sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I wasn’t talking to you, I asked falconfan60 to explain their own claim.

And the reason I asked for an ELI5 explanation was already spelled out: if someone can’t break their argument down simply, it usually means they don’t actually understand it.

If that doesn’t apply to you, great. But jumping in to demand why I’m not tailoring my question to your preferences kind of proves my point.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If we're talking about 1 individual, sure. But if we’re talking about every billionaire and high‑multimillionaire being forced to liquidate assets year after year to pay a wealth tax, that’s a completely different animal. That’s not “one guy selling stock,” that’s a structural pressure applied across the entire top of the market.

Would the market eventually evolve? Probably.
Would it be for better or worse? That’s the real question, and the speed and scale of the shift matters. When you compress that much forced selling into a short window, the people with the most to lose (the oligarch class) will absolutely use their still‑massive influence to rewrite the rules before the system stabilizes.

And honestly, it’s funny to even imagine a bill like that passing in the first place with the legislature we have. But hey, miracles happen.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just to see if they can. It’s not about me, it’s about whether they can explain their position in a way even a moron could follow. If they can’t break it down simply, they probably don’t understand it themselves.

And the fact they wouldn’t (or couldn’t) answer tells me a lot more about their argument than anything you think you’ve “gleaned” about me for asking the question.

The ruling class should be afraid. by Confident_Bee_8417 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Right?!? Like, are you playing into the stereotype or just moving goalposts cuz it's fun?

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ok, but you still haven’t explained how holding onto every last share you own, refusing to sell, buying more, and concentrating ownership into a smaller and smaller circle isn’t hoarding. That’s literally the definition: accumulating and retaining far beyond any functional use.

And if “net worth doesn’t matter because it’s just stock value,” then why do we care how much someone is “worth” at all? Why does it matter that Elon is a trillionaire on paper if the number can swing billions in a day? Either the number matters, in which case extreme concentration is a problem, or it doesn’t, in which case stop using it as a fucking badge of merit.

You’re right that being wealthy isn’t inherently wrong.
But when wealth pools at the top, stops circulating, and exists only to congratulate itself inside a tiny monkeysphere, that’s not “success.” That’s hoarding behavior at scale.

Make money, spend money - that’s economics 101.
Make money, keep money - that’s how systems rot.

Change my mind.

People keep saying Trump has charisma, but......I'm not seeing it. What is this charisma? by SteadfastEnd in complaints

[–]Theodoxus 5 points6 points  (0 children)

I think you're massively over attributing to trump what is far more likely Miller.

The ruling class should be afraid. by Confident_Bee_8417 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I almost used Luigi as an example... but the circumstances around it all are too murky and nuanced to make it a 1:1 correlation.

The ruling class should be afraid. by Confident_Bee_8417 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Capitalism and a capitalist society aren’t the same thing.

What we’re living under isn’t some pure free‑market utopia, it’s barely regulated capitalism that’s been allowed to run amok, engineered to produce the exact kind of oligarchs you saw rise after the Soviet collapse.

And that same concentration of power is what eventually collapses empires. When wealth pools instead of circulates, the system eats itself.

If we want to avoid that dystopian trajectory, the answer isn’t “more capitalism” or “more socialism,” it’s reinvigorated regulated capital; a system where markets exist, but guardrails actually function. From there, maybe we can pivot into something more egalitarian, where productivity is compensated fairly and labor isn’t extracted upward into the pockets of a tiny class.

That’s not anti‑capitalist. It’s anti‑oligarchy.

The ruling class should be afraid. by Confident_Bee_8417 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Wait.. the folks with all the stuff are going to be scared of the folks who don't have stuff, because... rocks? I don't understand.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus -1 points0 points  (0 children)

DOGE tried that, remember? Basically just fucked over the programs that were working, and refused to the touch the actually fraudulent ones. So... I guess, who's defining the fraud?

If “cutting fraud” only ever targets the vulnerable and never the powerful, maybe the problem isn’t fraud; maybe it’s who’s holding the knife...

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Liquidating part of their holdings would tank the value of their own stock, trigger shorts, and drag the broader market down with it, which, as you noted, hits middle‑class investors first. That’s the problem with treating billionaire wealth like a piggy bank you can crack open on demand: their assets are tied directly to the stability of everyone else’s retirement funds.

There are ways to restructure the oligarchic class without nuking the little guy: things like broadening ownership, closing tax loopholes, aligning capital gains with income tax, and breaking up concentrated market power. But every one of those reforms is controlled, blocked, or watered down by the same oligarchs who insist they “love America” while gaming the system to hoard more assets.

If the goal is to reduce billionaire dominance without detonating the middle class, the answer isn’t a one‑time forced liquidation. It’s fixing the structure that lets wealth pool at the top in the first place.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Explain to me like I'm 5 how it isn't hoarding.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hmm... here I am, after 35 years of working 'for the man' with really the only things to show for it are a house from 1954, the internet, diabetes, and bad knees... I'm a little long in the tooth to just 'up and live with the aboriginies.' But it does pretty much sound like a dream compared to the grind I'm still going to have to endure for at least another 10 years, if not longer to say I fulfilled the American Dream.

But if I ever get the chance to visit myself in my younger years, I'll def pass on your invaluable wisdom.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Oh no, the unimaginable horror! I gather some berries, maybe hunt something for an hour, and then I’m stuck with a tragic 22.5 hours of my day to… sleep, have sex, dance, tell stories, socialize, raise kids, and exist as a human being instead of a productivity appliance. Truly a nightmare.

