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Comment by WalterBright | Hacker News Reader

On the other hand, I know a low level person at Nvidia who has made somewhere near $100m on his stock options.

And if the workers aren't getting stock options, they can still buy stocks on the open market. How much would $10,000 invested into AMZN at the IPO be worth today?

$13,000,000

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> they can still buy stocks on the open market

Well that's my point - people who do the work and create the wealth don't get that wealth in wages, it is parasitically expropriated by stockholders.

I am arguing on the side of those who work, that the wealth they create is kept by them. You argue for idleness and parasitism - that those who don't do the work can be rewarded via these various mechanisms, by being parasites on those who do work.

That is the notion that the only value in a business is that of labor, i.e. the labor theory of value.

Business needs two other things:

1. capital

2. taking a risk

in order to function. To get capital requires a source of capital, which are investors. Investors take a risk in exchange for possible gain.

No gain => no investors => no capital => no business

Let's say you want to start a business. Where are you going to get the startup capital from?

> taking a risk

You are only taking a significant risk in production investment in an unplanned economy.

So it is tautological, circular reasoning. Capitalists want an unplanned economy and then say they deserve their profits for the risks of an unplanned economy.

(Theroretically - of course, the US economy is not unplanned, but semi-planned - we type on chips paid for by US military spending sent to Fairchild, over IP packets on a network created by DARPA handing taxpayer money over to BBN etc.)

> You are only taking a significant risk in production investment in an unplanned economy.

Any investment that is a "sure thing" is going to have a very low payoff. Sure things also tend to have a track record of imploding.

You're just reiterating that capitalism is capitalism. Capital demands a higher possible gain than the labour that is actually creating value to play the game, simply because it is harder to accumulate capital than providing labour, if you have enough capital you can mitigate risks, so why exactly should that risk be compensated more than the actual creation of value provided by labour?

Without capital in this system labour can still provide value, it's harder, and slower but a group of people getting together and creating something is still possible (albeit much slower). Without labour capital has almost no value.

Without capital labor has no value.

How so? One can dig a hole with their bare hands and find a water source. If one create some rudimentary tools then the process is faster. If another one sculpts the dug clay and fashion rudimentary sun-dried clay vases you got a way to temporary store that water.

All of that has value and the only "capital" needed were the basic resources of some wood, food, and water, if you stretch the meaning of capital.

Capital cannot, ever, create value by itself, it has to come from labour. Capital can only help the process to be faster.

Even in a potential distant future where everything is made by machines, labour is required, just not human labour.

There's absolute no value from capital without labour.

Please, prove me wrong.

Try starting a lemonade stand without capital.

QED

I gave you a clear example of a process which can be started without capital.

Don't be an asshole, every single time I attempted to have a discussion on this topic with you you've been a dismissive asshole, instead of some of your more usual thoughtful comments you retract into this dogmatic stupidity.

Again: what can capital do without labour?

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