has.


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## budda (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> By all of the costs you guys are laying out the entire country should be in shambles if a household makes less than a combined 60k a year.



This is exactly what's being said. Congrats, you got there.


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

fantom said:


> By your own logic, having "familycare" (a spouse to take care of the kids the first 5 years) is a luxury. Or do you mean aunts/uncles/grandparents should drop their minimum wage jobs to help you out instead? Lol.
> 
> Also, not everyone has a family that can help. Ours is mostly deceased or has to work 1-2 jobs just to take care of their own finances. I can't imagine what is like for people with only 1 adult, orphans, or whatnot. I think you are assuming a much better family structure than the average person actually has.



Not necessarily, I ascribe luxury to anything you can literally live without. Hence the axe to the internet bill/computer, get a phone/unlimited data plan instead since the phone can replace the computer for just about anything you need it to do. A kid needing supervision isn't a luxury, it's a responsibility. So realistically, the most responsible and well informed decision is to not have kids until you can bear the cost or well afford it.

But people have kids anyways, and since the alternative to expensive childcare is to have family help then how are people living day to day with their kids while they work?

Seems like the problem here is the cost of childcare and the wages of people who work in that field.



budda said:


> This is exactly what's being said. Congrats, you got there.



I've always "been there", people are still having children and living out of their means and manage to make things work. But please ignore the rest of my posts more, and assuming my stances and what I'm stating.

It has been about AMZN/FB/MSFT supposedly not paying a living wage from the start, folks who work at those companies are far from the poverty line (24k National Average). Assuming both parents in a household of 4 are working at Amazon at the lowest paying job, they are making (Gross: 62400, Net: 43680) almost 20k above what a family of 4 is considered to be in poverty.

If you want to shift the conversation towards affordable childcare and bare essentials for people making a national minimum wage, then feel free to. That's not what we're discussing.


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## jaxadam (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> If you want to shift the conversation towards affordable childcare and bare essentials for people making a national minimum wage, then feel free to. That's not what we're discussing.



If you find the right strip club, sometimes you can kill two birds with one stone for the whole childcare/lap dances thing.


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## fantom (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Not necessarily, I ascribe luxury to anything you can literally live without. Hence the axe to the internet bill/computer, get a phone/unlimited data plan instead since the phone can replace the computer for just about anything you need it to do. A kid needing supervision isn't a luxury, it's a responsibility. So realistically, the most responsible and well informed decision is to not have kids until you can bear the cost or well afford it.
> 
> But people have kids anyways, and since the alternative to expensive childcare is to have family help then how are people living day to day with their kids while they work?
> 
> ...



So I agree people have kids out of their means by existing standards. But that is literally the problem this thread is discussing. Why is it out of their means? You just said people who are more financially stable should have kids and people working minimum wage shouldn't. But if the ultra wealthy people weren't taking advantage of the lower class financially, that wouldn't be the case.

As far as more affordable childcare, is that really the problem? People on that industry are paid minimum wage while companies like kindercare are charging families ridiculous amounts. Caregivers quit within 3-9 months. The kindercare here pays about 15 / hr to watch 4 infants while charging 3k / month for each infant. That means the caregiver is making $2700 / month while the leadership is taking in about $9300. Some is for expenses, but I don't think they are frugal for their own pocketbooks. This is exactly the same shit in a different industry that isn't amazon. Same applies to schoolteachers.

So ya, your statement that people are having kids out of their means is just bullshitting that the system is broken and the solution is for people to accept that they are substandard. These people should be completely fine financially if dickheads weren't greedy and taking advantage of them.


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## budda (Aug 22, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Seems like the problem here is the cost of childcare and the wages of people who work in that field.



Why do you think that there's so many people who have to stretch their money so their kids can be remotely comfortable in today's world?

Why do you think these parents are going past their means in the first place?

How do you think the ultra-rich get that way?


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## Jonathan20022 (Aug 22, 2020)

fantom said:


> So I agree people have kids out of their means by existing standards. But that is literally the problem this thread is discussing. Why is it out of their means? You just said people who are more financially stable should have kids and people working minimum wage shouldn't. But if the ultra wealthy people weren't taking advantage of the lower class financially, that wouldn't be the case.
> 
> As far as more affordable childcare, is that really the problem? People on that industry are paid minimum wage while companies like kindercare are charging families ridiculous amounts. Caregivers quit within 3-9 months. The kindercare here pays about 15 / hr to watch 4 infants while charging 3k / month for each infant. That means the caregiver is making $2700 / month while the leadership is taking in about $9300. Some is for expenses, but I don't think they are frugal for their own pocketbooks. This is exactly the same shit in a different industry that isn't amazon. Same applies to schoolteachers.
> 
> So ya, your statement that people are having kids out of their means is just bullshitting that the system is broken and the solution is for people to accept that they are substandard. These people should be completely fine financially if dickheads weren't greedy and taking advantage of them.



The thread as a whole is discussing ultra wealth, and several pages after the first of people discussing ultrawealth.

My first response in regards to the lowest starting wage at the 3 mega-corporations I've continuously mentioned was a response to this post:
https://www.sevenstring.org/threads...-on-amazon-shares.343270/page-10#post-5172801

Why is having a child out of the means of certain people? Well if you're making minimum wage, and you're wearing yourself thin paying for rent/food/utilities/basics, then introducing a child into your life that will cost you 12k a year just doesn't add up in any budget period.

And I think you're making my point, Kindercare employs 36000 people across 1500 locations.

They charge families 1200 a month per kid, which is fucking ludicrous, but that's their price and people seem to be paying them because those are their options. Childcare is tough work, but I'm pretty sure I outlined a budget that accounted for a 12/hr wage on the last page. Just because the work is hard doesn't mean kids don't need care, lots of jobs are difficult in the world, but if $15 an hour accomplishes an individuals real cost of living then that accomplishes the point of the discussion. They could certainly pay their teachers way more, and I implore them to.

If a corporation is paying a living wage to it's lowest paid workers as a starting wage, then we arrived where we were going to land eventually.

Now comes the next part, the Corporation is making exponentially more than they pay their employees yet their employee's starting wage is livable. And that's what the thread is detailing, should the government intervene and regulate when corporate profits aren't trickling down to their base employees?

It's commonplace to ask for a raise 6 months - 1 year after starting a job, or just outright receive one and that doesn't seem to be an exception in Amazon Fulfillment Centers. If their workers were still making their starting wage 2+ years into the job we'd have a major issue for sure.



budda said:


> Why do you think that there's so many people who have to stretch their money so their kids can be remotely comfortable in today's world?
> 
> Why do you think these parents are going past their means in the first place?
> 
> How do you think the ultra-rich get that way?



Again, I'm literally discussing starting wages at Amazon/Facebook/Microsoft and wether or not those starting wages are "livable" which is the accusation lobbied against them.

Why are people stretching themselves thin? Well they don't make enough where they work, clearly. But I've literally been speaking about living wage at Amazon/Facebook/Microsoft, which on paper seems perfectly livable.

