Billionaires Blast off

[DBT]

''For instance, if incomes for all people (or households) increase by 10%, inequality would not be affected. However, a 10% rise for a millionaire is much more money than a 10% rise for someone who has very little to begin with. Therefore, it also makes sense to measure inequality in absolute terms and/or using so-called centrist measures, which are a combination of absolute and relative indices.''

Therefore it makes sense to use the deceptive data because it supports your point.

Absolute Gini is one such example--it exists purely to deceive.

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

 

[Harry Bosch]

''For instance, if incomes for all people (or households) increase by 10%, inequality would not be affected. However, a 10% rise for a millionaire is much more money than a 10% rise for someone who has very little to begin with. Therefore, it also makes sense to measure inequality in absolute terms and/or using so-called centrist measures, which are a combination of absolute and relative indices.''

Therefore it makes sense to use the deceptive data because it supports your point.

Absolute Gini is one such example--it exists purely to deceive.

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

I think that their power is greatly overrated. Most of them want to go to space, clean up the oceans, support the arts, and etc. How many governments support these issues? But you don't seem to address the issues with a wealth tax. From an earlier post: "There is no doubt in my mind that taxes need to go up at some point. But wealth taxes aren't the best imo. They are inefficient. How the hell do you measure your wealth each year? We're all going to have to appraise our house each year? Not to complicated to find the value of your public stocks (but it would still take some work); but people would avoid going public anymore. This would be bad for society. Secondly, how would you value non-public stock? I could tell you that I have private stock. We debate it's value all the time. It's a moving target. Another issue: you'd be creating anther incentive for the entrepreneur to move his company to another country. These large publicly traded companies pay far more than the average job."

 

[DBT]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

I think that their power is greatly overrated. Most of them want to go to space, clean up the oceans, support the arts, and etc. How many governments support these issues? But you don't seem to address the issues with a wealth tax. From an earlier post: "There is no doubt in my mind that taxes need to go up at some point. But wealth taxes aren't the best imo. They are inefficient. How the hell do you measure your wealth each year? We're all going to have to appraise our house each year? Not to complicated to find the value of your public stocks (but it would still take some work); but people would avoid going public anymore. This would be bad for society. Secondly, how would you value non-public stock? I could tell you that I have private stock. We debate it's value all the time. It's a moving target. Another issue: you'd be creating anther incentive for the entrepreneur to move his company to another country. These large publicly traded companies pay far more than the average job."

Overrated by whom? Perhaps those in positions of great wealth and power would like more wealth and power, so rate their own as inadequate?

Some degree of inequality is inevitable because positions that require greater skill and responsibility should be rewarded. The problems arise with scale, when the differences between the very wealthy and the rest of society becomes too great:

The Disadvantages of Economic Inequality

Inequality Stifles Growth

A degree of inequality can act as a positive influence on economic growth in the short term.[24] However, some economists find empirical evidence of a negative correlation of about 0.5-0.8 percentage points between long-term growth rates and sustained economic inequality.[25]

A variety of explanations have been proposed to explain how inequality can work to stifle growth. A high level of economic inequality means a higher level of poverty. Poverty is associated with increased crime and poor public health, which places burdens on the economy. In the face of increasing food prices and lower incomes, support for pro-growth government policies declines.[26] Wealthy citizens maintain disproportionate political power compared to poorer citizens,[27] which encourages the development of inefficient tax structures skewed in favor of the wealthy. Unequal income distribution increases political instability, which threatens property rights, increases the risk of state repudiated contracts, and discourages capital accumulation.[28] A widening rich-poor gap tends to increase the rate of rent-seeking and predatory market behaviors that hinder economic growth.[29]

According to one theory, growth is suppressed in economically unequal societies, after a phase of increased growth, by the decreasing availability of investments for human capital. Physical capital becomes increasingly scarce, as fewer individuals have funds to invest in training and education.[30] As a result, demands for human capital are difficult or impossible to meet, and economic growth stalls.[31] As an additional consequence, market demands increase for risky unsecured loans, which increase lenders’ risk exposure to the borrower’s default. More risks in the markets increase market volatility and the possibility of cascading defaults such as the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis.[32]

 

[Derec]

AOC has expressed concern that oil barons might be replaced by solar barons. But renewable energy is much more distributed than fossil fuels, and that may keep it from creating a new set of oligarchs.

Yes. Sunshine is unevenly distributed over Earth's surface, but still a lot more evenly than oil. And one of the chief advantages of photovoltaics (over concentrated solar as well as over wind) is that it can use zero net area. You just use surfaces that you use anyway - chiefly rooftops, but one could also envisage canopies over parking lots that not only make electricity but provide shade so your car is not scorching hot when you get in it. For skyscrapers, the window panes making up the façade could capture part of the incoming light and still allow enough of it out.

