All I know, is if I was worth $200B and owned the island of Lanai, you would never hear from me again. Ellison, Musk, Zuckerberg and the rest of these weirdos are deeply damaged human beings.
The best things that Bezos (and arguably Bill Gates) did was get divorced. Observe the ex-wives doing what a normal/sane person would do with that amount of money.
What weird stuff have you heard about Eric Schmidt, John Doerr, Zhang Yiming, Jayshree Ullal, or Alex Karp? There are plenty of people who you don't hear much about, but because you don't hear much about them, the other ones tend to take up all of the air in the room.
Though, there's also the argument that making that kind of money makes you even weirder, and having seen glimpses of that through someone I know getting rich, that might also be true.
By definition, average people will make an average amount of money. It takes extraordinary people to make extraordinary amounts of money. Unfortunately, our system seems to be optimized to reward extraordinary psychopaths.
The money itself also isolates them and makes them more likely to become psychopaths, imo. It's a positive feedback loop on whatever differences allowed them to obtain that wealth, and those personality features eventually metastasize.
I often think back to this 90s 60 minute interview with Bezos and wonder, what happened. He was already a billionaire at this point, but he felt so much more ordinary, down to earth, geeky. He seems very much like the developers I meet all the time. What was the catalyst to the changes we see in him today.
And being that rich in and of itself, I imagine. Tony Hseih of Zappos is another interesting story where, if I had that kind of money, wouldn't I try and help all of my friends, if they knew about it?
It seems the real trick is changing who you are, and realizing that, counter to what you may have learned as a child, lying to everybody, especially your friends, is actually a good thing. We only hear about these stories because they get told. Far more mysterious is the lottery winner who got $20 million who calls up Dave Ramsey and asks what to do with it so their son doesn't become a waiter. That is, someone just waiting for their parents to die and get their inheritance. You'll never hear about their boring life where they lived comfortably and gave money to causes they believed in and helped people they know anonymously and didn't cause a scene.
If it's possible for money not to change a person, we wouldn't hear about it, almost by definition, so we can only conclude that it does.
> And being that rich in and of itself, I imagine.
There was a thought experiment posted on Reddit and I think was from elsewhere. Something like:
Imagine you get $1 million dollars a day. You can't keep it -- it's all gotta get spent. You can invest it, sure, but those holdings aren't going to go up as much as, like, another $1 million the next day. And you have to spend it
So at some point you're going to start doing stuff basically on a whim. You're going to get 3 Lambos in different colors -- because you can. You already have the harem, you already have donated to most causes you care about. You've already got a house (houses, really), so now you start thinking about political causes you're mildly interested in, on top of ones you strongly are. And then you can get petty; if you don't like person X? Take out ads on billboards... cuz you can. Or fund their lawsuit against Gawker, cuz fuck em. etc. etc.
IMO because you have to be a psychopath/sociopath to make that amount of money.
We're talking hundred's of billions of dollars here; $20 million is already a big fortune where 2% interest gets you $200,000.
These people (on paper) have 5 orders of magnitude (100,000x) more. At that point you aren't doing all the questionable things it takes to get there for the money. IMO you have to be broken in some way, shape or form to do what it takes to get there.
I am by no means a religious person (ex-Christian, in fact), but 1 Timothy 6:10 seems applicable here.
> For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
The USA system is made this way. There are other systems in the world (namely the scandinavian countries) that don't allow individuals to accumulate that amount of wealth.
Yes, I probably should have voted a couple extra times to make sure my vote counted, much like a billionaire can, by paying millions of dollars to a marketing firm to do advertising of every kind to push their agenda. Shame on me.
> There are other systems in the world (namely the scandinavian countries) that don't allow individuals to accumulate that amount of wealth.
This is a common misconception. The Scandinavian model has changed rapidly the last few decades. Sweden now ranks higher than the US in number of dollar billionaires per capita, even if none are at Ellison level yet.
