Anymore I think the question shouldn't be about some kind of economic fairness (the time value of money thing being discussed) but the idea that wealth accumulation is a disease that afflicts society. I don't think anyone should have the level of control or influence on others that having a billion dollars currently allows. If a millionaire gives $100 to a political candidate it probably doesn't require too much thought. It's impressive to note that a 10-billionaire can give $1M just as easily, and so we have a class of folks who can throw around influence, who can order a team of lawyers to do things, can employ their legion of sycophantic followers to harass people, or can threaten the employment of many people not-of-their-class because they can make decisions that threaten someone's employer's bottom line. And note that above I compared a millionaire to the 10-billionaire, but there are plenty of folks, especially around the planet, who economically live several orders of magnitude below the millionaire.

As a bit of an aside, "spending more time with family" is an often-used euphemism around someone being fired, but if you have more money than you know what to do with and you aren't using it to spend more time with those you love, then what on earth is it for?

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nearbuy 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I know this is tangential to your main point, but in the US, you can only give a max of $3,500 to a candidate per election cycle, for each the primaries and general election.

To give more financial support, you have to do independent, uncoordinated campaigning for the candidate. So you can spend a million dollars on ads saying to vote for a candidate, but you can't give that money to the candidate's campaign and the candidate can't coordinate with you. This is what Super PACs do.

I only write this because a lot of people are unclear on the rules. I'm not making an argument about billionaires.

	▲	blanched 4 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		That’s the law, yes, but in practice it’s murkier: https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2023/08/super-pacs-raise-mi... > In fact, not a single coordination investigation has ever resulted in a PAC being fined.
	▲	klaff 4 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		As one example see million dollar donations to inaugurations.

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arh5451 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How do you think society works without wealth accumulation? There would be no incentive to innovate to push forward. You wouldn’t have your iPhone, computer, or car. Want to see the result of societies that forbid wealth creation? Go to Cuba.

	▲	klaff 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It's an interesting question. If we lived in a universe in which we weren't in fear of losing access to basic necessities of food, shelter, and healthcare, but had to work to have anything beyond those, what would happen? I don't truly know and I don't believe we have done the experiment anywhere. But I do know that the system we have not only produces innovative products but also corruption, oligopolies, and steamrolls over labor and the environment if not regulated. I'm not naive enough to think communism is a magical answer (but Cuba is not some A/B experiment - the U.S. in particular has done a lot to make sure Cuba didn't succeed) - it ends up concentrating the wealth too. I would favor some form of democratic socialism, with leaders who can be kicked out if they abuse their power and limits on the influence of rich individuals and corporations. On the latter, I think we forget that corporations are a legal construct intended to benefit society by allowing risk pooling - they are not people and should not be considered as such for things like free speech rights. Corporations should not be allowed to make political contributions in any way.