Hacker News Reader

Comment by mankash666 | Hacker News Reader

While sold as a tax for the homeless, we've seen over and again how $50M entrusted to 6 people with little oversight really turns out.

This is the right move

View on HN

Bezos said he literally cannot think of anything better to do with his money than waste it going to space. While his employees suffer due to lack of water, air-conditioning and such. So no, its better to put the 50 million in the hands of 6 elected councilors instead of a private corporation who is just going to hoard it and waste it.

Yeah! I don't approve what he's doing with his money either! We should take it from him and give it to others we like better! What could go wrong?

Yes, actually we should take all his money from him. Because he earns it by abusing his employees, going so far they require ambulances. Due to that he should be put in jail (because he knows this happens and refuses to do anything about it).

No, it’s not better to give the money to elected officials - they have no incentive at all to spend the money wisely. When you’re spending other people’s money, the incentive to do what’s best for the money disappears.

Further, when discussing politics, giving money to politicians leads to corruption, kickbacks, and other waste.

Finally, politicians have shown time and again they are awful businessmen. Boston’s Big Dig, Seattle’s tunnel under the city, California’s high speed rail, and I could go on and on and on.

>they have no incentive at all to spend the money wisely

This is very obviously not correct

>Further, when discussing politics, giving money to politicians leads to corruption, kickbacks, and other waste.

Thus we should give no money to governments at all! What societies have flourished under this ethos in human history?

>Finally, politicians have shown time and again they are awful businessme

So are many businessmen! 9 of 10 startups fail. Humans are not good at things. The success of a project depends less on whether it is run by a government or a private enterprise, and more on who is running it and how good of a job they do. NASA landed men on the moon when computers were made of cheese, they have been landing robots on mars successfully more recently, the roads get built, we drive on them, europe is smashing atoms in a huge collider learning how the universe works, the police have kept order, the US military stopped the nazis.

Time to play other foot shoe!

---

No, it’s not better to give the money to corporate executives - they have no incentive at all to spend the money wisely. When you’re spending other people’s money, the incentive to do what’s best for the money disappears.

Further, when discussing business, giving money to businessmen leads to corruption, kickbacks, and other waste.

Finally, executives have shown time and again they are awful businessmen. HP's Itanium, Tharanos' nanotainers, and I could go on and on and on.

That usually works, but Jeff Bezos owns his company. The wealth he’s acquired is his.

So, tax breaks which boost amazon profits are 'his', but taxing him is 'stealing'?

I actually agree. The solution is of course anarchism. No bosses, no masters, no corporations. Only workers associations that democratically decide how to control the companies.

It's laughable that we pretend to care about democracy, but most of us spend a large part of our lives in these dictatorships we call work.

A generic attack on politicians is orthogonal the main argument, by your logic, taken to its conclusion is that the government shouldn't be funded.

The opposing logic, taken to its conclusion, would mean that government should get all of your money. Yeah, now we're back where we started. Nobody is saying the government should be de-funded. This is a red-herring.

No where did I say that. But the argument that the tax should be repealed because the city won't spend it well is not germane to the discussion.

>But the argument that the tax should be repealed because the city won't spend it well is not germane to the discussion.

Why?

Let's break this down.

You're implying that 6 city councillors, elected and paid into the position are inherently not trustworthy enough to manage city funds, simply by vice of being part of government?

And yet, Amazon, who will spend nothing on these schemes and are even less accountable than the councillors, will make better use of it?

This sounds like you want to eliminate all government and tax.

Would be amusing to see I suppose.

What does Seattle currently spend on the homeless? Genuinely curious if you know any of the numbers.

I looked it up at the beginning of the year but I think it was around 180 million. There was something around 10 million of private funding. So close to 200 million. Is this a quiz? Am I right?

Edit: these number are for 2017.

When I see numbers like this, I start to understand these 'no big government' and tax minimisation people.