Edited to add: in fact, the Scandinavian model has always been more about equality of income, rather than wealth. There are, and has been throughout the 20th century, wealthy dynasties as well as industry tycoons who has largely been left alone by the social democratic system, and indeed viewed more as an important part of the system than anything else. Since the 90s, though, it has changed rapidly, such that today there is no tax on wealth, inheritance, gifts or real estate, as well as a low corporate income tax.
Thanks for explaining some intricacies about taxes, however this does not disprove my point.
1. Scandinavian countries impose higher taxes on their rich VS the US. It does not have to be a wealth tax. Think effective tax rate.
2. Income inequality is lower there compared to the US.
It is a very different system than the US, it's frankly strange to have to argue that.
Nah, this is something you say about a dude who stole your highschool girlfriend, not about the absolute sort of psychopath who could, you know, literally give every kid in America free lunch with little to-no-effect on his own life and money, and just chooses not to.
Unlike hunger, health, etc. that are at the base, Maslow's hierarchy says nothing about fulfilling your AI needs. Even if you argue this is a manifestation of "self", it's at the top, and least impactful for the broadest audience.
> Ellison no doubt genuinely thinks that such an effort is his highest calling, the best contribution he can possibly make to humanity's well-being
It's likely much simpler: Larry thinks the solution to (his) immortality - or longevity at the very least - may be contained in Americans' collective DNA, and AI may be able to tease the answers out.
Ellison has made it clear that he thinks the US needs a Chinese style social credit surveillance system, and is likely concerned that the proles are gonna rise up and sink his boats.
Ellison no doubt is primarily, if not exclusively, concerned with his own well-being even at the expense of humanity. He may or may not actually believe otherwise, but his wealth objectively disqualifies him from being altruistic or even trustworthy.
Be careful what you wish for. Being a billionaire gets you lots of ability to inflict unintentional damage because being a billionaire doesn't necessarily mean you understand how to best solve programs outside of your domain. There's also lots of people who will happily lead you to inflict pain on the world by convincing you that it's actually a solution.
It's not impossible to begin to liquidate fractions at a time to both live on and make the world a better place instead of revelling when the line goes up. Somehow MacKenzie Scott has found a way to be both rich and provide large chunks of cash, over 10 billion now, to causes.
Most philantropy is closer to what MrBeast does than everyone is comfortable admitting. Most times I decide to read into some public philantropy intervention or other, especially those that happen in remote/far off places, it turns out it was a disaster, nothing was achieved, funds were stolen, and the intervention ended up doing more harm than good. Except to the philantropist's brand, which always comes out on top.
Would you think his hundred clean water wells were all just theatre for a video?
It's definitely a PR campaign and virtue signal he is a good guy, but I wouldn't doubt his water wells are fake (or in your case, not valid evidence of anything).
i absolutely think they're 100% just theatre for video
and they may be real, but like a lot of feel good charity things, it's not about building them, it's building ones that are sustainable and that the locals will actually use.
beast shows up, digs some holes, gets some smiles, but all of those holes will require maintenance and tools for the local population to use. they may not be built to withstand local conditions, and don't have real community involvement.
in a year they'll just be another route for nasty shit to leach into the ground, and beast will be on to his next showboating bullshit feelgood episode
Sorry you're getting downvoted. I just saw a yt video about the Live Aid concert in the 80s and it was just sickening how much today's culture shits on them for trying to help. The comments section was very keen on using the failure as an excuse to not donate ("U2 are millionaires, they should donate instead of asking us to!") and using 40 years of hindsight to absolutely slay the musician who organized the event (Bob Geldof).
They raised an enormous amount of money that unfortunately was stolen by an African warlord, and the ones who's hearts were in the right place were hung out to dry over it. Stuff like that erodes my faith in humanity.
Thanks. I knew I'd get downvoted for it. That's why I warned about unpleasantcy in my comment.
> They raised an enormous amount of money that unfortunately was stolen by an African warlord, and the ones who's hearts were in the right place were hung out to dry over it. Stuff like that erodes my faith in humanity.
Exactly my point, you put it better than my crude comment.
It's not about the money, it's for fun and/or belief in the mission.
