🤔 I don’t necessarily believe that. An independent creator of a blockbuster franchise could in principle become a billionaire ethically. Like J.K. Rowling; she’s estimated to have upwards of a $1.2 billion net worth.
Comment on Flashback - Mark Zuckerberg on billionaires: 'No one deserves to have that much money'
AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 9 months ago
Just for context, if you made 100k a year, an extremely enviable salary, and saved every penny somehow, you’d be a billionaire in exactly TEN THOUSAND YEARS.
No one can earn a billion dollars through honest labor the sweat of their brow. It must be exploited out of others. It must be stolen.
pinkdrunkenelephants@sopuli.xyz 9 months ago
funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 9 months ago
You’re forgetting that it’s not like we go to Rowling’s house to get her books, or even download the manuscript P2P from her personal server.
Someone’s exploited labor printed the folio, bound it, packed it, shipped it, stocked it, advertised it, sold it to you and put it into a bag…
And more, cut down the trees to make the paper, mixed the ink, delivered the reams and the vats to the factory…
pinkdrunkenelephants@sopuli.xyz 9 months ago
And here’s the problem I have with that: not all labor is exploitative. No matter what economy we have, there would still be laborers printing the book, binding it, cutting down the trees and making the paper, etc.
That doesn’t change simply because we switch from capitalism to some other system.
The only fair way for that book to be made from the implications given is if all of the labor is automated, but at the end of the day a human being would have to do some work somewhere no matter how many levels of automation redundancy you have, so how is he not implying being expected to do anything is the problem, and using the blatant shitty behavior of the rich as a smokescreen for that?
We could live in a Jetsonian paradise where all he’d have to do is push a few buttons once a day and he’d still complain.
funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 9 months ago
I have done things that are hard work for less compensation than it deserves and been happy to give it freely (ie charity, volunteering), but that doesn’t mean we can’t examine the power structure, even if the plurality of people are happy inside it.
CoderKat@lemm.ee 9 months ago
But it’s not the author exploiting publishing companies. It’s the execs of those companies exploiting their own workers. The publishing companies make excellent money (and same for paper creators, etc). Just if disproportionately goes to execs and possibly shareholders, not workers.
funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 9 months ago
of course you can slice it any way you like. I’m not saying no one should be an author, but I am saying billionaires aren’t made without exploitation somewhere
Prethoryn@lemmy.world 9 months ago
“stolen”
Buddy it ain’t stealing if we keep using the product and indirectly (directly) supporting the billionaires exploiting others.
AllonzeeLV@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I think you underestimate the propaganda influence they have. I don’t consider it voluntary by most, any more than I blame a North Korean citizen for hating the west as they’ve been indoctrinated to do.
venorathebarbarian@lemmy.world 9 months ago
I was off Facebook for years, and was never a heavy user, but I had to get back on because the school my daughter goes to sends out so many notifications that way.
Facebook is very ingrained in how business and groups interact these days, what’s an individual to do? Disconnect from the world and miss important school notifications, among other things?
Plus the “stealing” isn’t just from people using the platform, it’s also in wages and benefits for employees. Why aren’t they getting a bigger share of those profits they worked to produce?
Nobody@lemmy.world 9 months ago
They’ve been getting away with it for centuries. Would you like to know more?
June@lemm.ee 9 months ago
100k isn’t that much in many regions these days. Its enough to get by but hardly enough to save to buy a house in the Seattle region.
KevonLooney@lemm.ee 9 months ago
You forget the impact of compound interest. If you invested 1 dollar at 1% interest, you would have a billion dollars in just over 2000 years. So these comparisons based on income are not useful.
dangblingus@lemmy.world 9 months ago
If you invested money at 1% interest, you would lose money due to inflation.
KevonLooney@lemm.ee 9 months ago
Real interest, after inflation.
Kalkaline@leminal.space 9 months ago
I work 7 days a week and my wife works full time to get that $100k/year and it took us years to get where we are in our careers. $1million in assets is still so far away. It’s such an incredible amount of money and Zuckerberg and friends have thousands of times that much money. It’s just so crazy to think about.