He earned it thru hard work!!!

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Every time there is an article about Bezos, Musk or said other cunt and their wealth (which seems to be increasingly often) this results in a discussion about their right to hold such sums of money.

Invariably some responses will, with all earnest Protestant ethics, claim that it is simply entirely due to his own input and hard work, and the money is therefore his to enjoy.

No amount of reasoning can apparently overcome this mentality. Even if you use an analogy of limited oxygen, and Bezos finding a way to ensure he stockpiles most of the oxygen, by making other people work for him for oxygen rations... even with this plain and simple example, they don't get it.

You can go on to explain how removing this money from the economy gradually damages people. Democratically, their working conditions, their quality of life, their health and well being, and how it is ultimately unsustainable, leading not only to economic but ecological collapse.

But why worry about that because IT HIS MONEY HE EARNT IT

What sort of brain disease is this, and can it be treated?

[Huxleys Babkins]

NAME ME A COUNTRY WHERE SOCIALISM WORKED.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Basically they still believe in the lie that America is Meritocracy.

"Thus did a handful of rapacious citizens come to control all that was worth controlling in America. Thus was the savage and stupid and entirely inappropriate and unnecessary and humorless American class system created. Honest, industrious, peaceful citizens were classed as bloodsuckers, if they asked to be paid a living wage. And they saw that praise was reserved henceforth for those who devised means of getting paid enormously for committing crimes against which no laws had been passed. Thus the American dream turned belly up, turned green, bobbed to the scummy surface of cupidity unlimited, filled with gas, went bang in the noonday sun."

[Famous Mortimer]

I use the median income argument, which doesn't work that much either but it's fun. The median income in the US at the moment is $61,000. It would take someone nearly 3 million years at median wage levels to earn what Jeff Bezos has now. I ask "has Jeff Bezos done 3 million years worth of work, do you think?" Now, most people just call me a smug prick, but...I don't know, it's as good a tactic as anything else (other than stringing the useless fucker up, Mussolini style, and taking all his money).

[Fambo Number Mive]

This is shown with the Republicans not wanting low income housing in suburban areas. Even if they are poor themselves, they regard poverty as caused by laziness. Asking people "Well l, you work 40 hours a week and only earn £15k. By your logic  that.means you don't work hard, so would you care to revise your theory?" doesn't work. No wonder conservatives love Trump. They see him as someone who worked really hard to get his money. It's like they think everyone is on performance related pay, and probably one reason why conservatives hate workers rights. For them someone's worth is mainly about how much money they earn.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

That's a very useful example that ought to work, perhaps, I'm not sure some of those involved understand the meaning of median.

[Sebastian Cobb]

HE CREATES JOBS THOUGH

[Wonderful Butternut]

You can bet none of them work in an Amazon warehouse or anything similar.

I think a lot are lost causes. Aside from people who just red-bait, there's plenty living a fantasy whereby they think either:

1) If a person works hard enough and gets a couple of lucky breaks, they too will be obscenely rich like Bezos and Musk. So billionaires must be allowed keep all their money so I can keep all mine once I join them.

or, more common than that:

2) I'm in some comfortable mid-level job. I'm not minted, but I have a decent house, a car that doesn't break down every week, food, heat, and enough left after paying for those things that I can afford a bottle of wine and a holiday every now and then. Everyone should be able to reach that point, since I was able to. Things like generational economic disadvantage, discrimination on race, gender, social background etc. aren't real obstacles because I didn't personally encounter them. So anyone who can't get to at least my level is failure, and it doesn't matter that Musk has infinity money because everyone who doesn't have enough to live comfortably must be a failure. Why should Musk subsidise failures?


There's also the 'cult of work' that someone had a thread about a couple of months ago too. Work in it's own right is wonderful, sacred, purifying and makes the person better off. So Bezos deserves to have more money than any human could possibly ever need to meet their needs because of all the wonderful work he does. And as for his workers, well they're working aren't they? So even if they're barely making ends meet whilst their boss rakes in figures that ordinary people struggle to truly comprehend, it's okay! Because their spirits are being made wholesome and pure because of all the work they're doing.

[Mr_Simnock]

What is most amount of money\wealth anyone should be able to possess at any sort of ethical level then?

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

What is most amount of money\wealth anyone should be able to possess at any sort of ethical level then?

I think people becoming obscenely wealthy is to an extent inevitable. It is the system we have that produces those results.

If we obliged people above a certain level of wealth to use their earnings and keep that money actively circulating in the economy that would be a start. Lavish spending at least goes somewhere out of their pockets.

To move on to answering the question, I don't have a figure or threshold, but we, I assume agree with income tax and other aspects like capital gains tax and corporation tax, so it doesn't seem ridiculous to draw another load of lines with the objective of minimising excess stockpiling of wealth, perhaps even criminalising it and encouraging it to be put back into the economy. There is no convincing moral argument I can think of against this.