Years ago, there has been an initiative in Europe by governments and industry to use North Africa and SW Asia to supply Europe with electricity and hydrogen. It is called Desertec, but I think it is mostly defunct now. It is exactly the same approach as it would replace dependency on Arab world for oil with dependency on Arab world for solar electricity and hydrogen.

 

[Derec]

I kinda do hope for that.

I hope you get disappointed tomorrow.

By the way, if you get your wish, that will also kill an 18 year old from Netherlands and an 82 year old woman who trained for the Mercury project but never meant to space.
But you can't make class warfare omelet without breaking a few eggs, right?

I see modern manned space flight as immoral. It's horribly inefficient, given current propulsion systems. One could give a million kids vaccination and mosquito nets instead of giving a big company the resources to send someone into space for a thrill.

How do you propose fixing the inefficiency problem other than by doing? Cars were once horribly inefficient. Cars were once playthings of the rich.

But, yeah, if one of those vehicles blew up like Challengers did it would probably be worth losing a billionaire or two. Other billionaires would be less likely to invest the resources of the Human Family in a thrill ride, which I see as a moral outcome.

Most people who will be flying on these things will be mere millionaires, not billionaires.
And I hope the opposite. I hope these and other billionaires keep investing in space. If not them, who? NASA is a shadow of it's former self. Biden administration is more interested in giving trillions for things like "free" childcare and does not appear too interested in space, esp. manned spaceflight.

So it's either the Chinese or the private sector, but why not both?

Somebody like Bezos could fund a permanent lunar base from his wealth and it could be designed and built by 2040. It could be used for space tourism, research on long term low-g environment for human body, research on growing crops in non-Earth soil etc. Eventually it can be used as a staging ground for further space missions, with lunar mining providing materials so they don't have to be brought up from Earth's relatively deep gravity well.

So yes, I wish them all the success and let this be inspiration for much bolder projects in the future!

 

[Ford]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

Well that's what it's deteriorated into...a discussion about the morality of wealth itself, rather than about billionaires in space. The former can be debated endlessly. How much is too much? A billion? A million? A six figure income? Do we simply make being wealthy illegal? And what constitutes wealth?

And while it's easy to point to rich people who spend their money on excess and ego, there are also some very wealthy people who leverage their fortune and fame to do good things. Bill Gates comes to mind. George Clooney is one of those "rich Hollywood celebrities" who donates his time and rather large sums of money to charitable causes. At the end of every PBS program there's a list of foundations funded by wealthy families that make the programming possible.

So "should Branson, Bezos, and Musk be that filthy stinking rich?" is - IMO - a separate question from "is it a good or bad thing that they're using their wealth to go into space?"

I'd say that on balance, the answer to the latter is that it's a good thing. They're throwing a whole bunch of money at manned space travel, which is something the US has been scaling back ever since Apollo 17 came back from the Moon. Rather than building on that success and making the Moon a waypoint to further destinations, we said "hey, let's stay in low Earth orbit instead." Then after a mixed record, we mothballed our orbiters, and farmed out putting people into space to the Russians. Going back to the Moon? Going to Mars? Space tourism? Nope, nope, and nope. Branson picked up the space tourism ball. Elon wants to go to Mars. Bezos? If we build a Moon base, I guess he'll deliver the groceries?

Is it a battle of egos? Sure. But that's also what the Space Race was. The difference now is that instead of nations trying to top each other, it's billionaires. If that's how we move forward, then let's do that. We can work on the "is it moral to have billionaires" question while they're throwing their own money at solving space travel.

 

[lpetrich]

... And in the context of a discussion about billionaires, the relevant polity is the US, home to most of the world's billionaires (including two of the three who are engaged in the 'space race', and to plenty of genuinely poor people.

The US Gini coefficient is roughly linear from 0.39 in 1968 to 0.49 in 2018

The third billionaire in the race is Richard Branson, who is from the UK:

The UK Gini coefficient was roughly constant at 0.26 from 1961 to 1980, the increasing to roughly 0.35 in 1988 and then roughly leveling off. This period of increase was for when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister (1979-1990).

 

[DBT]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

Well that's what it's deteriorated into...a discussion about the morality of wealth itself, rather than about billionaires in space. The former can be debated endlessly. How much is too much? A billion? A million? A six figure income? Do we simply make being wealthy illegal? And what constitutes wealth?