How do the Ultra-rich get where they are? We're not in the 2000's and talking about Walmart paying their employees $7 an hour and letting the government pick up the remainder of the tab with welfare. That system is unequivocally fucking trash, no argument there. But it's a completely different landscape in 2019/2020.

Maybe you're expecting me to say people shouldn't be paid more for their work, which isn't an idea I've presented nor represented at any point in this discussion.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 22, 2020)

fantom said:


> So how about you start this instead of throwing a vague argument out there? Run some numbers, shall we?
> 
> Assume someone with a spouse and 2 kids. Keep in mind if you make minimum wage then a nanny or daycare might not be financially much different. How much do you need to make per hour for a 2 bedroom apartment, cell phones, 1 car, insurance policies, food, entertainment, etc.?
> 
> ...



ok let me stop you right there. 

zoos are not a luxury. 

and zoos are fucking evil. 

If you hate Bezos and love zoos I don’t know wtf is wrong with you.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 22, 2020)

Eat the Rich! With a corn dog, a side of candy corn, cotton candy and and some fried pickles! Yeaaaah Bwwoooiiii!!
USA USA USA!


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 22, 2020)




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## StevenC (Aug 23, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Not necessarily, I ascribe luxury to anything you can literally live without. Hence the axe to the internet bill/computer, get a phone/unlimited data plan instead since the phone can replace the computer for just about anything you need it to do. A kid needing supervision isn't a luxury, it's a responsibility. So realistically, the most responsible and well informed decision is to not have kids until you can bear the cost or well afford it.
> 
> But people have kids anyways, and since the alternative to expensive childcare is to have family help then how are people living day to day with their kids while they work?
> 
> ...


I'm all for sterilizing poor people, but you might find that an unpopular opinion in most places. 


diagrammatiks said:


> ok let me stop you right there.
> 
> zoos are not a luxury.
> 
> ...


Most zoos are pretty bad, but there are plenty of zoos that exist to protect animals and do actual valuable things.


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## budda (Aug 23, 2020)

StevenC said:


> I'm all for sterilizing poor people, but you might find that an unpopular opinion in most places.
> 
> Most zoos are pretty bad, but there are plenty of zoos that exist to protect animals and do actual valuable things.



End zoos and start sanctuaries. Seems to be the right mix.


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## possumkiller (Aug 23, 2020)

Idk I just don't think there is any excuse for being poor in America. It's just laziness. It's literally the land of opportunity. All you have to do is get off your ass and make more money!


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## jaxadam (Aug 24, 2020)

possumkiller said:


> All you have to do is get off your ass and make more money!



No kidding. People complain about working a 40 hour week. There are 168 hours in the week, enough room for 3.2 more 40 hr/week jobs.


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## Drew (Aug 24, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> But people have kids anyways, and since the alternative to expensive childcare is to have family help then how are people living day to day with their kids while they work?
> 
> Seems like the problem here is the cost of childcare and the wages of people who work in that field.


The cost of daycase, for young children (say under two years), tracks loosely with the average cost of a "starter" family mortgage, in my experience - condo where that's the norm, single family where that's the norm, whatever. It falls pretty steeply after that, maybe by half, but it's still a massive amount of money. 

As far as how people juggle having a family and working, with two parents working, well... I have a number of friends with families, anywhere from solidly middle class to upper-middle class, and even bordering on what I'd call upper class. Their strategies are all broadly similar, though - grit their teeth and cut expenses to the bone through the 18-24mo part of day care, hope for a "bundle discount" that's still eye watering for a second kid if they're having one, then ride it out until kindergarten starts. Kindergarten through grade school becomes a "free day care," but they just have to figure out the pickup/dropoff schedule, usually tag teaming it with other parent friends, especially when it comes to sports, etc. In the summer, sign the kids up for one or two sleepaway camps, which aren't cheap but are cheaper than daycare used to be so it seems like a good deal, maybe have them spend a week visiting their grandparents, and then that leaves maybe a week or two where they're actually home and out of school, and then the parents just take turns using a couple vacation days to get through it. 

It's not cheap, it's not easy, but if both parents are working fairly good jobs, it's cost effective rather than having a parent stay home as the primary caregiver. The problem is, with lockdowns and quarantines, Covid has absolutely _torpedoed_ this, and my parent friends are absolutely torn between hoping schools reopen so they can actually focus on work for much of the day, and worried if schools reopen there'll be an even worse second wave. It's definitely exposed a gap in American society, though, that even relatively well off Americans are navigating a complex balancing act when it comes to childcare, and it may not really be sustainable.


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## jaxadam (Aug 24, 2020)

Drew said:


> The cost of daycase, for young children (say under two years), tracks loosely with the average cost of a "starter" family mortgage, in my experience - condo where that's the norm, single family where that's the norm, whatever. It falls pretty steeply after that, maybe by half, but it's still a massive amount of money.
> 
> As far as how people juggle having a family and working, with two parents working, well... I have a number of friends with families, anywhere from solidly middle class to upper-middle class, and even bordering on what I'd call upper class. Their strategies are all broadly similar, though - grit their teeth and cut expenses to the bone through the 18-24mo part of day care, hope for a "bundle discount" that's still eye watering for a second kid if they're having one, then ride it out until kindergarten starts. Kindergarten through grade school becomes a "free day care," but they just have to figure out the pickup/dropoff schedule, usually tag teaming it with other parent friends, especially when it comes to sports, etc. In the summer, sign the kids up for one or two sleepaway camps, which aren't cheap but are cheaper than daycare used to be so it seems like a good deal, maybe have them spend a week visiting their grandparents, and then that leaves maybe a week or two where they're actually home and out of school, and then the parents just take turns using a couple vacation days to get through it.
> 
> It's not cheap, it's not easy, but if both parents are working fairly good jobs, it's cost effective rather than having a parent stay home as the primary caregiver. The problem is, with lockdowns and quarantines, Covid has absolutely _torpedoed_ this, and my parent friends are absolutely torn between hoping schools reopen so they can actually focus on work for much of the day, and worried if schools reopen there'll be an even worse second wave. It's definitely exposed a gap in American society, though, that even relatively well off Americans are navigating a complex balancing act when it comes to childcare, and it may not really be sustainable.



Good post, Drew.

I have to say though, that’s the good thing about having your own business... once they are old enough to carry shit, on the payroll they go! I just keep getting letters from the IRS about why I have so many 16 year old kids and why the age doesn’t match their social security number.


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## Drew (Aug 24, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> Good post, Drew.
> 
> I have to say though, that’s the good thing about having your own business... once they are old enough to carry shit, on the payroll they go! I just keep getting letters from the IRS about why I have so many 16 year old kids and why the age doesn’t match their social security number.




Every time someone brings a kid into the office (one coworker, and keep in mind this is working at a small private investment management firm while her husband works for a private school so it's not like this is a family is scraping to make ends meet, does this once or twice a summer during the gap when kids aren't in camps, and will just set them up in an empty conference room or on an empty workstation with headphones to watch something), we always joke about teaching them how to use Excel or confirm bond trades, but we haven't actually gotten as far as W-2s yet. I'm feeling like an amateur here! 

