I actually like that he’s giving away his fortune.
I don’t know where all of it is going, but that which I do know about, I like.
I just don’t see him the way others seem to. I don’t buy into the hype.
I believe that Warren Buffett pledged most of his fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
The philanthropy of giving away his fortune is all well and good (especially for his legacy, and that of other ultra-wealthy people) but something that the hardcore libertarian capitalist is averse to recognizing is that there are some services and systems that government is key in providing, particularly those involving large infrastructure or dealing with pandemics, and other things like education or protecting the environment that are valuable but not innately profitable. (The converse is that there are many things that governments are poor at doing, like building cars or making good commercial art.)
Nice that Buffett is supporting charity in whatever form, even if it is primarily going to ensuring that Bill Gates get that Nobel Peace Prize he has so coveted, but he should also be contributing a fair share (and by “fair”, meaning in proportion to the outsized benefit he has realized by being able to invest in businesses supported by the large scale transportation infrastructure, government funded research labs, and a well-educated customer base with a large amount of discretionary income, rather than “fair” meaning exactly the same as every other taxpayer) to the nation that has built and support all of this infrastructure and services. That this does not fit with the Objectivist view of the virtuous wealthy and lazy poor is a reflection of the skewness of that worldview rather than in accordance with actual reality.
Stranger
Well said.
Thank you.
Oh the Right fully mandated Trump brand stupidity.
I see people say this often in this sort of discussion. And what I read is “I know so little about taxation in a business context that I’m wasting everyone’s time”.
I bow to your enormous…
wisdom
Allow me to offer you a belated “bravo” for this sentence.
“These people don’t have any skin in the game! In fact, they’re got no skin at all!”
But $2 billion dollar donations to charitable foundations started/headed by his children is not the dame thing as providing for his kids. A “foundation” isn’t a trust fund set up for the kid’s benefit.
Maybe, but the Right alone wasn’t enough to get him elected. He got enough votes from moderates in both parties and independents that didn’t want a Hillary POTUS.
Should all corporations be state-owned? Should the price of public equities be regulated and collared by the SEC? Please enlighten us on your brand of societal economies.
Strawmen! Pitchforks! Yeah!
Stranger
That seems a bit extreme, maybe we could just increase taxes on the very wealthy?
And ban political contributions from corporations.
Then how could China, Saudi Arabia, and Russia pick the President?
nope
nope
In general, I believe that no one’s wealth, be it great or small, is acquired in a vacuum. We all rely on and benefit from each other. The greater your wealth, the greater your obligation society.
Warren Buffet supporting tax increases on people at his level of income is essentially in the same position as the responsible member of a share house coming into the living room and saying “God this place is a tip - we should spend the weekend cleaning it up.” It’s not really responsive to counter this with “well if you think it’s so crap why don’t you clean it yourself.” Nobody expects one person to clean the common areas by themselves all the time, and nobody should expect one person to contribute a massive amount more money to run a modern state than the other people at their income level.
On the share-house level “how clean should it actually be” is a worthy subject of conversation. Nobody’s going to agree on this all the time, but once a level has been agreed on by whatever means is used, it’s up to everyone to pitch in. Once a level of spending for the state has been agreed on, it’s up to everyone to contribute. Warren Buffet has as much right as anyone to make an argument about how big the contribution should be, and it isn’t hypocricy to want to be making his contribution along with everybody else who can rather than all on his lonesome