Doh, this is so wrong, and I note in your criticism of Howard Buffet that you simply don’t understand why.
Simply, the global system of capitalism is unfair.
The winners take order-of-magnitude multiples of reward, completely disproportionate to their efforts, compared to the poor. It’s a power law, and part of that is the self-reinforcing effect that having wealth makes it easier to get more wealth. The only way this can happen is that wealth is shifted from the poor to the rich, and of course Wall Street is the very pinnacle of this system.
Like in sports. The best players are multi-millionaires, the worst get nothing at all, indeed they end up contributing towards the winners by buying sponsored sports equipment, paying for training, seminars, etc, attending sporting events, and often volunteering for free.
That might be fine for sports. But it’s not what we want in life.
By proposing that do-gooders work on wall street, you’re advocating people do exactly what Howard Buffet talks about. Taking with their left hands, before giving with their right.
The Aid industry is just a salve on the problem, and though it obviously helps individuals and saves lives, it doesn’t address the underlying problem. Indeed it can make the most glaring of the symptoms disappear to a point that to some people the problem doesn’t appear to need a solution.
Thanks for raising this topic. Your position probably captures what very many people think when hearing about “earning to give” for the first time. It’s difficult to engage with most of your points, though, because in the last sentence of your reply you seem to be favoring a situation where conditions deteriorate, rather than improve, for impoverished people, so that political changes will take place that you believe will be ultimately beneficial. That’s probably correct under some circumstances, but in general the burden of proof would be on you.
Alternatively, if you think political change is the way to ultimately help people, wouldn’t you want high-earning persons to support efforts at political change, if there are advocacy organizations in need of funds? Would you agree that, in principle, the positive effects of that investment could outweigh negative effects from the marginal usefulness of that person to their employer, above their next-best-qualified potential employee?
Doh, this is so wrong, and I note in your criticism of Howard Buffet that you simply don’t understand why.
Simply, the global system of capitalism is unfair.
The winners take order-of-magnitude multiples of reward, completely disproportionate to their efforts, compared to the poor. It’s a power law, and part of that is the self-reinforcing effect that having wealth makes it easier to get more wealth. The only way this can happen is that wealth is shifted from the poor to the rich, and of course Wall Street is the very pinnacle of this system.
Like in sports. The best players are multi-millionaires, the worst get nothing at all, indeed they end up contributing towards the winners by buying sponsored sports equipment, paying for training, seminars, etc, attending sporting events, and often volunteering for free.
That might be fine for sports. But it’s not what we want in life.
By proposing that do-gooders work on wall street, you’re advocating people do exactly what Howard Buffet talks about. Taking with their left hands, before giving with their right.
The Aid industry is just a salve on the problem, and though it obviously helps individuals and saves lives, it doesn’t address the underlying problem. Indeed it can make the most glaring of the symptoms disappear to a point that to some people the problem doesn’t appear to need a solution.
Thanks for raising this topic. Your position probably captures what very many people think when hearing about “earning to give” for the first time. It’s difficult to engage with most of your points, though, because in the last sentence of your reply you seem to be favoring a situation where conditions deteriorate, rather than improve, for impoverished people, so that political changes will take place that you believe will be ultimately beneficial. That’s probably correct under some circumstances, but in general the burden of proof would be on you.
Alternatively, if you think political change is the way to ultimately help people, wouldn’t you want high-earning persons to support efforts at political change, if there are advocacy organizations in need of funds? Would you agree that, in principle, the positive effects of that investment could outweigh negative effects from the marginal usefulness of that person to their employer, above their next-best-qualified potential employee?