logoalt Hacker News

andriesmtoday at 3:10 PM3 repliesview on HN

Plenty of us non-billionaires are glad PG wrote this article, because a lot a success-striving people are pretty grossed out by the lie that the only way to be a self made billionaire is to do something 'bad'.


Replies

geysersamtoday at 3:35 PM

That's a misunderstanding of the original argument. It's not about billionairs "doing something bad". The claim is that the only way to become a billionaire is to benefit from an unfair economic system.

crispyambulancetoday at 5:42 PM

A lot of success-striving people are pretty grossed out by absurd levels of wealth inequality as well.

Sure, some folks are going to be fantastically wealthy, that's OK to a large extent.

But, we're on the precipice of trillionaire's existing in a country where literally half of the population is functionally illiterate (yes, that's the USA), where the middle class is dissolving, and where we are approaching a feudal level wealth inequality-- and all this stuff is accelerating.

I mean, I guess it's not that bad. We still have a democracy. It's not like we have billionaires re-arranging political power and public resources for their pleasure and benefit. Oh wait, we do!

ModernMechtoday at 4:51 PM

So then if you're glad for it, what do you have to say about the straw man he presents? The sibling reply spells it out, but as a non-billionaire why are you willing to accept that argument?