EDIT - also, I'll say this - I wouldn't want this to come across as "oh woe are these poor rich people! sending their kids to camp! bringing them to work!" etc etc. These are challenges no matter if you're rich or poor, with two working parents, but they're challenges that these families ARE able to solve, and have the money to do so even if it gets pretty tight at times. Even less well off families usually can do it, as long as they can survive on one salary, if the second earner is at a threshold where it's cheaper for them to stay home and provide child care because paying someone to do it would cost more than the take home salary they could make. The real struggle is when you have two income earners, at least one is making less than paying someone to provide childcare would cost, but they _can't_ make ends meet on one salary. Higher up the socioeconomic ladder it sucks, its stressful, and its expensive, but it's a solvable problem. Lower down, god only knows. It's a huge challenge, though, that as american society has increasingly moved to a point where most families need two income earners, we've come to depend more and more on people outside the home for child rearing, and COVID has posed some real questions about how sustainable that actually is. 

I'm fortunate that my girlfriend and I both kept our jobs, didn't take pay cuts, etc, but trying to imagine how the last six months would have gone with say a two and four year old around... Holy shit, I don't know how I would have done it.


----------



## StevenC (Aug 24, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> No kidding. People complain about working a 40 hour week. There are 168 hours in the week, enough room for 3.2 more 40 hr/week jobs.


Not enough room? My place is two cubic metres, and we only take up 1.5 cubic metres. We've got room for a whole 'nother two thirds of a person!


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## zappatton2 (Aug 24, 2020)

StevenC said:


> Not enough room? My place is two cubic metres, and we only take up 1.5 cubic metres. We've got room for a whole 'nother two thirds of a person!


I'm just imagining the closet space.


----------



## StevenC (Aug 24, 2020)

zappatton2 said:


> I'm just imagining the closet space.


To shreds you say?


----------



## jaxadam (Aug 24, 2020)

zappatton2 said:


> I'm just imagining the closet space.



Mountain, ocean, lake, and river views.


----------



## Wuuthrad (Aug 25, 2020)

Oops


----------



## Wuuthrad (Aug 25, 2020)

Rise up!?


----------



## Drew (Aug 25, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> Rise up!?




Oh god, the old Federal Reserve = illuminati cartel garbage. Just, no.  

Worth at least making passing reference to is one of the byproducts of Bretton Woods is that the US Dollar is now squarely entrenched as the reserve currency of global business, which means we can borrow as much as we want by issuing Treasuries (which are basically forward commitments that settle in dollars) at insanely low borrowing costs. We've done pretty well in a world that allows currencies to float.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 25, 2020)

Found this after doing some reading, their numbers seem pretty low in certain areas but they are dealing in averages so I'm not sure how applicable this is when you compare to living in different areas within a county. So for all intents and purpose, use this realizing that it's accounting for county averages.

https://livingwage.mit.edu/


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 25, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Found this after doing some reading, their numbers seem pretty low in certain areas but they are dealing in averages so I'm not sure how applicable this is when you compare to living in different areas within a county. So for all intents and purpose, use this realizing that it's accounting for county averages.
> 
> https://livingwage.mit.edu/



I for one would really like an answer to your previous question.

Like do these people really care about people and their standard of living or do they only care about fucking rich people. 

Minimun wage is a legal issue right. So if it's too low then it should be raised. Or does bezos have to pay for this in order for people to feel ok.


----------



## Wuuthrad (Aug 25, 2020)

Drew said:


> Oh god, the old Federal Reserve = illuminati cartel garbage. Just, no.



Lol... yea, it’s from the Debt Clock App- “History of Money.” More of an “info“ post than opinion really...


----------



## jaxadam (Aug 25, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Found this after doing some reading, their numbers seem pretty low in certain areas but they are dealing in averages so I'm not sure how applicable this is when you compare to living in different areas within a county. So for all intents and purpose, use this realizing that it's accounting for county averages.
> 
> https://livingwage.mit.edu/



Well according to that my wife needs to get a third job.


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## Mathemagician (Aug 25, 2020)

Imagine thinking it’s fine to expect a single parent or a young married couple making ~$32k/yr each to just “suck it up and budget” AND commute 2 hrs+ to work because it’s cheaper, where in most states the population continuously votes down and form of cost effective public transport.

I especially don’t get it because what if the young hardworking broke couple wants to have a kid(s). They already work full time raising everyone else’s kid 8+ hours a day.

So add in a car, gas, insurance, maintenance just be allowed to work.

You would think people who identify as “Pro-Life” would be for things that allow someone the baseline needed to live.

Everyone is a fan of rugged individualism, but tax payer funded bailouts for publicly traded for-profit companies is just fine.

Why doesn’t anyone want big companies to fail? “Because I’d lose my job and health insurance”.

“What if we spent tax dollars on healthcare and UBI to make that a non-issue?”

“No that’s socialism and then the POORS might get a better life than they DESERVE!”

“You mean basic food, a roof, and medicine?”

“Yes fuck ‘em!”


I left my employer in the middle of a pandemic for a better offer because I was tired of arguing about comp. Suddenly after years of arguing they offered massive incentives for me to stay. Someone making $15/hr that should be making $25/hr just via 15 years of inflation and repressing wages doesn’t have that option.

The hardest pill to swallow? Most people making under $60k/yr DID work super hard to get there, and THEY are horrendously underpaid. Everyone suddenly catching up and making $40K shouldn’t scare them, because they should be making more too.

Apple didn’t engage in anti-capitalist and anti-competitive practices with Google and Adobe to build a better phone, they did it to suppress developer salary growth. So even the guys making $175k in SF were getting hosed though they may not have felt like it.

And no Bezos doesn’t need his assets seized. A lot of good could come from using tax dollars for things they should go to to benefit society would do a lot of good. On top of correcting the overly generous taxation at the highest end of the curve. People making below $20 million a year don’t even count. One less military plane would equal significant boosts to spending in multiple areas important to US growth and power like education, and nutrition.


----------



## budda (Aug 25, 2020)

Well said.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 26, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I for one would really like an answer to your previous question.
> 
> Like do these people really care about people and their standard of living or do they only care about fucking rich people.
> 
> Minimun wage is a legal issue right. So if it's too low then it should be raised. Or does bezos have to pay for this in order for people to feel ok.



I'm assuming you mean people in this thread? Like those talking about ultrawealth? I'd say people have generally good intentions, but don't consider the bigger picture like the cost of their changes.

It's like the hyper fixation on the prominent figures in whatever topic is being discussed. Which isn't the be all end all answer.

General discussion has steered towards Billion(s) being too much money to have for any single person. Bezos paying more in taxes than he already pays wouldn't resolve anything. It wouldn't trickle down and affect people the way they think it does. Especially not in the long term, a scaled tax on the "1%" would be more effective, but you'd see returns in a few years of sustained wealth redistribution.

If the problem is living wage for Americans, then why not tackle minimum wage and intervene with the ultra wealthy involved in the industries producing basic necessities? Childcare has risen over 200% in cost since the 90's, and instead of posturing against a grossly bloated internet flea market. If you're after a more immediate living wage, increasing their base pay + regulating necessities seems like a better path to it.



