Big Tech has already made enough money in 2024 to pay all its 2023 fines

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• PaddleMaster@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  [deleted]

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  • Radiant_sir_radiant@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    The EU knows fines of ‘up to’ 4% of revenue for privacy violations, which means the company still gets to keep 96% of whatever it’s made by breaking the law. The fine should be a minimum of 50%, plus jail time for the managers responsible. Any fine that does not make the shareholders cry with fury is too low and will do nothing to change the situation.

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    • B0rax@feddit.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      No, they don’t get to keep 96%. It is revenue, not profit. That is a big difference.

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  • explodicle@local106.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    We need a total revolution. The people who ought to be fined are the ones buying the laws.

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    • DdCno1@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Total revolutions tend to eat their children. Those who are already the most vulnerable in the old system tend to be in the most precarious situation in the new one as well. What we actually need is careful and gradual reform, based on democratic principles, instead of revoluzzers imposing their will upon the rest of the population, which is how most revolutions end.

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• BlueBockser@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Revenue is the wrong metric for this type of comparison. Last I heard even big tech didn’t have a profit margin of 100%.

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  • Radiant_sir_radiant@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    I don’t know, a percentage of revenue hurts more than the same percentage of net profit. Maybe some companies need to be forced to operate at a net loss until they clean up their act.

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    • BlueBockser@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      I’m not arguing about the fines themselves, those can indeed be scaled by revenue. I also agree that many fines should be higher to prevent companies from merely seeing them as an operating cost.

      However, my point is that company revenue can’t be used 1:1 to pay off fines. That doesn’t take into account that revenue also has to cover all other operating expenses and taxes. As an example, the article states that Meta would take roughly 5½ days to pay off its fines, but taking the 23.42% profit margin into account a more realistic answer is 23½ days.

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• Lightrider@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Defeat the fuckingcapitalists

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  • DdCno1@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Who would take their place?

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    • NattyNatty2x4@beehaw.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Ideally? Something like worker cooperatives or similar where profit and decision-making is more democratically spread through businesses.

      Realistically? Probably capitalists by another name

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    • Lightrider@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Rational people

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• onlinepersona@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  They thank you very much for purchasing their goods. Good job everybody! We did it!

  CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

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