this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2023

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Self made billionaires (lemmygrad.ml)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Is the original Simpsons episode making fun of people that climb Mount Everest as a feat while also paying the Sherpas to carry all their equipment, food, & water?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago (2 children)

In the episode (s09e23) Homer is being used to market a bogus nutritional bar by climbing the tallest mountain in Springfield. The company owners are aware that he'll never be able to survive the climb on his own because their product doesn't work so they pay two Sherpas to advance through the climb while he's sleeping.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

"the tallest mountain in Springfield" which was basically never seen again

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

so, yes

[–] [email protected] 11 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

So, I was curious. I looked up what percentage of the Forbes 400 is 'self-made' and it turns out to be about 60%. If measuring as coming from a middle-class background with no inheritance of the wealth.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelsandler/2021/10/05/the-forbes-400-self-made-score-2021-from-silver-spooners-to-bootstrappers/?sh=2b960ac730c2

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

If measuring as coming from a middle-class background with no inheritance of the wealth.

that's still doing better than a lot of people tbh.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's still a long way off being a millionaire or billionaire.

It's pretty impressive someone can make that much money in a lifetime.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

millionaire or billionaire

You know what the difference is between a million and a billion? Roughly a billion.

By which I mean that grouping millionaires and billionaires together is downright detrimental to understanding wealth inequality and supports the kind of right wing narratives that keep the ultra-rich from being taxed fairly.

It's pretty impressive someone can make that much money in a lifetime.

It's really not, mainly for two reasons

1: beyond a certain point (which is LONG before a $1b, probably before $100m), you have more than you could possibly spend even when living lavishly and are just hoarding money that could have a life-changing or even life-SAVING impact on less fortunate people.

2: it's impossible to get anywhere near that point without a SHITLOAD of luck, exploitation of others or both. Usually both.

[+] [email protected] -38 points 9 months ago (1 children)

In the communist version of the meme, one of the workers is shot for complaining while dragging the Party officials uphill

[–] [email protected] 16 points 9 months ago (1 children)

What no theory does to a mf

[+] [email protected] -13 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I pay more attention to practice than theory

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (2 children)

While historically I agree that communism hasn't worked out (not to be confused with socialism, which did work a few times and failed due to foreign sabotage from US), it's only been tried a handful of times and there are things to learn from each failure that could be applied to future attempts, just like in science. Scientists didn't go "yeah we need to stop researching x-rays as it hurt people a few times, doctor examinations are good enough" after lethal exposure killed people.

Also, the example you left above as the parent comment can literally be applied to China, which is one of the most capitalist countries in the world. Does this mean that capitalism inherently is like that?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

was there any legitimate communism?

USSR was State capitalism, China went from State feudalism to state capitalism.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago

There was in the Free Territory of Ukraine under Makhno. Of course they were brutally crushed after 3 years because their succes and freedom was a threat to the Bolsheviks, and their legitimacy, who had already abandoned their ideals for power, as is inevitable when you concentrate power that much.

[+] [email protected] -6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

China is a fascist nation, not a capitalist liberal democracy. And I don't see any reason why we should expect future experiments with communism to be any less dismal than past and current experiments with it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

Capitalism doesn't have to be a liberal democracy. The sad truth is that authoritarian capitalism, while being something people don't like, is very effective when it comes to economic growth (just look how China turned into a superpower because of it).

Does this mean that capitalism more or less goes hand-in-hand with 'fascism', or is authoritarianism/totalitarianism/liberalism separate from economic systems such as capitalism, socialism or communism?

Speaking of which, assuming that communism is an optional later stage of socialism (which seems to be the consensus), the vast majority of socialist/communist countries have failed due to reasons related to their totalitarian/authoritarian governments, either due to the leader's death causing power struggles or the oppression going completely against the goals/ideals of socialism or communism and turning it into an oppressive state.

Does this mean that communist/socialist state cannot work because it requires totalitarian regime to establish authority and make everyone play by the rules? Well, no, there were lesser known attempts such as Salvador Allende's Chile (was very successful for a year, but failed due to CIA running propaganda compaigns, strikes and promoting a coup) and Paris Commune, they both were liberal as opposed to authoritarian, but failed due to mostly outside/external factors.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

There is no practice without theory. The first step of action is the idea.