I don't live in the US, and I've never been to Seattle, but if you can't 'solve' homelessness with 180 million, what's an extra 50 million going to do?

180 million doesn't seem that much for a city like Seattle.

Even if it was the solution isn't to stop paying taxes and get rid of the government. That's throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. That money could be keeping tens of thousands of people off the streets and out of hospitals.

If we're throwing cliched adages around, don't throw good money after bad. People flock to places like SF and Seattle in part because they have all of this spending and infrastructure for the homeless.

Any evidence for that? I have a hard time believing people are moving to 'Rain City' to live outside.

We host the county jail and courthouse, and in many municipalities it's illegal to be homeless, so they get picked up there, jailed here, and released here.

If I were homeless I'd try to go to a place that helped homeless people.

You have no idea the scale of the problem here. It's not just a few people camping under an overpass. If you walk around Pioneer Square there are encampments on many of the blocks. There are encampments on Seattle anywhere there's grass. Drive on I5 through the city and you'll see encampments starting and ending at the city limits.

$230 million is a lot of money!

I'm not saying the problem isn't worth fixing - it definitely is! But Yikes, that sure does seem like a lot doesn't it.

And you’re actually implying that these people, who have not done anything even remotely successful in terms of business, elected by roughly 4% of the population of Seattle, who meet once a week for a few hours, who have split incentives to both “help the city” and get continually re-elected, who need to fundraise for elections from entities they could potentially benefit with the money...these are the people you trust more with money than one of the 5 most successful businessmen in the last 100 years?

Having worked for him, yes I'll trust the Seattle city council.

You sure seem to be on this thread frequently with some hard opinions and loose facts.

2 posts is posting frequently?

Don't make it personal about another HN member

> these are the people you trust more with money than one of the 5 most successful businessmen in the last 100 years?

Yes, because I don't equate being rich and 'successful' with having a social conscience. If anything I'm more inclined to believe that rich and successful person didn't do it by being a paragon of virtue.

And what exactly do you think Amazon's incentives are?

To the city? Come on now.

Amazon, the corporation, should only have 1 incentive - to maximize shareholder value.

I mean, that's not a legal requirement and in the past companies were expected to maintain some kind of social conscience.

Not sure when that changed.

https://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/libertarians/issues/f...

Friedman argued it was good for corporations to be greedy, and corporate America liked that idea.

The more I learn about Friedman and Hayek the more I hate them and the politicians that still cling to their hack theories in the face of overwhelming evidence that they don't work for anyone but the amassers of capital.

Their views on people as individual self-interested rational actors are so narrow and simplistic.

I think in the past companies were far less concerned with social conscience than they are today. The entire reason for the EPA is because too many companies were dumping toxic chemicals into the water supply (1).

(1) http://time.com/4696104/environmental-protection-agency-1970...

This is good for people who are Amazon shareholders and sometimes good for people who are Amazon customers.

There are many people in Seattle who stand to benefit more from having better roads, schools or provision for homeless people. Some of them, shockingly, are not Amazon shareholders or even Amazon customers. Why would they trust Jeff Bezos to help more than even an unusually inept public official with their problems, when providing such services to the people of Seattle without charge is manifestly not in the financial interests of the average Amazon shareholder?

Corporations are part of the communities from which they hire. They have ethical, if not legal, obligations to their workers and their communities.

Also, do you think it's interesting how everyone who disagrees with you is downvoted into low-contrast?

I don't understand your point. Amazon has no incentive to help the city. What do you mean when you say you trust them with the money. Trust them to help themselves? How does that help the people who don't work at or own Amazon shares?

"you trust them with the money" -> "you trust them with THEIR money"

Why is Amazon, the corporation, with offices in 30 countries, under any obligation to help people in a city where they're headquartered, who don't work there or own shares?

Depends on what you mean by "trust with money" - trust them to spend it on something that will give back to society? In that case, yes...I trust almost anyone more than Jeff Bezos.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com