Mathemagician said:


> Imagine thinking it’s fine to expect a single parent or a young married couple making ~$32k/yr each to just “suck it up and budget” AND commute 2 hrs+ to work because it’s cheaper, where in most states the population continuously votes down and form of cost effective public transport.
> 
> I especially don’t get it because what if the young hardworking broke couple wants to have a kid(s). They already work full time raising everyone else’s kid 8+ hours a day.
> 
> ...



The worries from white collar workers unhappy with minimum wage rising is unfounded in the first place.

Without fully understanding the effects of it, they will feel fear and anger at the thought of someone else making more than they did with less "work" to achieve it. But I think we all agree that a TRUE living wage shouldn't be "earned", it should be the default.

All the MIT Calculator for living wage showed me was the great disparity between locations.


----------



## Mathemagician (Aug 26, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> The worries from white collar workers unhappy with minimum wage rising is unfounded in the first place.
> 
> Without fully understanding the effects of it, they will feel fear and anger at the thought of someone else making more than they did with less "work" to achieve it. But I think we all agree that a TRUE living wage shouldn't be "earned", it should be the default.



You would think this would be a reasonable “starting point” for the discussion for anyone participating. But that means you haven’t read many of the posts, comments, or spoken to many people who had to struggle to build up to “working poor” (~$40-45k/yr outside most major cities).

Many (not all, obviously every individual is different) Low-paid white collar workers making between that $45-60k absolutely do not want to discuss a baseline level of livable wages, because it would mean admitting that they AREN’T middle class. That the $60k they make affords them the very baseline it takes to feel like a human being in a society and not a broke wage slave.

Middle class:
If a person cannot
1) pay for their their basic needs
2) any and all medical expenses
3) max out their 401k annually
4) take a single family vacation a year (doesn’t have to be fancy, taking a week off and piling into a car to drive to see the forests/mountains/beaches while staying in motels counts as a vacation)
5) and still have enough for a modest/cheap hobby then they aren’t middle class.

Middle class doesn’t mean “struggling but ok”. It means 1) Needs Met 2) Retirement savings on track 3) Time and energy for family activities.

Middle class isn’t picking and choosing, it’s all of them. It’s “I’m not rich but I’m good. I can either grind to get further ahead or coast but I get to CHOOSE”.

And a lot of people aren’t there yet. So they see a discussion of baseline needs as a threat to all their hard work.

However just “blaming the rich” distracts from those more nuanced discussions, just like “guess they hate success” does. 

Because everybody wants a sound bite and mic drop snarky comment. Not a discussion.

The first point is noting that $40k/yr is the baseline in most areas to do ok with a roommate. That’s it. It’s not sinister. And they’ll spend all of that money right back into the community.

I just think that at 40hrs a week minimum wage should get someone into the “working poor” group, not “wage slave”.


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 26, 2020)

Mathemagician said:


> You would think this would be a reasonable “starting point” for the discussion for anyone participating. But that means you haven’t read many of the posts, comments, or spoken to many people who had to struggle to build up to “working poor” (~$40-45k/yr outside most major cities).
> 
> Many (not all, obviously every individual is different) Low-paid white collar workers making between that $45-60k absolutely do not want to discuss a baseline level of livable wages, because it would mean admitting that they AREN’T middle class. That the $60k they make affords them the very baseline it takes to feel like a human being in a society and not a broke wage slave.
> 
> ...



I was reading some news or studies a while ago where you could be making something crazy like 800k post tax in a place like Silicon Valley and not meet all the middle class requirements you stated.

2 million in Manhattan barely gets you a place big enough to raise 2 kids.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 26, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I was reading some news or studies a while ago where you could be making something crazy like 800k post tax in a place like Silicon Valley and not meet all the middle class requirements you stated.
> 
> 2 million in Manhattan barely gets you a place big enough to raise 2 kids.



Are you saying a salary of two million, or a house costing two million?


----------



## Mathemagician (Aug 26, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> I was reading some news or studies a while ago where you could be making something crazy like 800k post tax in a place like Silicon Valley and not meet all the middle class requirements you stated.
> 
> 2 million in Manhattan barely gets you a place big enough to raise 2 kids.



This is true. It’s also, very fairly I might add, very difficult for someone in their late 40’s doing “just fine“ on $50k in Missouri to relate to. 

That’s why I listed that example about collusion between tech giants on wage fixing by reducing hiring competition. Just because they were making $175K doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have been closer to $225k+, it’s still wage suppression. 

It’s not just “blame landlords for high rents” it’s “Hey Mega Shopping Unlimited can absolutely pay enough to keep employees off of government assistance and be profitable, but they’ve lobbied to be able to pay so little and provide no health insurance that the rules don’t apply to them.” 

If people’s wages kept up with inflation then the ever increasing price of things wouldn’t be as much of an issue. 

Broadly, if you aren’t getting annual raises >3-5% and promotions every 2-3 years with 10-15%+ jumps in pay then you need to leave or your comp will stagnate. 

Again, not everyone has that option. So what do you do about 2% annual increases in costs? Healthcare costs are typically modeled at 4% annual increases mind you. 

That just isn’t a super easy “vote for X” thing to plan for. But at least people are talking about it now.


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 26, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Are you saying a salary of two million, or a house costing two million?



there ain't no houses in Manhattan. (there are but like not really).

but ya an apartment.


----------



## fantom (Aug 26, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> ok let me stop you right there.
> 
> zoos are not a luxury.
> 
> ...



In return, I'm going to call you out on trying to derail a conversation by focusing on an irrelevant detail. Insert any establishment or service that costs money and makes a kid and parents happy. The argument doesn't change. So who the hell cares about zoos being immoral in this discussion outside of it being an example that parents bring kids to. It could be Chucky Cheese, a movie theater, or Disneyland for all I care.


----------



## fantom (Aug 26, 2020)

First thanks for the well thought response. I don't have time right now to respond to every point.



Jonathan20022 said:


> Now comes the next part, the Corporation is making exponentially more than they pay their employees yet their employee's starting wage is livable. And that's what the thread is detailing, should the government intervene and regulate when corporate profits aren't trickling down to their base employees?



In my opinion, the government should be protecting people from companies preying on low wage employees. Consumers clearly can't do it themselves. In fact, it is against the interest of a consumer to want the salaries of employees to increase if companies make the items they buy more expensive. I'm not saying tons of regulations, I'm saying require more equity and paychecks when a company is profitable. Someone shouldn't be able to make $70 billion in 6 months while firing employees for calling for raises and health protections during an economic and health crisis. I'm referring to Amazon and the NJ warehouse workers.



Jonathan20022 said:


> How do the Ultra-rich get where they are? We're not in the 2000's and talking about Walmart paying their employees $7 an hour and letting the government pick up the remainder of the tab with welfare. That system is unequivocally fucking trash, no argument there. But it's a completely different landscape in 2019/2020



I agree Walmart tried to make progress, it wasn't enough to have one company barely move the needle. The Walton's are still some of the richest people in the world. So not much changed.



