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Comment by Randgalt | Hacker News Reader

What's more important is that he produced that much money. You can't give away what you haven't produced.

Before going too far down that road, it might also be a good idea to consider how he produced that much money. It's not entirely pretty.

I sincerely don't think there is a "pretty way" to make ~$60b. You're going to have to be willing to be a hard ass and take some unethical routes.

I think that's an unfounded assumption.

You're right, but I don't think it's a ridiculous one to make.

Name somebody who has made that much money ethically.

Warren Buffett?

I would argue that he is an outlier.

Fortunately, all that was asked for was an existence proof.

Not quite. At different points in his career, Buffett had large holdings in tobacco and coal. Plus, to this day, owns a decent percentage of Coca-Cola - which I would argue is a pretty unethical investment.

I think the onus lies the other way. Go through the list of the 10 wealthiest billionaires and explain how each has earned their wealth either ethically or unethically. Please. Maybe just the top 5 even?

Which is exactly why people should reflect a bit before lauding them for producing in such a way.

What, did he blow-up his competition? Murder them? Kill their families? Did he bomb villages? Nuke cities? Did he use slavery? Did he poison people's water? Did he kick families out of the company town with pinkertons? Did he spill oil on beaches? Did he use eminent domain to steal property? Did he pay his employees horribly?

Oh you mean he vanquished other companies without using any kind of force what-so-ever? Oh he bundled! (which every company does) Oh he used market leverage! (which every company does)

Did they use the government + legislation to become successful? (unlike most large companies) No, they made fools out of the largest tech company on earth, IBM.

Netscape lost why? Because of their own incompetence, as proven by the rise of Firefox. Did Microsoft stop the rise of Java, nope, turns out it's slightly common these days. Did they kill Apple? Nope, Jobs would tell you himself that Apple was its own worst enemy. And on, and on, and on. Did they stop the rise of Android or iOS? Nope, couldn't even begin to. Music, movies? Nope, nada. How about search? Har har. Do they dominate tablets (despite practically inventing the field)? Nope. Do they dominate gaming? Nope. Intuit? You know that story. How about Linux? They would have loved to have killed it, they couldn't even touch it. How about Apache? Turns out it's doing pretty well these days. Social anything? Nope. Shopping anything? Nope. Payments anything? Nope. Databases? Nope, at best they're a modest player. It's a really long list.

So... the problem was what exactly? They had market power for a few years (maybe ten years tops), and then it faded.

There was nothing particularly terrible about how Gates produced that money.

Exactly.

And let's not forget that Microsoft -- as a corporation -- as no responsibilities other than to make money for its shareholders and, as CEO, Bill Gates had likewise no responsibility beyond making money for his employers (i.e. shareholders). So talk about what Microsoft did or did not do is disingenuous since it is people, not corporations, that have moral or social responsibilities.

Therefore, what Bill Gates has done is extremely praiseworthy as he has spent his own personal wealth and it is not diminished by whatever Microsoft may have done to give him that wealth.

Nope. What's more important is that he spent the money on humanitarian causes, to try and better the world. He could have just bought islands for himself.

Agreed, I'm reminded of another SV billionaire, who emphatically chose not to donate to any causes until shortly before his death...and even then, only to causes which would have personally benefited him.

You know nothing of which you speak.

Steve Jobs believed that Apple products were better for people than charitable giving like food, clothing, shelter, or medical care. http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-10-11/news...

"Despite accumulating an estimated $8.3 billion fortune...there is no public record of Mr. Jobs giving money to charity..." "in 1997, when Mr. Jobs returned to Apple, he closed the company’s philanthropic programs." http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/08/29/the-mystery-of-steve-...

"And it wasn’t until after an unflattering media report about Jobs on the subject over the summer, that Apple in September initiated a “matching gifts” program, under which donations to philanthropies made by employees are matched by the company." http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-10-06/business/35277...

This was just the first 3 results of the google search. There are hundreds of more sources to choose from.

Can you cite some evidence to the contrary? I'm tempted to say it's you who may be mis-informed.

I only pointed out that the poster has no idea of truth of the matter. I did not claim that anyone else, other than Laurene, and maybe the IRS, does.

Take note of the poster's wording, and leap of accusation. He has zero basis for his position, but he's not letting that stop him from passing judgement.

There's a word for that sort of behaviour. It isn't complimentary.

Not just that, he also ordered his company to kill all contributions to charity as soon as he was in power.

This trend has now been reversed since his passing.

Are you implying that a museum dedicated to Jimi and owning the majority of the Northwests' sports franchises doesn't directly benefit all of humanity? Because that sir is something we will simply have to disagree on.

How does one "produce" or "make" money? I was always under the impression it basically just gets shifted around.. yeah, you first have to attract a lot of mass before you can repel it again, but that ain't making mass.

Here's a radical idea: instead of passive-aggressively determing this does "not add to the discussion" you might simply try to answer the question. After all, people (surely on here) say making money this and making money that all day long; and while needed, pointing out how dumb that is will not ever be "on-topic", so I attached the (trick) question to a comment that is sure to remain at the bottom of the discussion. If it rubs you the wrong way it's probably for a reason; good luck with that. I didn't imply Bill Gates never produced any value, any such crap is solely in your head as well.

Creating wealth is not a zero-sum game. So your phrase: "I was always under the impression it basically just gets shifted around" is wrong.

Basic economics, man.

The extension of this is that if you've accumulated great wealth (through the market, rather than through dictatorship or government) then you have also generated great wealth for your business customers or clients. But that wealth will be more spread out.

The fact that wealth is not a zero-sum game doesn't mean that your second claim follows: it is not the case that all transactions are positive-sum. Not all accumulation of wealth produces a multiplier; it's possible to make a fortune by siphoning off money with no net creation of wealth, or even by net destroying some.

Creating wealth is not a zero-sum game.

That's great; "making money" however is, seeing how there is a fixed amount in circulation.

Every bank loan is new money in, at minimum, the form of an interest charge (but more often on some or all of the principal too). The principal+interest paid to the bank is more than the principal alone, even in the simplest case. In either case, however, the bank has "made" money (but not wealth or value) and devalued (inflated) the paper currency in circulation. (You, however, are expected to make value with the capacity to transact that has been loaned to you). In the case of almost everyone else however, I agree: people are largely competing for the pre-existing numbers. But banks get to make them up, and that function is independent of the printing of currency. The actual currency is just printed as needed to facilitate trade, satisfying debts, and hopefully the creation of wealth; hopefully the wealth created is enough to counter the wealth removed, because otherwise there's lots of vacuums running around sucking up value. Oddly, most modern countries accumulate interest-bearing public debt (inflation and interest), employing banks as lenders, instead of just printing the money (currency) to spend on worthwhile projects and to remove from circulation when they're done.

How does that work? Back at the big bang, there were 0 dollars, euros, rupees, etc. Now there are many.

Read this Paul Graham's essay: http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html

Your trolling will work better under a less telegraphic username.

You can give away what you obtain, regardless of who produced it.

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