Yeah, I do agree that HAVING billionaires is probably a failure of our version of capitalism.

Anyway, yeah, I'd probably be comfortable with super-duper high taxes on everything over $xxx or even $xx mil earned per year.

Yes, this is gross and alarming, like nearly everything Trump touches.

But Rawstory is about as reliable and useful a source as the former National Enquirer, unfortunately.

(not saying the bit about the coin isn't true or awful, but the source is -- editorialwise -- the left's equivalent of FOX)

And now for some (literal) harmony in otherwise oft-unharmonious times!

Listen to me and 150+ other people sing "Breaking Free" from "High School Musical" :-)

www.instagram.com/p/DPwI0Igj1kE/

#acappella #music #singing #sf #sanfrancisco #bayarea #toomanyhashtags #dothesethingsevendoanythinghere?

And then I also contemplated... holy hell, if I had an unlimited amount of cash, I'd bribe @jay.bsky.team to increase the character limit on posts so that I'd actually stop experiencing post-rage and quitting the service for months at a time.

Every other service has longer character limits like Mas

I used to dream of building an super-diverse international music school for kids. Fly out kids from Africa, Middle East, Latin America... harmony in every sense!

And then I realized, zomg, the # of experts I'd need... and would need to vet all of them! And also live with mistakes and failures

- Being a great, maybe even *good* philanthropist requires a TON of knowledge or at least research. Because as we've seen so very many (depressing) times: simply throwing money at a person or org in no way guarantees positive outcomes.

[...]

There are the two rubs, though, Dawn.
- In my scenario, your identity as a super-rich person would be known. I genuinely think this is a big part of what fucks super-rich people up, frankly (inability to trust friendships, constantly being besieged by relatives for money, etc.)

[...]

yeah, absolutely right. I mean, to people living paycheck to paycheck, the distinction is specious anyway.

Yep, agree with both of you. I know it's hardly original, but I've spent so much time pondering -- from a purely logical standpoint -- how much better society could be if we had saner wealth distribution *without actually impinging on the lifestyles of 99.9% of people, even really rich folks*.

I largely agree with you, but what about the Taylor Swift situation? She's a billionaire now, right? And she works super hard and delights zillions of people. And she already gives away a lot of her wealth.

How/why do we block people like HER from continuing to earn money?

100%! This very thing has caused me to wonder why the insanely-rich area of Silicon Valley has so many issues that *could* be fixed with tiny portions' of individuals' wealth but haven't been. Like, they drive these roads every day, too, no? Or: wouldn't they like to save that amazing museum?! etc

Ha! The whole "buy your politicians" thing in the U.S. is so horrifyingly gross, I hadn't even considered fighting money with money.

But yeah, on a happier note, so much good stuff to fund...! :)

I personally think SOME people can handle massive power with grace, responsibility, even kindness, but maybe not most or perhaps even not many

But how would you select a financial advisor? When you're super-rich, how do you know who to trust? This would eat away at me! :o

And also, who would you know who to donate to? If you had $1bn and wanted to donate $100K to each charity, that's 1000 charities you have to vet :o

Ah yeah, there's the rub! I just made the assumption in this scenario that being 'unmasked' as a rich person is... part of the bargain, and certainly a major part of the calculus.

(in case you're curious, this curiosity was triggered from various FIRE conversations I've read and from recent news about tech free agents changing companies for literally a billion+ dollars, etc.)

What's your number? And if you feel comfortable explaining, why?

When I was younger, I thought the more-the-happier when it comes to money.

But now I firmly believe that at a particular point, the stresses (increased security needs, hard to make/trust/maintain friendships, etc.) vastly outweight the marginal gains from $1 more.

Just a random thought exercise / curiosity poll:
If you could have a genie INSTANTLY make your net worth whatever number you wanted... $100K USD, $100B.... any number in between... what would it be and why?

[...]

Regardless of awful Benioff may be, more sane people on Bluesky (and elsewhere online) need to make it clear that immature and asinine calls to violence like this are unhelpful and disgusting.

Lots of people earn or inherit obscenely large amounts of wealth and continue to do good things societally; I don't believe billionaires are (or become) inherently terrible people.

But their actions & utterances get, understandably, orders of magnitude more press than others.

I generally don't think most folks' characters change dramatically in their adulthood, they just get unmasked for who they really are.

And many billionaires, just like 'regular' people, run the gamut from *genuinely* kind to... not :-(.

But no one requested any changes, I mean, those specific changes! I know this 100% because I sure didn't!