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171 points · 89 comments · latexr

  1. titzer · · focus · HN ↗
    I don't think it's unreasonable to limit a person's total wealth to, say, 100x the median person's lifetime earnings. In America, the median income is about $50k/yr. So 40 years as a wage earner means $2 million. With compounded interest, inflation, and wage growth, it's still under $10 million. So if we capped individual net worth at 100x that, it'd be $1 billion.

    The fact that we live in a society where people don't bat an eyelash at people who have literally 100,000x the median lifetime earnings of a person (literally, 1000x what I personally consider reasonable) and yet want more says that our society has passed one of these absurdity tests and just suck down whatever stupid propaganda they promulgate.

    1. weaksauce · · focus · HN ↗
      billionaires are a flaw in the system. it's an obscene amount of wealth for one person to have. A million is a lot for most people but a billion is 1000 of those.
      1. FLeXMurphy · · focus · HN ↗
        Just so happens those people are in power, and, checks notes, you are not in power to do anything about it.

        It is not a flaw in the system if the system is theirs.

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