Jonathan20022 said:


> Maybe you're expecting me to say people shouldn't be paid more for their work, which isn't an idea I've presented nor represented at any point in this discussion.



I don't think you presented that idea. If anything, I think you underestimate cost of living and hardships families without nearby relatives face.


----------



## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 26, 2020)

fantom said:


> In return, I'm going to call you out on trying to derail a conversation by focusing on an irrelevant detail. Insert any establishment or service that costs money and makes a kid and parents happy. The argument doesn't change. So who the hell cares about zoos being immoral in this discussion outside of it being an example that parents bring kids to. It could be Chucky Cheese, a movie theater, or Disneyland for all I care.


Chuck E. Cheese*


----------



## jaxadam (Aug 26, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Chuck E. Cheese*



:fist bump:


----------



## fantom (Aug 26, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> Found this after doing some reading, their numbers seem pretty low in certain areas but they are dealing in averages so I'm not sure how applicable this is when you compare to living in different areas within a county. So for all intents and purpose, use this realizing that it's accounting for county averages.
> 
> https://livingwage.mit.edu/



Then 2 example counties (California and Florida) in conditions I raised before are $42/hr and $26/hr. So ya, $15 is plenty to make people satisfied in life.


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 26, 2020)

fantom said:


> In return, I'm going to call you out on trying to derail a conversation by focusing on an irrelevant detail. Insert any establishment or service that costs money and makes a kid and parents happy. The argument doesn't change. So who the hell cares about zoos being immoral in this discussion outside of it being an example that parents bring kids to. It could be Chucky Cheese, a movie theater, or Disneyland for all I care.



sup casual animal slaver


----------



## narad (Aug 26, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Chuck E. Cheese*



That's just a zoo for furries


----------



## Wuuthrad (Aug 26, 2020)

Wait so Bezos actually pays taxes? 

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/04/ama...come-taxes-for-the-first-time-since-2016.html

1.62 mil out of 13.9 billion? Nice tax rate right there. Keep pounding those nails homey, you’ll get there someday. lmao


----------



## Drew (Aug 27, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> Wait so Bezos actually pays taxes?
> 
> https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/04/ama...come-taxes-for-the-first-time-since-2016.html
> 
> 1.62 mil out of 13.9 billion? Nice tax rate right there. Keep pounding those nails homey, you’ll get there someday. lmao


I apologize if this comes across a little flip.... 

...but to pay federal income taxes, you first have to have federal taxable _income_. Amazon hasn't done this much in the last decade or so, as they've been focused on investing for future growth (non-capitalizable expenses are written off in the period they occur, whereas capitalizable capital expenditures are amortized over the useful life of the investment, and in either case all or part of the expense is netted against revenue when determining what's actually "profit"). It's only really in the last couple years as their cloud business has taken off that they've been consistently profitable, the "Amazon.com" service as we know it has been struggling to breakeven for some time now based on the size of capital investment and the fairly narrow margins. This article doesn't provide much color, but I suspect a lot of those "tax credits" are prior-period carryforward losses.


----------



## Drew (Aug 27, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> Lol... yea, it’s from the Debt Clock App- “History of Money.” More of an “info“ post than opinion really...


It's got a VERY specific axe to grind, and it's mostly bullshit.  I start just tuning out when people bring up fiat money, because frankly it's not worth it. If nothing else, the libertarian gold bugs always seem to conveniently forget that gold is a commodity too, and subject to the same laws of supply and demand as any other commodity...


----------



## Randy (Aug 27, 2020)

Drew said:


> I apologize if this comes across a little flip....
> 
> ...but to pay federal income taxes, you first have to have federal taxable _income_. Amazon hasn't done this much in the last decade or so, as they've been focused on investing for future growth (non-capitalizable expenses are written off in the period they occur, whereas capitalizable capital expenditures are amortized over the useful life of the investment, and in either case all or part of the expense is netted against revenue when determining what's actually "profit"). It's only really in the last couple years as their cloud business has taken off that they've been consistently profitable, the "Amazon.com" service as we know it has been struggling to breakeven for some time now based on the size of capital investment and the fairly narrow margins. This article doesn't provide much color, but I suspect a lot of those "tax credits" are prior-period carryforward losses.



For laymen, how does a business their size not break even but the value of the stock, value of the business beyond the stock market and the value of it's CEO soar? To common folk, other than trouble grasping how a company Amazon's size fails to break even, is the perception not breaking even means failing, yet their CEO is one of the wealthiest people in the world by virtue of his stock in that company. Is Amazon in reality spending that much compared to what they take in or is there some slight of hand?

Your explanation sounds like how Amazon _dodges_ paying taxes more than why they _shouldn't_ be paying taxes.


----------



## diagrammatiks (Aug 27, 2020)

Randy said:


> For laymen, how does a business their size not break even but the value of the stock, value of the business beyond the stock market and the value of it's CEO soar? To common folk, other than trouble grasping how a company Amazon's size fails to break even, is the perception not breaking even means failing, yet their CEO is one of the wealthiest people in the world by virtue of his stock in that company. Is Amazon in reality spending that much compared to what they take in or is there some slight of hand?
> 
> Your explanation sounds like how Amazon _dodges_ paying taxes more than why they _shouldn't_ be paying taxes.



Because valuations are made up. It's just an agreed upon number by investors for what the stock of the company should be sold and bought at. 

For most of amazon's life it was spending more then it's revenue. But amazon does stupid big revenue. Over a trillion dollars in revenue. 

But you're stock holdings are only worth as much as what someone else is willing to pay for it. Which is why bezos will never actually have 170 billion dollars. He'd never be able to liquidate 10 percent without severely impacting the value of the stock.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 27, 2020)

Measuring a business' worth by it's revenue is pretty surface level, and operating at a loss as long as you produce returns to stay relatively close to or above water can be a much bigger indicator of booming business.

Amazon spends all of their money laying down the infrastructure for what will eventually be their invasion into several industries. If you turn trillions in revenue consistently, then investing is smart because the second you begin turning a profit and if business is still growing as much as it is, it'll pay off for investors.

Jeff was in this for the long term, and he convinced enough people to invest in his business to get to this point. Amazon isn't going anywhere, they're here to stay.


----------



## Randy (Aug 27, 2020)

Okay, so short answer, nothing's wrong with Amazon paying little to no taxes, and Bezos is only capable of being mega-wealthy, not ultra-wealthy?


----------



## fantom (Aug 27, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> Because valuations are made up. It's just an agreed upon number by investors for what the stock of the company should be sold and bought at.
> 
> For most of amazon's life it was spending more then it's revenue. But amazon does stupid big revenue. Over a trillion dollars in revenue.
> 
> But you're stock holdings are only worth as much as what someone else is willing to pay for it. Which is why bezos will never actually have 170 billion dollars. He'd never be able to liquidate 10 percent without severely impacting the value of the stock.


Stock value for a company like Amazon are based on what people are buying and selling stock at. It isn't some magical number.

