I saw a meme or something a while back that said to eliminate billionaires, every cent over 999 million should be taxed at 100%, we could give them a little plaque that says you won capitalism and they'd still have more money than anyone could spend in a single lifetime.
this post was submitted on 16 Aug 2025
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There's nothing wrong with billionaires in themselves, that'd be stupid. A billion's js a number slowly losing it's value as time goes on. It's how the money's acquired that matters.
A lot and overwhelming amt of billionaires in places like america make their money thru fistfucking their entire country and the destruction of society, but they don't notice money's just a number, a value and once that society's destroyed you can't eat money. Like I said nothing wrong with making money but it depends on how you make it.
Most billionaires make their money from coming out of the right womb.
Which is why inheritance tax is a thing even tho most find ways to avoid it.
As long as they pay their dues, instead of leaving us plebs to run their own state for them, which granted a lot of them don't, idrc. I want to make P's as much as anyone else but if the game's rigged against my favour we need to change the game.
Same way how in sport people win and lose, that's not the issue, but the game has to be fair, we can't allow doping, the playing field has to be even.
Soft disagree. I think even numerical wealth past a certain number is a sign of, at best, incoherent markets.
why didn't he pay a bunch of that to the employees?
Because that's against how the system works. Shareholders can and will sue your company if you don't maximise profits. I honestly do not believe that we will achieve an acceptable distribution of wealth under capitalism.
That's a certainty as equitable distribution of wealth is diametrically opposed to the fundamental working of the capitalist system.
$100 million invested into dividend stock would gross him $1-5 million per year. About 1/3 of that will be paid in taxes, depending on what kind of dividends those are.
Me personally, I think I'd be happy with $10 million but I guess you get hungry when there's a lot of food in front of you.
Depends if you want rich people play money or just comfy people play money.
Also if you want to say buy a beach front house in california or a nice mountain home in Colorado. That alone can run you a few millions dollars upfront not to mention a the on going costs.
100m is honestly not a lot of money if you plan to not for for the next handful of decades and want to actually enjoy a rich life style.
10 mill will put you in a nice middle class home and keep you living a middle class life style for the same length of time.
Wealth to life style scales pretty well from 10 to 100 million dollars when your looking at a 35 year span.
Good for him.
Raise the taxes, remove the cap on FICA contributions, implement universal healthcare.
I love the sentiment but want to make sure it's understood that M4A would cost less, not more, than what we have today. The US government already spends more per citizen on healthcare than most governments with universal programs. The money just doesn't go to healthcare, it pays for profits and unnecessary overhead (like CEO salaries) at insurance companies, physician networks, hospitals, and medical suppliers.
The US government already spends more per citizen on healthcare than most governments with universal programs. The money just doesn’t go to healthcare
Then the US is nor spending that money per citizen, now is it?
"Per citizen" doesn't imply that the money ia going to each citizens. It nust means "total spent divided by the number of citizens".
Should have shared the money with the workers who built the company into a $1.6B valuation and worth acquisition.
Jesus Christ, it's never good enough for you, why even bother trying.
That's correct, there's no way to be the good guy in a system like this. All you can do is try
Just because he gave it away, doesn't remove his responsibility for how he "earned" it.
Look, at least he does not seem to have raped anyone.
That's a low bar.
I agree, but it doesn’t sound like his choices are bad. There’s a comment further down.
duckin' A
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How many more people/companies do we need to see doing this before we see change?
I am praising the action not the individual :)
Just a general reminder to anyone to use a site like Charity Navigator to find good causes to donate to.
Seems to be only American
Because most other Western countries have social security networks paid for by taxes, which are infinitely more efficient than the temporary bandaid which is charity.
or GiveWell if you want causes ranked according to their impact as measured in QALYs. They research these things pretty carefully to determine the impact. If you're not a utilitarian then you may not see the point of doing this (though on the other hand, if you're not a utilitarian, I don't know if there's any way to evaluate charities well.)
I reserve my praises until I learn how exactly he gave away the money. Family-controlled foundations that only do political lobbing while avoiding taxes are a thing .
I wasn't able to find details with a quick search, but it sounds like it wasn't his own foundation:
After the AppNexus sale, O’Kelley and his wife carefully chose which causes to support. Their donations focus on education, social justice, technology access, and healthcare initiatives.
https://www.ceotodaymagazine.com/2025/08/could-you-give-away-1-5-billion-like-this-ceo/
Perhaps the only good billionaire is one who isn't.
Perhaps the only good billionaire is one who isn’t.
Duh
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When a billionaire gives money away, it's usually to their own charity, and it's to avoid paying taxes. Of course it sounds good to say they gave it away but it reality, they give it to a charity they fully control.
Or to reinvent their image, and not be look upon as a terrible person. Aka, gates
Basically he paid the cost of buying the Benevolent Nerd Dad image when you're primarily known for running a company with some of the most anti-competitive practices ever around.
O’Kelley’s [sic] says billionaires represent “such an incredibly ludicrous waste of money in a world where there’s so many people who don’t have that,” but he says actually being one is also “othering”—separating you from the limits and consequences that define normal life. “There’s something about keeping connected to normalcy that is really, really important,” the entrepreneur explains. “I don’t want a yacht and I don’t ever want to be able to be without consequences. I think that’s the biggest risk, is, how can we be accountable when we have so much money we can buy anything?”
He gets it. Past a certain point, wealth erodes your humanity. I think I'd have picked $100M too - at a safe 4% return that's $4M per year, plenty for anybody to live on but not megayacht money.
I've always said If I could have enough where I could purchase in cash a cottage in a small cottage town here in Canada with a top of the line internet connection and I'd never have to work or worry about money for the rest of my life I'd be happy. what would I do? nothing. I'd pursue my hobby projects, more FOSS development, gaming, painting, build model kits, drink beer, eat whatever I wanted, and socialize with as few people as possible.
That's all i want. I just want enough money right now to achieve that.
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