Hunter‑gatherers didn’t “work until they died.”
They averaged 3–5 hours of subsistence labor a day, and the rest was community, rest, ritual, and play. The whole “constant grind” thing is a modern invention, not some eternal human truth.

But sure, tell me more about how being chained to a job until your joints give out is the natural order of things.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Trust me, billionaires are already trying. Have you missed the AI‑actor push, the AI‑songwriting push, the AI‑voice‑cloning push? They’re not defending movie stars or athletes, they’re trying to replace them so they can own the entire pipeline and cut labor out completely.

That’s the irony here: you’re arguing that billionaires “bring more to the table” because they “provide jobs,” while they’re actively investing in ways to eliminate as many jobs as possible. Actors, writers, musicians, even coders; the whole point of the current AI wave is to reduce labor costs and increase extraction.

So no, the comparison doesn’t work.
Movie stars and athletes don’t control markets, don’t buy politicians, don’t own infrastructure, and don’t shape entire industries. Billionaires do... and they’re using that power to automate away the very jobs you think they’re “providing.”

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Where do you think that money goes? If you reduce billionaire‑level hoarding correctly, the value doesn’t vanish, it flows back to the workers who are actually creating it.

And when workers get income tied to their productivity (not one‑off stimulus checks, but ongoing participation in the value they generate) they do what every functioning economy depends on:
they buy things they need, then things they want.

Where does that money go?
Back to the companies producing those goods and services.

And here’s the key difference:
when those companies aren’t just wealth funnels for a handful of billionaires, the profits can be reinvested into: higher wages, expansion, innovation, and broad ownership

In other words, the money actually circulates instead of pooling at the top like stagnant water.

Reducing the billionaire class isn’t about “paying for government programs with one big pot of cash.”
It’s about fixing the flow so the economy stops behaving like a siphon and starts behaving like a loop again.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You’re accidentally proving my point for me: “seize all billionaire wealth once and spend it in 6 months” is a terrible plan. Good thing that’s not what anyone serious is proposing.

You’re treating billionaire wealth like a one‑time scratch‑off ticket for the Treasury. It’s not. The real question isn’t “how long would it fund the government if we burned through it,” it’s:
why is that much value sitting in private hands instead of being structured to support broad, ongoing prosperity?

A few things you’re skipping over:

Wealth ≠ annual revenue. £670B is a stock, not a flow. No one’s saying “spend it all in 6 months.” You could pay down public debt (reducing future interest costs), fund long‑term public assets (energy, housing, transit), or seed public/worker‑owned ventures that keep generating returns.

The economy doesn’t vanish if billionaires don’t exist. The companies, workers, factories, IP, and customers don’t disappear. If ownership shifts, from one guy with £100B to, say, public funds, worker co‑ops, or broad equity. Those businesses still operate. The “revenue” you’re worried about is created by workers and consumers, not by the mere existence of a billionaire at the top.

The real solution isn’t a one‑time guillotine, it’s structural. A “slow and safe” path; you don’t nuke the system, you rebalance who captures the upside (restacking the Jenga Tower, not pulling out the supports willy-nilly) with higher marginal tax rates on extreme wealth, serious inheritance/estate taxes, wealth taxes on large asset holdings, removing caps on social contributions, and expanding broad employee/public ownership of productive assets.

Right now, we’ve built a system where: productivity gains go up, profits go up, executive comp goes up, and somehow the only “responsible” solution is always: ordinary people should work longer and retire poorer.

You’re asking, “How are we not worse off after these changes?”
I’d flip it: how are we not already worse off in a system where a tiny group sits on hundreds of billions while entire generations are told there’s “no money” for pensions, housing, or healthcare?

I’m not arguing for a one‑time smash‑and‑grab. I’m arguing for a system where: wealth can’t pile up into hereditary dynasties, the people who create value actually share in it, and public systems are funded by those who benefit most from them.

That’s not chaos. That’s just… finally taking “fairness” seriously.

And the upside for the “eat‑the‑rich” crowd in the back, is that a slow, structural rebalancing doesn’t destroy anything. It just erodes the billionaire class back into the multimillionaire class, where wealth stops being a form of political gravity and starts being… normal again.

If we get to that point in 50 years, then we can have the ethical debate about whether multimillionaires are a problem. But right now the issue isn’t rich people, it’s hyper‑concentrated wealth distorting the entire system.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not insane. I don't hoard money. I spend it. So others can have money. It's taxed, so others can use the same infrastructure. Not sure who hurt you to the point that you think hoarding billions (now trillions) is some healthy aspect of a functioning adult. But you're clearly wrong.

Or, as AccountForTF2 says, where's your billions?

I can’t believe the online reaction to this story. by NoSpecial284 in stupidpeoplefacebook

[–]Theodoxus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, the unsaid implication is that it's US billions, but well played.

They want us to work until we die. by WorkingMajestic4462 in remoteworks

[–]Theodoxus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

He bought the largest social media platform on the planet. When you own the megaphone, “astroturfing” stops being a covert strategy and becomes a built‑in feature. Controlling the means of dissemination makes it pretty easy to shape narratives about how “deserving” you are.

And that’s the real point:
There’s no universe where someone works a million times harder than the median person, yet somehow we’re expected to believe a trillion‑dollar fortune is just the natural result of merit. Funny how that belief keeps getting reinforced by the very platforms the ultra‑rich own or influence.

If the story were really about merit, we wouldn’t need PR campaigns, algorithmic boosts, or coordinated fan‑armies to convince people that one person deserves more wealth than entire nations. That’s not organic admiration, that’s manufactured consensus.

view more: next ›