[PlanktonSideburns]

muksys dad got a goldmine. total morris in IT crowd situation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAWvvE9w6Po

[BlodwynPig]

NAME ME A COUNTRY WHERE SOCIALISM WORKED.

NAME ME A COUNTRY WHERE CAPITALISM WORKED.

[Blumf]

If we obliged people above a certain level of wealth to use their earnings and keep that money actively circulating in the economy that would be a start. Lavish spending at least goes somewhere out of their pockets.

I don't think that works. Bezo etc. don't have idle bank accounts[nb]Even there, the money would still be active in the economy[/nb] with lots of zeros in them, or stacks of banknotes under the mattress. Their wealth is held in active items, like the companies they own, stocks, shares and bonds, and land. The money is circulating, it's just that it's all providing (mostly) unearned returns to them.

A fairer tax system (that's properly enforced) would be a real start.

[Huxleys Babkins]

NAME ME A COUNTRY WHERE CAPITALISM WORKED.

OH, JUST A LITTLE PLACE CALLED THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, THE ONLY FREE COUNTRY ON EARTH.

[Kelvin]

Don't know why some people are pinning this on America. Half the "up by the bootstraps" cunts in this country think the same way. 

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

I use the median income argument, which doesn't work that much either but it's fun. The median income in the US at the moment is $61,000. It would take someone nearly 3 million years at median wage levels to earn what Jeff Bezos has now. I ask "has Jeff Bezos done 3 million years worth of work, do you think?" Now, most people just call me a smug prick, but...I don't know, it's as good a tactic as anything else (other than stringing the useless fucker up, Mussolini style, and taking all his money).

you can simplify this argument by asking why nurses aren't all rich.

[Shit Good Nose]

you can simplify this argument by asking why nurses aren't all rich.

Cos they don't work hard enough.  Lazy workshy cunts.

[Fambo Number Mive]

Conservatives in the UK tend to dislike nurses because they don't generate money but save lives instead. Maybe it's different in the USA.

[Dex Sawash]

Munny had dey day

[popcorn]

Personally I can't think of a reason why anyone needs to be a billionaire - to the extent that if you removed 50% of their wealth they probably would experience no actual difference, there being not enough things in the world you can actually spend a billion dollars on - and support massive taxes or other measures to redistribute the money.

However, the idea that Bezos simply worked harder isn't really the whole argument is it? Isn't it also that he, to use a horrible 90s phrase, worked smarter? In capitalist terms he outperformed the competition - and all the suckers stacking shelves in Tesco - not because he simply worked harder but because his ideas and decisions were better. Capitalism is supposed to reward innovation, not just elbow grease.

(Of course it's not really that simple - there are a billion complex reasons as to why Bezos is as wealthy as he is, and most of them can't be credited to him.)

[bgmnts]

In the US, this attitude is (barely) excusable because they have it drummed into them that they will be the next millionaire/billionaire too with enough elbow grease.

But you get this attitude here too, what the fuco is our excuse?

[Sherringford Hovis]

Cunts gonna cunt.

[DistressedArea]

It's pretty hard work being a burglar, but no-one ever stops to think about the hours they put in.

[Pingers]

I think it is linked to people's desire to think that what they have is a result of their own hard work and sage wisdom, when mainly it's just luck. It's the same resistance to Black Lives Matter - people don't generally want to accept that they have what they have because they're white or because of some other advantage, so they get angry when people say things that might force them to acknowledge this.

If you grow up black or brown / poor / around addiction, abuse, neglect / on a shit estate / in care, etc. you will do less well on average. If you do well you'll have to work harder than those with the advantages. People don't like hearing this because they assume you are personally attacking them for their privilege when that's not necessarily the case.

I do alright despite my lack of ambition. Partly that's because I make good decisions, but that's because I grew up in a way that helped me recognise good and bad decisions. Ditto for lots of other things I do that work out well for me. If my dad had sexually abused me or my mum been on the skag I'm sure it would have been different. That's why I give away what I can, because I know I just got lucky, not because of anything that I did.

[Emma Raducanu]

Lend me a tenner

[idunnosomename]

In the US, this attitude is (barely) excusable because they have it drummed into them that they will be the next millionaire/billionaire too with enough elbow grease.

But you get this attitude here too, what the fuco is our excuse?

tories

[Twit 2]

Love Jeff Bezos. Want to rub my bollocks on his head.

[touchingcloth]

No one who has more money than anyone else can criticise Bezos. Only the poorest man - or woman, women can be poor too - can complain.

[idunnosomename]

is it possible to have less money than 0?

[poo]

Amazon's just great though innit👍