I agree with you for someone that has a miserable client-service job, such as an investment banker that is still slaving away so he can keep up with the Joneses.
But Musk, Zuckerberg, Ellison can do whatever the fuck they want. They don't need to take shit from anyone, and they get to build products and shape the world.
Musk, for example, wants to get humans to Mars. To the extent he cares about money anymore, it's in service of that goal, which does require a LOT of resources.
With a guaranteed salary of $300k/yr and unlimited free time I could do whatever the fuck I want. I'd plant a garden, brew beer, work on fun home/shop automation projects, build cool car stuff. All while being paid handsomely to do so. And I'd travel, go sailing, go hiking, go snowboarding. But I have no delusions of grandeur about "getting humans to Mars" or whatever, that shit sounds stressful, and like a waste of life.
"Only" is doing a lot of work there. Life is "only" hedonism for billionaires too--it's just that the things they enjoy are all about controlling other people.
toys and trips for yourself are as far as you can think to do with this hypothetical wealth? are there no other people in your life that you'd take care of and help and yes, spoil? It's your hypothetical wealth and not mine, but (after buying whatever toys I want) I imagine I'd spend my time and money helping other people. Having a workshop with every single tool known to man, all to myself, sounds awesome, but also lonely.
I mean I figured that was a given.. Obviously help the people in your life (and not in your life to the extent possible).. But you should already be doing it anyway wealth or not. I just meant that if I didn't have to work for money anymore it would free up time to do a bunch of things that are otherwise just.. dreams for if I'm able to retire someday. I simply can't imagine the mindset of someone who wouldn't take that at the earliest possible opportunity. Also, it turns out if you have a shop and a ton of free time you can use that to help people ;)
That sounds fine by me. Hiring people is work. Managing people is work. It's a fine thing to do if they pay me and I need the money, but I certainly wouldn't seek that out if I didn't have to. I don't suspect many others would either.
"Standard experiences any plebian can buy with money" includes things like westward solo circumnavigation which is a more elite group than humans who have walked on the moon. And you don't really even need that much money to do it. More money wouldn't really make you any more likely to succeed. So not everything comes down to money, you can do some incredible things without much.
I think one of the problems is that a lot of them start deciding "The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a billion dollars is a good guy with a billion dollars." but then they get so caught up in getting a billion dollars that they don't notice themselves becoming a bad guy.
Also it is very common to think that once you achieve X you will be happy and maybe you will be for a moment, but then you start to feel empty again and you think now if I only had Y I would be happy in a never ending cycle. It is human nature.
This doesn't pass muster when there are literally millions of us living perfectly normal lives at $70k a year or less and living enjoyable, "simple" lives with plentiful hobbies.
The reality is that it takes absurdly few resources to make a normal and well adjusted human happy. Happiness doesn't come from money, though unhappiness can come directly from poverty. If you are fed, housed, and have enough free time to explore your interests, and have sufficient social connections, that's usually all it takes. The way quality scales also means that unless you are playing dumb ideological games like "Getting the best", you will have satisfaction beyond your dreams at a 2X price point from the basics. Eating steak every day isn't that much more expensive than eating beans and rice every day, and certainly doesn't require taking home $100k more than the US average.
Even in a high cost of living port city in a liberal place that embraces weirdness and hasn't built a new housing unit in a decade, $150k total before taxes gets you the ability to outbid most other people looking for housing, enables you to afford buying the expensive eggs just because you feel empathy for chickens, allows you to buy beef when it's not on sale as a regular experience because it's more convenient than finding recipes using cheaper meats, allows you to buy a very nice car and pay exorbitant parking for it, gets you more healthcare than you can use, gets you an overpriced getaway vacation a year, and still putting plenty of money into retirement accounts and a savings account, pays for cheaper colleges, allows you to afford an overpriced gaming computer AND consoles, allows you to buy a new VR headset you never use etc. With a small increase in pay or an ability to live away from the city center, you can raise kids with good expected outcomes. Kids are expensive but the people insisting on $50k a year private schooling are literally insane.
If you are still not satisfied with "stuff" at that point, the problem is not money, the problem is you.