Think of it like gear. If you have 30 identical guitars, you can claim they are worth 3 million each, that is you view of made up valuation. If you can sell 20 of them at 2000 each, then the other 10 are worth 2000 regardless of whether or not you sell them.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 27, 2020)

Randy said:


> Okay, so short answer, nothing's wrong with Amazon paying little to no taxes, and Bezos is only capable of being mega-wealthy, not ultra-wealthy?



The slippery slope of this is that Bezos has too much, and once he's gone it'll be the next down the list and so on.

I think the way you're phrasing this is pretty one sided, if you make x amount of money and retain none of it all while continuously pumping r&d with any money you make. Then you make literally no money on paper, so what is there to tax?

If you're against tax breaks, then there's your real answer. The US is retroactively rewarding businesses who invest in their own infrastructure and expand, which Amazon has done consistently since inception.

I've already said I'm not even pro Amazon, because their marketplace has been shit for years and they provide no benefit to me as a consumer. So I'm not here to get labeled a white knight for Bezos, but I find it hard to see folks just blatantly ignoring the numbers.

The article posted a few comments up lays it out:
*
Amazon Reported in 2019*
$280.5 Billion in Total Revenue
$13.9 Billion in Pre-tax income
$162 Million in Federal-tax payments of the above number.
$276 Million in State-tax payments
$2.4 Billion in Payroll taxes/customs & duties

$1 Billion in Deferred Federal Taxes, $914 Million left after last year's Federal Tax Balance.

The notion that they're just operating under the shady pre-tense that they can exist in the country while paying no taxes at all is a wild reach to me. They could certainly be taxed MORE, and I'm not against that, but there's more at play that is reported publicly.

If Tax Credits/Breaks allow Amazon to operate how they do, it's the most reckless early business model and it seemingly paid off. And because the number is unfathomable to most people, it's somehow a bad thing to make that amount of money.

If anyone can seriously look at the above information and not reach the conclusion of, "Amazon doesn't pay (any/that much) tax, but it's a direct result of legitimate tax breaks offered by the government". Then I'm not really sure where to go from here.

If we're really posturing against malicious wealth, then it's probably a more effective use of time to look into Churches and Megachurch Preachers selling people snake oil corona fixes. Churches that qualify ACTUALLY pay nothing in taxes


----------



## Randy (Aug 27, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> The slippery slope of this is that Bezos has too much, and once he's gone it'll be the next down the list and so on.
> 
> I think the way you're phrasing this is pretty one sided, if you make x amount of money and retain none of it all while continuously pumping r&d with any money you make. Then you make literally no money on paper, so what is there to tax?
> 
> ...



I appreciate the effort (even if it's snarky) but it's still whitewash. As said earlier, Amazon has enough cashflow to "re-invest" into ancillary industries or things that are entirely unrelated into infinity.

I used the example of the robber barons, where they get into one business, suck all the oxygen out of the room until there's no viable competition, then "re-invest" their money into buying out all the related industries they'd otherwise have to pay (ie: I own the oil wells, so then I buy all the oil refineries, then I buy up all the trains, and then I buy up all the railroads).

Your description of Amazon's reinvestment is accurate. Your claim they're reinvesting the money within the rules of the US tax code is probably accurate. Your excusing the way they use it as not shady is conjecture. As I said earlier, at any other time "reinvesting" by buying up every industry you're not in or industry you rely on to deliver your product WOULD be considered a monopoly.


----------



## Jonathan20022 (Aug 27, 2020)

Randy said:


> I appreciate the effort (even if it's snarky) but it's still whitewash. As said earlier, Amazon has enough cashflow to "re-invest" into ancillary industries or things that are entirely unrelated into infinity.
> 
> I used the example of the robber barons, where they get into one business, suck all the oxygen out of the room until there's no viable competition, then "re-invest" their money into buying out all the related industries they'd otherwise have to pay (ie: I own the oil wells, so then I buy all the oil refineries, then I buy up all the trains, and then I buy up all the railroads).
> 
> Your description of Amazon's reinvestment is accurate. Your claim they're reinvesting the money within the rules of the US tax code is probably accurate. Your excusing the way they use it as not shady is conjecture. As I said earlier, at any other time "reinvesting" by buying up every industry you're not in or industry you rely on to deliver your product WOULD be considered a monopoly.



Amazon's Marketplace isn't a traditional monopoly in the first place, a business of their level could become anti-competitive very quickly, but if lawmakers are having a hard time pinning Amazon for it then I'm going to have to drop that point. A single business essentially owning the entire digital marketplace is a dangerous thought indeed, but it isn't there yet. You don't get arrested for a pre-meditated crime without proof that it was pre-meditated.

But in terms of the industries Amazon's invaded,

*Cloud Computing *- This is their most dominant market, and outpaced businesses like Citrix 10:1. Every tech job I've worked since 2014 has had AWS at it's core, they're massive and their handle businesses extremely well, nevermind their expansion into Government Agencies.

*Pharma *- Fuck Big Pharma, medicine is an essential market and Amazon acquiring PillPack/Drugstore to disrupt the highly corrupt pharmaceutical industry is a huge plus. Even if not to get medicine to people who need it in a more convenient way, the last time I had a prescription and had to walk into a CVS to get it, it was a huge hassle. Nevermind the cost, Big Pharma can live with being disrupted.

*Grocery Markets* - Pressuring competition to price competitively with their entrance and buying Whole Foods hasn't resulted in a monopoly, but Prime integration and costs savings has brought Whole Food's market share higher for sure.

*Device Installation/Repair* - Fairly decent reach for products bought on their site with reliable third party support under the Amazon banner. When your competition is the likes of Geek Squad, sitting as the most dominant force in that industry is a positive thing. Speaking from experience since my family's business was directly in this industry, we saw very little change in the residential space, but we operated on commercial level security in the first place so.
*
Book & Publishing Industry* - Their venture into the Book Industry hurt big players and publishing companies more than anyone, their entire model is branded on low cost/convenience. What customer isn't going to flock to them if that's their ultimate choice as a consumer? The Kindle turned the industry upside down, and their subscription based model made it easier than ever for customers to read on demand in the most convenient manner possible. They twisted the arm of big publishers to increase their cut on their own platform, and ended up opening their own Publishing company that has helped independent writers push their works out more than ever before. They have their rules and demands to sell on their platform, and this is definitely one of the cornered industries you mentioned. But Amazon began as a Book Selling company in the first place.

*Entertainment Streaming* - Pretty low market share in the first place between their music and video/movie streaming. Their original content is the best case for their platform, and they're as consistent as the competition with producing great original content in the first place. No Monopoly.

*Social Media* - Amazon Spark shut down last year

*Mobile Phones* - Colossal Failure

*Shipping and Delivery* - Probably one of their biggest industries, developing their own infrastructure to bring customers their products faster and cheaper than Fedex/UPS who are currently charging astronomical prices for their services in the middle of a pandemic. 

*Retail* - Depending on how their foray into competing with WalMart/Target/Costco/etc goes, it will have a major effect on the entire industry. Retail is definitely the wild card, and I hardly think the Waltons and Co are going to turn over and let their brand die from Amazon opening up shop across America. There is huge potential for monopolizing the physical retail space, but we'll have to see how this turns out.