And while it's easy to point to rich people who spend their money on excess and ego, there are also some very wealthy people who leverage their fortune and fame to do good things. Bill Gates comes to mind. George Clooney is one of those "rich Hollywood celebrities" who donates his time and rather large sums of money to charitable causes. At the end of every PBS program there's a list of foundations funded by wealthy families that make the programming possible.

So "should Branson, Bezos, and Musk be that filthy stinking rich?" is - IMO - a separate question from "is it a good or bad thing that they're using their wealth to go into space?"

I'd say that on balance, the answer to the latter is that it's a good thing. They're throwing a whole bunch of money at manned space travel, which is something the US has been scaling back ever since Apollo 17 came back from the Moon. Rather than building on that success and making the Moon a waypoint to further destinations, we said "hey, let's stay in low Earth orbit instead." Then after a mixed record, we mothballed our orbiters, and farmed out putting people into space to the Russians. Going back to the Moon? Going to Mars? Space tourism? Nope, nope, and nope. Branson picked up the space tourism ball. Elon wants to go to Mars. Bezos? If we build a Moon base, I guess he'll deliver the groceries?

Is it a battle of egos? Sure. But that's also what the Space Race was. The difference now is that instead of nations trying to top each other, it's billionaires. If that's how we move forward, then let's do that. We can work on the "is it moral to have billionaires" question while they're throwing their own money at solving space travel.

Good for a percentage of people, but not all. Good for the progress of space exploration and travel, but not good for the economy at large. Excessive wealth concentration doesn't economically improve the lives of ordinary people who struggle with the basics while the rich get richer.

Adam Smith supported a degree of inequality, yet realized the moral and economic pitfalls;

Quote:
''Even a cursory reading of The Wealth of Nations should make this point abundantly clear. Smith states, explicitly and repeatedly, that the true measure of a nation’s wealth is not the size of its king’s treasury or the holdings of an affluent few but rather the wages of “the laboring poor.”

''What’s more, Smith saw this distortion of people’s sympathies as having profound consequences: It undermines both morality and happiness. First, morality. Smith saw the widespread admiration of the rich as morally problematic because he did not believe that the rich in fact tend to be terribly admirable people. On the contrary, he portrayed the “superior stations” of society as suffused with “vice and folly,” “presumption and vanity,” “flattery and falsehood,” “proud ambition and ostentatious avidity.” In Smith’s view, the reason why the rich generally do not behave admirably is, ironically, that they are widely admired anyway (on account of their wealth).

In other words, the rich are not somehow innately vicious people. Rather, their affluence puts them in a position in which they do not have to behave morally in order to earn the esteem of others, most of whom are dazzled and enchanted by their riches.

Thus, it is precisely the presence of economic inequality, and the distortion of people’s sympathies that attends it, that allows—perhaps even encourages—the rich to spurn the most basic standards of moral conduct. Smith goes so far as to proclaim that the “disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition” is “the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.”

 

[Ford]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

Well that's what it's deteriorated into...a discussion about the morality of wealth itself, rather than about billionaires in space. The former can be debated endlessly. How much is too much? A billion? A million? A six figure income? Do we simply make being wealthy illegal? And what constitutes wealth?

And while it's easy to point to rich people who spend their money on excess and ego, there are also some very wealthy people who leverage their fortune and fame to do good things. Bill Gates comes to mind. George Clooney is one of those "rich Hollywood celebrities" who donates his time and rather large sums of money to charitable causes. At the end of every PBS program there's a list of foundations funded by wealthy families that make the programming possible.

So "should Branson, Bezos, and Musk be that filthy stinking rich?" is - IMO - a separate question from "is it a good or bad thing that they're using their wealth to go into space?"

I'd say that on balance, the answer to the latter is that it's a good thing. They're throwing a whole bunch of money at manned space travel, which is something the US has been scaling back ever since Apollo 17 came back from the Moon. Rather than building on that success and making the Moon a waypoint to further destinations, we said "hey, let's stay in low Earth orbit instead." Then after a mixed record, we mothballed our orbiters, and farmed out putting people into space to the Russians. Going back to the Moon? Going to Mars? Space tourism? Nope, nope, and nope. Branson picked up the space tourism ball. Elon wants to go to Mars. Bezos? If we build a Moon base, I guess he'll deliver the groceries?

Is it a battle of egos? Sure. But that's also what the Space Race was. The difference now is that instead of nations trying to top each other, it's billionaires. If that's how we move forward, then let's do that. We can work on the "is it moral to have billionaires" question while they're throwing their own money at solving space travel.

