wslackTerry Pratchett was wise
your_huckleberry@wslack but Mastodon keeps telling me that everything that's wrong is because of the Billionaires?
The OwlChemistThe error is, most certainly, the mindset that blame can be placed on just one person/entity/group.
They absolutely do plot behind cigars and brandy. They bastardize every good system we create for common good. They undermine the collective will.
Billionaires should not exist. They do Very Bad Things to exist. They are rightly due Their blame, for sure. But we own blame as well, for we have yet to eat them.
@owlchemist @your_huckleberry I would respectfully still say you are generalizing. There are different ways to make a lot of money and founding a company that becomes quite valuable gets it done, even if the holder of the equity has done no scheming and has little liquid money (and sometimes their companies are worth that much even while running at a loss).
I would grant that all billionaires are subject to poor incentives to use their money in harmful ways, but that doesn't make someone inherently bad.
DB Schwein@wslack @owlchemist @your_huckleberry
There is no way to legitimately make a billion dollars. No company is legitimately worth a billion dollars, they're made that way by manipulation of the stock market. When you look under the covers (or into the books) there is abuse of the workers, tax evasion, buying off gov't officials, etc.
There shouldn't be billionaires because there is no way to legitimately make a billion dollars.
@deirdrebeth @wslack @your_huckleberry Every billionaire is a Dangerous policy failure that pairs well with white whine.
Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱@your_huckleberry @wslack No. Mastodon has never told you that... Some people *on* Mastondon may have told you that. Just remember that all generalisations are wrong, including this one!
Claude@bytebro billionaires are bad people. I don't give a damn about any rationalization you use to not make a généralisation out of them but they are bad. They exploit other people's work, who they pay below a living wage. They speculate on food market prices. They privatize water sources. They have the collective power to get the ressources of the world more equally distributed but they don't. They are bad. @your_huckleberry @wslack
@switch I'm fine with Bill Gates being a billionaire. Microsoft average salary is $126k. I don't even work for Microsoft, but I earn a living wage, because many years ago I became a Microsoft Certified Professional. Nobody is stealing my labor. If I wanted to I could go out on my own, as a consultant. I don't want that, it's too much stress. For that matter, if I wanted to be a communist, I could. It's not illegal. There are lots of worker owned companies or communes I could join.
@your_huckleberry average salary doesn't mean anything if the person cleaning the bathroom is earning minimum wage.
@switch I don't think people are bad because they didn't solve every problem for every person they ever had contact with, or for the world entire.
Toilet cleaners at Microsoft make $21/hr. I suppose you could argue that $21/hr is what minimum wage should be if it had risen to keep pace with the overall economy.
@your_huckleberry being a billionaire is morally wrong.
AdeptVeritatisIt is already in the text: "No-one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them."
Yes, conversations here on Mastodon with people, looking at themselves and not at others, are VERY rare.
But be the one, who is not joining them. Don't talk about those people. Don't ask such kind of questions.
Talk about patterns, you think you recognized.
Explain ideas.
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people."
Eleanor Roosevelt
Be the one, discussing ideas.
Yesterday I was commenting on an event. I immediately had "average" replies. - My fault! Should not have started at all. Or talk about the idea behind it.