There's a lot of failures mixed in there, and a few true successful ventures that have paid off so far. At worst they've cornered the market, and at best they've stirred industries up and lit a fire under the ass of businesses sitting comfortably with no real major competition.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 27, 2020)

https://www.businessinsider.com/bez...-set-up-guillotine-demand-higher-wages-2020-8

Guillotine outside Bezos house now, time for the revolution.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 27, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> https://www.businessinsider.com/bez...-set-up-guillotine-demand-higher-wages-2020-8
> 
> Guillotine outside Bezos house now, time for the revolution.


Are you in support of using the guillotine if they do not get their way?


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## Randy (Aug 27, 2020)

The Brazen Bull would also work


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## SpaceDock (Aug 27, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> Are you in support of using the guillotine if they do not get their way?



Of course not, they are ridiculous.


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## iamaom (Aug 27, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> *Social Media* - Amazon Spark shut down last year
> *Mobile Phones* - Colossal Failure


I think it's hilarious how poor the leadership and market research has been with these two in particular. They're so transparently cheap knock-offs of per-exisiting and established brands, with the sole purpose to get you to buy shit from amazon. When people use instagram (or youtube, or google, or whatever) and are eventually led to paying for something (like with a discount code from their favorite channel), it as if the consumer made an organic informed decision by themselves. My phone is a multi-tool that I just happen to use for shopping, not a dedicated shopping device that happens to be able to call people. It's bizarre how much money can be spent and how little the company seems to have learned about consumer behavior.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 27, 2020)

Jonathan20022 said:


> You don't get arrested for a pre-meditated crime without proof that it was pre-meditated.



Nah, they’ll just shoot you in the back...


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## fantom (Aug 27, 2020)

So the thread started August 5th. It is still August and his net worth went up another 30 billion?!

It has been 17 business days. If he was a salaried employee, he is making $220 million per hour. What the actual hell. He could literally have paid all amazon employees and contractors the equivalent of $260/hr in equity. This is ridiculous.

I'm sure he "earned" every penny.

Edit: fix math


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## Randy (Aug 28, 2020)

Yeah but he can't cash all of that out at once so he's basically poor.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 28, 2020)

We should riot until the government starts to see things our way and bankrupts every rich billionaire and millionaire. Only then can Our Utopia be achieved.


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## diagrammatiks (Aug 28, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> We should riot until the government starts to see things our way and bankrupts every rich billionaire and millionaire. Only then can Our Utopia be achieved.



ya don't worry that stocks aren't actually cash. and if you give someone a stock they still don't have any cash.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 28, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> We should riot until the government starts to see things our way and bankrupts every rich billionaire and millionaire. Only then can Our Utopia be achieved.



I’d settle for a democracy. 

I don’t know about you but I’ve had enough of failed millionaires pretending to be politicians!


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## narad (Aug 28, 2020)

Randy said:


> Okay, so short answer, nothing's wrong with Amazon paying little to no taxes, and Bezos is only capable of being mega-wealthy, not ultra-wealthy?



I believe the term is giga-wealthy.


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## jaxadam (Aug 28, 2020)

fantom said:


> So the thread started August 5th. It is still August and his net worth went up another 30 billion?!
> 
> It has been 17 business days. If he was a salaried employee, he is making $220 million per hour. What the actual hell. He could literally have paid all amazon employees and contractors the equivalent of $260/hr in equity. This is ridiculous.
> 
> ...



Did all 30 billion get direct deposited into his Bank of America free checking account so that he can pay rent, get some uber eats, a new iphone, and his Spotify subscription?



diagrammatiks said:


> ya don't worry that stocks aren't actually cash. and if you give someone a stock they still don't have any cash.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 28, 2020)

diagrammatiks said:


> ya don't worry that stocks aren't actually cash. and if you give someone a stock they still don't have any cash.


He's Scrooge mcducking in cash. What are you talking about?



Wuuthrad said:


> I’d settle for a democracy.
> 
> I don’t know about you but I’ve had enough of failed millionaires pretending to be politicians!


If you listen to fools, the mob rules!

(If you say the riff didn't start playing your head, I'll say you're a liar!)


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## Necris (Aug 28, 2020)

Wuuthrad said:


> I’d settle for a democracy.
> 
> I don’t know about you but I’ve had enough of failed millionaires pretending to be politicians!


But you could have Schrodinger's Billionaire as a president!


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## Randy (Aug 28, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> He's Scrooge mcducking in cash. What are you talking about?



Well where did we end up, he has actually $3b in cash? How many cubic feet does that take up in coins and small bills?


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 28, 2020)

Randy said:


> Well where did we end up, he has actually $3b in cash? How many cubic feet does that take up in coins and small bills?



Im thinking “stockpile”... a double entendre... and “hoards”... (the irony of “hoarders” as mentally ill, many who buy his products, while he hoards all the money, seems lost on most...)


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 28, 2020)

Randy said:


> Well where did we end up, he has actually $3b in cash? How many cubic feet does that take up in coins and small bills?


I bet a sex worker would know.


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## fantom (Aug 28, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> I bet a sex worker would know.



Is this trying to be funny? I don't see the purpose of this post at all.


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## fantom (Aug 28, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> Did all 30 billion get direct deposited into his Bank of America free checking account so that he can pay rent, get some uber eats, a new iphone, and his Spotify subscription?



This isn't the first time you have said something like this. This mentality is rather idiotic. Any finance person will tell you stocks are liquid assets. I can agree that selling 100 billion worth of amazon stock will tank the stock value, which is why I never suggested he do that. He should increase pay and equity for employees. He can easily stock split and create non-voting shares so employees can be rewarded more.

https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/032715/what-items-are-considered-liquid-assets.asp



> Stocks and marketable securities, which are considered liquid assets because these assets can be converted to cash in a relatively short period of time in the event of a financial emergency


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## jaxadam (Aug 28, 2020)

fantom said:


> This isn't the first time you have said something like this. This mentality is rather idiotic. Any finance person will tell you stocks are liquid assets. I can agree that selling 100 billion worth of amazon stock will tank the stock value, which is why I never suggested he do that. He should increase pay and equity for employees. He can easily stock split and create non-voting shares so employees can be rewarded more.
> 
> https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/032715/what-items-are-considered-liquid-assets.asp



I am so glad you brought me up to speed. I’ve always heard the word stock, but it just has so many meanings, like a broth, part of a gun, etc. that I just never really know.


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## fantom (Aug 28, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I am so glad you brought me up to speed. I’ve always heard the word stock, but it just has so many meanings, like a broth, part of a gun, etc. that I just never really know.



You really are a proud troll. I'm going back to ignoring you.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 28, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I am so glad you brought me up to speed. I’ve always heard the word stock, but it just has so many meanings, like a broth, part of a gun, etc. that I just never really know.



I prefer bone stock, boiled from the soft bones of the freshly decapitated Bourgeois...

There are legions of strippers preparing the next feast, have any of you thirst for the real wealth of souls?


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## jaxadam (Aug 28, 2020)

Double post


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## jaxadam (Aug 28, 2020)

Triple post.