The hedonistic treadmill (and more importantly, normalcy bias) does NOT imply that already rich people will seek more wealth. It implies that people who seek wealth will never be satisfied by the amount of wealth they currently have. People who don't seek wealth but still get it will be satisfied with that amount of wealth. If you are happy with your minimal needs met, you will still be happy as a millionaire, and if you are not happy with your needs met, you will continue being unhappy as a trillionaire.
Some broken people have "I need more money" as a trait. We shouldn't build society to optimize around them.
The moment you breach a billion dollars net worth, you should only be allowed to be paid in teams of psychologists dedicated to finding out your fucking issue.
> This doesn't pass muster when there are literally millions of us living perfectly normal lives at $70k a year or less and living enjoyable, "simple" lives with plentiful hobbies.
And yet, the only immortally he will obtain is history remembering him…unfavorably. Paperclip maximizers are weird, but at least we all die eventually. Checks and balances.
What's the name of the disease where people see someone who gained a lot of money by abusing/exploiting/stealing from others and thinks to themselves "They deserve that money"?
Ouch. I really want to believe that capitalism is more like a condition which can be beneficial to the host and population as long as it's carefully managed.
"Damaged" has a particular connotation that is one particular opinion, but we can certainly say they are very different, and presumably got even more different over time from their starting point which was already very different
> This presumes these folks had that part to lose. Based on all available evidence, I don’t believe they had the empathy, compassion, or emotional health in the first place.
Even after climbing the mountain, they can’t stop, they can’t help themselves. It’s just how they’re wired.
Those are basically the same thing though. Acquiring extreme wealth filters out people with empathy; they either never had it or lost it.
This presumes these folks had that part to lose. Based on all available evidence, I don’t believe they had the empathy, compassion, or emotional health in the first place.
Even after climbing the mountain, they can’t stop, they can’t help themselves. It’s just how they’re wired. They don’t know what enough is or feels like.
Are we sure about this? McKenzie Bezos and Melinda Gates are, of course, different -- but they really really really appear to be doing what a normal person would do, given that amount of money.
I kind of agree that in order to amass it, you have to make evil choices over and over again. Being the beneficiary maybe doesn't convey the same kind of psychological damage.
I think it takes a certain kind of determined/ruthless/crazy individual to actually amass that amount of wealth. It's no coincidence that many (most?) ethical billionaires gained their wealth from divorce.
You’re looking at them from an individual basis, they each have a large collection of other individuals that have their personal wealth tied to the wealth of the central billionaire figure. Those individuals are highly incentivized to convince the billionaire to continue increasing their wealth.
One such story may be that Timmy is working hard at your company to help his sick grandma and he needs to stock price to increase 10% this year in order to do so. If you don’t deliver then his grandma will die. Multiply the that by 1000 Timmies with 1000 grandmas and I could see why it might be hard to say no.
I'm not going to empathize with them based on a slightly derivative version of the Nuremberg defense. The fact that this is how they're choosing to deploy their wealth speaks volumes - all for me, nothing for the public good. Why not collectively agree to limit their wealth to a sustainable billion dollars each? They could police each other on that just as easily as the dragon-hoarding they're doing now.
Not even close to the Nuremberg “following orders” defense. Empathy is an essential component to understanding and understanding is an essential component to productive change. This is on the fairly safe assumption that most changes, especially random or chaotic, would be unproductive or even counter productive.
Why would Larry want to change your behavior, or even think about you at all? Requiring such reciprocity as a prerequisite only hurts yourself making it less likely you’ll achieve change or at least the kind of changes you want.
Risk aversion can take different forms. A paranoid Larry Ellison vows to build a security state. A paranoid Andrew Carnegie built libraries, universities, and concert halls.
+1. It's very different gambling $10 million if it's all the money you have, vs if it's just 4.58% of your net worth, as is the case with Ellison for example.
That's an odd assumption to make. HackerNews comments don't really bring any kind of posterity. I chose to do that because it forced me to be more thoughtful and less troll-y with my comments at a time when I found that to be valuable.