Good for a percentage of people, but not all. Good for the progress of space exploration and travel, but not good for the economy at large. Excessive wealth concentration doesn't economically improve the lives of ordinary people who struggle with the basics while the rich get richer.

See, you're doing it again. Shifting the argument to wealth inequality and saying - in effect - that if we can't fix the "rich getting richer" problem, everything else is a waste of time.

Have you ever heard of Danny Thomas? He was a Hollywood celebrity, and the star of one of the most successful sitcoms ever. He got rich as an actor, comedian, producer, and businessman. He accumulated considerable wealth. He also helped to found St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. I've done some work with St. Jude. It's an amazing operation, and I bring it up because of a conversation I had at a meeting a few years back with their fundraising team. I used space travel as an analogy.

I said that St. Jude was basically the NASA of cancer research. Back in the 60s, a lot of people looked at both of these endeavors and said "yeah, launching people into space? Sitcom star's charity? That's noble and all, but we've got bigger problems to deal with." Fast forward 50 years later, and we've got satellites giving us everything from traffic directions to weather updates, and oh by the way the rate of survival for childhood cancers had skyrocketed thanks in no small part to some rich Hollywood celebrity's pet project.


The problem of wealth inequality is not something that's sprung up recently. Bezos, Branson, and Musk are not a new thing. Do we need to work on this problem? Yes. Should we stop every effort by rich people who are trying to do good and say "excuse me, but we need to appropriate your wealth through taxes, distribute the money to the masses, and then maybe get to sending people to space and curing cancer?" No.

We can walk and chew gum at the same time. If Branson wants to throw billions at space tourism in the meantime? Great. If Clooney wants to throw millions at Darfur? Great. If Gates wants to donate 95 percent of his money to world health issues? Great. Rich people are throwing money at problems. You seem to be saying "we can't do anything until we stop them from being rich...and only after can we get some important work done."

 

[Canard DuJour]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

I think that their power is greatly overrated.

I think it's greatly underestimated. Neoliberalism, which has transformed society, wouldn't have happened without them.

Most of them want to go to space, clean up the oceans, support the arts, and etc.

They also like buying policies which restrict public spending and create vast inequality so that our ability to do these things becomes subject to their whims. Which is morally repugnant, not to mention dangerous.

 

[DBT]

Good for a percentage of people, but not all. Good for the progress of space exploration and travel, but not good for the economy at large. Excessive wealth concentration doesn't economically improve the lives of ordinary people who struggle with the basics while the rich get richer.

See, you're doing it again. Shifting the argument to wealth inequality and saying - in effect - that if we can't fix the "rich getting richer" problem, everything else is a waste of time.

Have you ever heard of Danny Thomas? He was a Hollywood celebrity, and the star of one of the most successful sitcoms ever. He got rich as an actor, comedian, producer, and businessman. He accumulated considerable wealth. He also helped to found St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. I've done some work with St. Jude. It's an amazing operation, and I bring it up because of a conversation I had at a meeting a few years back with their fundraising team. I used space travel as an analogy.

I said that St. Jude was basically the NASA of cancer research. Back in the 60s, a lot of people looked at both of these endeavors and said "yeah, launching people into space? Sitcom star's charity? That's noble and all, but we've got bigger problems to deal with." Fast forward 50 years later, and we've got satellites giving us everything from traffic directions to weather updates, and oh by the way the rate of survival for childhood cancers had skyrocketed thanks in no small part to some rich Hollywood celebrity's pet project.


The problem of wealth inequality is not something that's sprung up recently. Bezos, Branson, and Musk are not a new thing. Do we need to work on this problem? Yes. Should we stop every effort by rich people who are trying to do good and say "excuse me, but we need to appropriate your wealth through taxes, distribute the money to the masses, and then maybe get to sending people to space and curing cancer?" No.

We can walk and chew gum at the same time. If Branson wants to throw billions at space tourism in the meantime? Great. If Clooney wants to throw millions at Darfur? Great. If Gates wants to donate 95 percent of his money to world health issues? Great. Rich people are throwing money at problems. You seem to be saying "we can't do anything until we stop them from being rich...and only after can we get some important work done."

I'm not saying the problem is recent. It has ebbed and flowed throughout history, it's been worse and its been better. It was better in developed nations after the war, 50's through to the 80's, after which the gap grew into a gulf.

As I said, a certain degree of inequality is not an issue where opportunities exist.

The given problems relating to economics, ethics, status, power, etc, arise with scale.

The scale of power, wealth and status has now well and truly shifted in favour of the super rich.

That's all.

 

[Ford]

The scale of power, wealth and status has now well and truly shifted in favour of the super rich.

That's all.

