Other people, equally talented and equally hard working, are paid far far less. To say that Allen "earned" every dollar is to suggest that they have not, that luck is not a factor.
Other people, equally talented and equally hard working, are paid far far less. To say that Allen "earned" every dollar is to suggest that they have not, that luck is not a factor.
That said, I don't think your argument that no-one is worth a huge amount of money is inherently a strong one. My favourite example of this is JK Rowling, who is arguably the most successful author in history and reportedly worth around a billion dollars today. That money was earned primarily from the success of the Harry Potter books she wrote, which have sold almost half a billion copies worldwide. That's a lot of happiness she's created for a lot of people, and personally I don't begrudge her being heavily rewarded for doing more good than most of us ever will in our lifetimes.
The position is not as clear cut in the case of Paul Allen, since he didn't almost single-handedly write the software that generated the vast amount of value Microsoft has produced in the world over the years, and there is a much stronger element of the founder/investor/senior vs. employee argument I mentioned before in his case. But given how much value Microsoft has generated over the years, if you're going to criticise Allen's wealth I think you need more than just a blunt "no-one deserves to be that rich" argument to be convincing.
I also have experience anchoring in the Caribbean, among reefs as well (abeit in a much smaller yacht, like, kind of order of magnitude smaller :-)). And no, you can't predict where your anchor chain will go, especially if your common sense contradicts what "local authority" says. Sometimes they're right (most of the time, they were born there and spent the whole life) but sometimes they are just plain drunk and do not care. Island time.
bullshit. People get rich on the unpaid labor of others. If nothing else, he would have less money if microsoft didn't participate in the anti-poaching scandal. It's clearly not his fault, but he got money because his corporation didn't pay market wages.
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This is, perhaps, a little harsh. I don't think he's a villain. I've never met the man, but i'm sure he's a decent guy. But you have to admit, his net worth is not a perfect reckoning of the value he created in the world. He's rich. good for him. Some of that money came from him, as an owner, colluding to not pay fair wages. This is just the most recent example. There was the whole temp workers thing. Microsoft has a fairly shady history.
>Some of that money came from him, as an owner, colluding to not pay fair wages.
What are you referring to?
"citation needed" (c)
> There was the whole temp workers thing.
"bullshit" (c). You automatically assume that under other conditions these workers would have made more money. In many similar cases though, they would have stayed unemployed. So you have to prove the point that somebody made some actual wealth from underpaying these workers. Which is possible, but not automatically true.
Also, http://paulgraham.com/wealth.html
Also, I was born and lived half of my life in Soviet Union. I know what you're talking about and experienced it first hand. I've also experienced big time what happens when it doesn't work (and so far there's no good example in the world of it working sustainably).
Microsoft, IBM, ebay, a bunch of other companies participated in the collusion scandal. Microsoft's case was dismissed due to the statute of limitations. [2]
Again, I don't think he's a villain, good for him for getting rich. I don't believe those billions are an accurate reckoning of the value he personally has created in the world.
[1] http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/24/apple-goog...
[2] http://www.workplaceclassaction.com/2015/12/microsoft-defeat...