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## Wuuthrad (Aug 28, 2020)

fantom said:


> You really are a proud troll. I'm going back to ignoring you.



Fine and dandy sir, might I assume?

I am OG Troll, b4 the advent of digital delusion and cyber warfare, you would not recognize me b4 it’s too late. 

I SO GRACIOUSLY WARN THEE-

DO NOT TAKE THE NAME TROLL IN VAIN! 

FROM THIS POINT FORWARD!

LESS YEE WANT TO JOIN THE STOCK!


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 28, 2020)

fantom said:


> Is this trying to be funny? I don't see the purpose of this post at all.


Too bad.


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## SpaceDock (Aug 28, 2020)

fantom said:


> You really are a proud troll. I'm going back to ignoring you.



No point in trying to have any productive conversation with a few people on here. They throw out trash then resort to nonsense when their ability to make an intelligent argument falls short.


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## jaxadam (Aug 28, 2020)

SpaceDock said:


> No point in trying to have any productive conversation with a few people on here. They throw out trash then resort to nonsense when their ability to make an intelligent argument falls short.



I thought we were buddies?


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## SpaceDock (Aug 28, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I thought we were buddies?



I think we’ll keep it to guitar stuff and other non politic topics.


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 28, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> I thought we were buddies?


The bromance is over! </3


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## SpaceDock (Aug 29, 2020)




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## jaxadam (Aug 29, 2020)

Spaced Out Ace said:


> The bromance is over! </3


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## Spaced Out Ace (Aug 29, 2020)




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## Daemoniac (Aug 29, 2020)

I'll let you guess where I stand. Take all the time you need.


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## Drew (Aug 31, 2020)

Randy said:


> For laymen, how does a business their size not break even but the value of the stock, value of the business beyond the stock market and the value of it's CEO soar? To common folk, other than trouble grasping how a company Amazon's size fails to break even, is the perception not breaking even means failing, yet their CEO is one of the wealthiest people in the world by virtue of his stock in that company. Is Amazon in reality spending that much compared to what they take in or is there some slight of hand?
> 
> Your explanation sounds like how Amazon _dodges_ paying taxes more than why they _shouldn't_ be paying taxes.


Sorry, been offline for a few days. 

Basically, because Amazon, even 20 years in, is still a pretty classic "growth" company, where their valuation is based on extremely rapid revenue growth, the expectation that expenses and capex will at some point stabilize, and at some point down the road their earnings will be high, so they deserve a much higher multiple than a "mature" business when it comes to valuation, because the investor concensus is at some point their earnings WILL support their valuation.. If you want an even more egregious example it's TSLA - they haven't even been consistently cashflow positive, yet investors are so giddy for their future earnings that they're now one of the most valuable car makers in the world, based on market cap. I'm more willing to give Amazon the benefit of the doubt here than Tesla - Bezos' "Day Zero" philisophy is to never stop treating his company like a startup, while Musk seems disinterested in, alternately, turning a profit, taking being a CEO of a car company seriously, or doing much of anything but trolling on Twitter. 

Again, the irony for Amazon is they're best known for e-commerce, but that side of the business hasn't consistently been profitable, though it seems to finally have reached sustained profitability in the US. It's the cloud computing segment that's really been the operational segment responsible for driving them to profitability, which for most of us seems like a very auxiliary business for them. In fact, over time, if you want to put your tinfoil hat on, one plausible attack they're going to have to be very careful to not create a set of facts that could potgentially support this read, now that the cloud segment is driving overall profitability, they could certainly afford to run their ecommerce segments at an operational loss to grow market share - if they're not careful and don't maintain both cashflow and accounting profitability here, I could see regulators having a thing or two to say about this.


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## Drew (Aug 31, 2020)

fantom said:


> So the thread started August 5th. It is still August and his net worth went up another 30 billion?!
> 
> It has been 17 business days. If he was a salaried employee, he is making $220 million per hour. What the actual hell. He could literally have paid all amazon employees and contractors the equivalent of $260/hr in equity. This is ridiculous.
> 
> ...


I mean, I get what you're saying, and the fact the pandemic has been VERY good to e-commerce companies is undeniable... but, not really. 

The problem is Jeff Bezos' _personal_ wealth, and Amazon as a company, are very clearly related, but Jeff Bezos the person, and Jeff Bezos the CEO of Amazon, are two different entities, from the perspective of the corporation. If Bezos were to sell stock equal to the $30 billion in appreciation of Amazon stock he's seen over the last month, it wouldn't be cash that Amazon would have access to for payroll purposes. He would need to then somehow invest it back into the company, very likely via a private equity offering, which would probably piss off current investors as it would somewhat dilute their existing shares, at which point the cash would belong to Amazon and the company could do what they wanted with it. 

tl;dr - Amazon is a corporation, not some sort of a private partnership where the assets of its owners were technically assets of the firm, as well (years ago I worked for a firm structured this way, though nowhere near the partner level, and if the firm itself were to fail then each partners' private assets were technically available to settle the debts of the firm, meaning they bore full liability for its operations.)


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## jaxadam (Aug 31, 2020)

Drew said:


> tl;dr - Amazon is a corporation, not some sort of a private partnership where the assets of its owners were technically assets of the firm, as well (years ago I worked for a firm structured this way, though nowhere near the partner level, and if the firm itself were to fail then each partners' private assets were technically available to settle the debts of the firm, meaning they bore full liability for its operations.)



What would be the difference in that structure vs the debt obligations of say an LLC, which technically removes a business owners private assets, with that of a personal guarantee clause which in essence brings them back into the fold?


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## Drew (Sep 1, 2020)

jaxadam said:


> What would be the difference in that structure vs the debt obligations of say an LLC, which technically removes a business owners private assets, with that of a personal guarantee clause which in essence brings them back into the fold?


I mean, corporate law is not my area of expertise... 

...but I'd think that it would probably depend on the strength of that guarantee and the ease with which it could be revoked. If it was relatively straightforward, then the guarantee would essentially be worthless, and if it was ironbclad, then it;'s a bit of a trick question because it wouldn't reallt be a LLC at all, unless there were only specific assets that were held to the guarantee. Either way, this would be tough for a company like Amazon, which is publicly traded so anyone who owns shares is an owner. 

That's a distinction worth thinking about though when we're talking about Jeff Bezos' wealth, and whether it's morally right for him to be as wealthy as he is. He's wealthy (about $202 billion per Bloomberg) because he owns a fucking _lot_ of Amazon shares, but his stake is only about 10.9% of shares outstanding. From a pure ownership standpoint, while he's been a very successful CEO and the board and shareholders have generally given him a lot of leeway, he can't actually do whatever he want running the company because about 89% of the company is owned by People Who Are Not Jeff Bezos.


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## tacotiklah (Sep 10, 2020)

Daemoniac said:


> I'll let you guess where I stand. Take all the time you need.



Uhhh... you're that person that thinks Bezos is okay?   <3


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## Daemoniac (Sep 11, 2020)

tacotiklah said:


> Uhhh... you're that person that thinks Bezos is okay?   <3



You caught me.


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