And so we should prevent Branson launching himself into space by taxing all his wealth into oblivion because....

 

[Harry Bosch]

I think it's greatly underestimated. Neoliberalism, which has transformed society, wouldn't have happened without them.

Most of them want to go to space, clean up the oceans, support the arts, and etc.

They also like buying policies which restrict public spending and create vast inequality so that our ability to do these things becomes subject to their whims. Which is morally repugnant, not to mention dangerous.

Wow. If they are using their vast wealth to restrict public spending, then they are incredibly weak! Not sure if you've noticed, but public spending has exploded in the US!

 

[bigfield]

The point is that there is a vast gulf in wealth and power between a small percentage of the super rich and the rest of the population, a situation that is not neither ethical or sustainable in the long term. The reasons have been given numerous times in numerous threads on this forum. Including several posters in this thread.

Well that's what it's deteriorated into...a discussion about the morality of wealth itself, rather than about billionaires in space. The former can be debated endlessly. How much is too much? A billion? A million? A six figure income? Do we simply make being wealthy illegal? And what constitutes wealth?

I don't think you can put an exact number on it, although I would say that the line is safely below a hundred billion dollars.

Using Bezos as an example, I would point to the lousy labour conditions in Amazon's US warehouses as a sign that Amazon workers should have more money, and that should come at Bezos' expense. In fact, that's just a symptom of a larger problem: the US is a society where people who create the wealth keep none for themselves. They may live to benefit from the scientific advances that emerge from billionaires' pet projects, but it hardly seems like fair compensation.

I agree that there may be some kind of scientific or engineering benefit to be gained from these space adventures, but I think it is important to consider what the US had to forgo in order to concentrate so much economic power in a handful of private citizens. The US is a country of billionaire philanthropists and pioneers, but it's also a country with huge numbers of people in slums and prisons.

 

[DBT]

The scale of power, wealth and status has now well and truly shifted in favour of the super rich.

That's all.

And so we should prevent Branson launching himself into space by taxing all his wealth into oblivion because....

Well, I'd say the issue is far broader and deeper than Branson and his flight to the edge of space.

 

[Elixir]

The scale of power, wealth and status has now well and truly shifted in favour of the super rich.

That's all.

And so we should prevent Branson launching himself into space by taxing all his wealth into oblivion because....

Well, I'd say the issue is far broader and deeper than Branson and his flight to the edge of space.

Anyone who was around and awake in 1969 knows how much deeper and broader. The difference is quite palpable.
Landing on/walking on the moon was the culmination of 10+ years of national co-operative effort, and it was a success that in one moment united hippies and cops, liberals, conservatives and a-politicals, intellectuals and line workers. There was a collective sense of accomplishment and pride that these private ventures will never approach. By contrast, this Bozos in Space mini-series is mere pablum for relatively disinterested masses.

My wife got out of bed a few minutes after the launch of Jeffrey's rocket. Watched with mild interest until we had a power failure as the returning capsule was some 500' from the ground. Dang. I wanted to see the touchdown. Oh well.
Power came back on in time to see Bezos' raised fists pumping triumphantly through his window on his space capsule. Much jubilation on the part of the owner. Quite a curiosity for the rest of us.

Oh well... time for Hoda and Savannah's "Today" show, or as I call it, Moose and Squirrel.
Blech.

And that is the main reason why I wish Jeffrey and Elon had paid their fair share of taxes, and these spacecraft, autonomous landers and all the rest of the tech was communally owned. It could have gone a long way toward providing common purpose and a deserved sense of pride to a tragically divided nation. But we are at that point in the devolution of our democracy where great accomplishment is the exclusive domain of oligarchs, and all benefits that can be anticipated are likely to accrue to them rather than to society.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Well Jeff, you did it. You’ve achieved your life long dream. Nothing left to do now but monetize it.
I missed most of the flight. I had a scheduling conflict with making breakfast. I did get to see the hugs upon return. The ladies looked wonderful in their southwestern sun dresses and darling cowgirl boots. And the hats. Oh the hats. What can I say.

 

[barbos]

I watched it.
My only complain is Blue Origin not being metric.

 

[Elixir]

I watched it.
My only complain is Blue Origin not being metric.

See? Even the Russians are blasé about it.
Not like the day they "lost" the race to the moon.
I wanna puke.

 

[Gospel]

The scale of power, wealth and status has now well and truly shifted in favour of the super rich.

That's all.

And so we should prevent Branson launching himself into space by taxing all his wealth into oblivion because....

Crabs in a bucket comes to mind. If we let the rich leave earth they won't come back to help the rest of us get out.