One of the best things I read was an 1889 essay by Andrew Carnegie called The Gospel of Wealth. It makes the case that the wealthy have a responsibility to return their resources to society, a radical idea at the time that laid the groundwork for philanthropy as we know it today.
In the essay’s most famous line, Carnegie argues that “the man who dies thus rich dies disgraced.” I have spent a lot of time thinking about that quote lately. People will say a lot of things about me when I die, but I am determined that “he died rich” will not be one of them.
Carnegie was the smartest of the Robber Barons. He knew what would eventually happen if he didn’t throw the peasants a bone.
He didn’t want a date with Madame Guillotine. And some of the other Robber Barons realized his motive, and the dumber ones just saw it as a competition. Most of them followed his example.
Cuban is trying to use this strategy today with his “Discount Pharmaceutical” thing. It’s not enough.
Can we please not help launder his reputation by proactively giving him credit for something he hasn’t done yet?
And he hasn’t done shit to help the peasants of the country that made him filthy rich?
Not shitting on the African communities he’s “helped,” but he can afford to help a lot more.
Oh, and he shit on making the CVD-19 vaccine IP free.
inb4 he “gives it away” to his own charity for tax dodging purposes
Obvious properity gospel propaganda is obvious Abolish billionnaires, fiscal paradises and inheritance with a monetary value in excess of a lifetime of the median income.
Give it away to a charity you don’t control now, or STFU about it already. We all know you’re still trying to rehab your reputation.
And he’ll still be a billionaire. And he got that money by suppressing the world with proprietary software. He’s single handedly helped hold humanity back. I don’t care the good he’s done as it’s built on the back of all the harm he’s done.
He was also a major opponent of the efforts during Covid to waive medical patents for producers in the global south to allow faster distribution of those vaccines.
Shouldn’t be much of a surprise. His family has always been eugenecists with a “benevolent” mask. Not knocking what his foundation has done against malaria, but I believe he’s said some very direct things about wanting lower birthrates in the global south.
Beat me to it. Anand Giridharadas has spoken on the general scam of billionaires white-washing their legacies like this… their philanthropy seldom approaches, much less exceeds, the harm they did in getting so rich in the first place.
And somehow, even when proclaiming to give “Most” of their fortunes away, it ends up in a “Charity” or “Philanthropy” they control.
He’ll still be a billionaire with the 1 % remaining.
Donate to his own foundation which he controls
People should just call his bluff and ask if he would support a big estate tax.
He literally has the financial resources to lobby congress to make it happen.
I honestly don’t understand why self made billionaires wouldn’t do that, it’s not like their kids are gonna be poor, they will still be rich, just not oligarchs level (which they probably would suck at anyway given how they don’t have proper experience).
Hell, he could buy the country like Musk did. He’s just not as narcissistic as Musk, who made very dumb decisions that would have landed him in prison in a sane reality.
This is a good comeback. Take that wealth and start lobbying to start fixing shit
He could start up a whole ass organization with departments to fight for education, health care, income equality, homelessness and more.
He could resolve homelessness single handedly by funding homes, but what we need is to fix the machine.
I seriously think we need to focus in fixing education and news/social media regulations to increase critical thinking in the masses and stop the suppression of “woke media”
They’re making everyone dumber and brainwashing the masses. How we got our current leader.
Social media platforms are how many Americans get thier information and news. Purposefully spreading misinformation and suppressing non offensive political views should be a massive fine by the FCC.
Why would he do that? He’s so rich, he can never go broke.
All his “Foundation” bullshit is PR, after he realized everyone hated him before Bush Jr. made all his troubles go away. I wonder how much that “Donation” was?
There is no such thing as a good billionaire.
That’s my point. A “good” billionaire would make moves not promises and donations.
Agreed.
I appreciate how civil most lemmings are. I’ve been wrong and admit fault. Or unclear and clarify.
We also have idiots on here though. I imagine that ratio may change as Lemmy gets more adoption.
The fact that he collected billions (worth of cash and financial instruments) in the first place is the problem. He should have been charging consumers less, and paying his workers more. He never should have accumulated his obscene wealth to begin with.
Unless he actively works towards making billionaires contributing to society non voluntary he is still part of the problem. Billionaires shouldn’t exist in the first place.
He’s already been claiming he would for the last 15. It was too little to late back then. He either needs to get busy with it or shut up about it.
At his current 69yrs age, he could get all the busy he wants for his remaining life and still fail to reach the 99% goal. 🙄 🤦♀️ 🤡
Great; start by paying off all student loans.
He could do that. Easily.
But he won’t.
The irs accepts donations.
People will definitely say that about me when I die too. Thankfully the US healthcare system is pretty damn good at making sure the vast majority of us can say this when we die.
I’ll leave a 20 year old car, and 3 electric guitars to the needy.
Can I have a library named after me?
More lies at 11.
