So ... in addition to green-washing and art-washing (among others) contrived to convince the general public that individual/corporate greed is actually benefitting society at large, we now have greed-washing? Bezos, Musk, SBF (really, who does that to his own name?!), et. al. are good, not bad. Their riches are for us, not them. They do it for the common good, not for their own. Wow. And I thought they were just a bunch of wankers when they're actually on my side. How did I miss that?
Taxing the rich just seems such a no-brainer. I make x, I pay y. I make xx, I pay yy. What’s the issue? Oh, yeah … it’s not so simple because of politics. Which is, of course, theory put into practice these days.
EA is just another rationalization to express that greed may be good. The main issue is whether these folks should get tax breaks.
Using statistics, MacAskill uses the term "longtermism," to argue that only by positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority–that, when making at least some of our most important moral decisions, we should be particularly concerned with the effects of our actions many generations into the future.
I was amazed to find how young he is and that "MacAskill" is not really his name, and that he has an institute at Oxford. Apparently, the institute and Robert have views in common.
"We find a good short and medium-term instrumental case for lower economic inequality. We then argue, somewhat speculatively, that we have instrumental reasons for inequality reduction from a longtermist perspective too, because greater inequality could increase existential risk. We thus have instrumental reasons for reducing inequality, regardless of which time-horizon we take. We then argue that from most consequentialist perspectives, this pro tanto reason also gives us all-things-considered reason. And even across most non-consequentialist views in philosophy, this argument gives us either an all-things-considered or at least weighty pro tanto reason against inequality."
I think Couch/ MacAskill is to philanthropy what Lawerence Summers or Jason Furman are to economics. They tell the rich and powerful what they want to hear, wrap it up in academic gibberish, and then see their career soar...
I hope Oxford see's through his grift and does not make him a Tenured Professor.
Daniel, I am always impressed by your comments and have subscribed to your newsletter on Substack. When might you expect to activate your newsletter; I am eager to begin reading it.
Likewise; further - to add to the point - the fact that more folks aren't asking why such avarice isn't met with a full tax burden is beyond a joke (forgive the 'Laffer' pun)...
Daniel, I may be naive, but, the super rich should only be able to take a charity write-off at the same level as everyone else. If they give more it should come from their own personal already-taxed income. It would mean more that way. Exchanging tax payments for gifts to some nebulous charity is not a fair exchange.
Why do the super Rich need to have such high incomes in the first place? It makes far more sense to tax them at 90% for income over $10M. They will then have the incentive to leave the money in their company and pay employees more money or spend more money on R&D which creates more jobs.
Who the heck cares what charity rich people care about. I sure don't. I'd rather that the people working for them in their companies get paid more money
American voters have had 40yrs of media telling then that "the government" is the problem. That is the default that most Americans assume is true. So higher taxes simply does not compute.
It may be clear to you and I that higher taxes are needed. But it is not clear to the vast majority of voters... Keep fighting to change the minds of Americans. Don't give up.
You know more of Piketty than I do, but not only is he correct in his assessment of the need for progressive taxation, even a wealth tax, but he is only echoing one Adam Smith, a compatriot of MacAskill, who said it all 200 years before MacAskill first breathed on his own.
Americans have been brainwashed into believing the government-is-always-the-problem BS, ever since Reagan and his wretched sidekick Milton Friedman stood Smith on his head. Wrong! Smith was an advocate of strong government, in large part because he wanted the wealthy to pay taxes at a HIGHER rate then the less wealthy. Without that check on the power of the wealthy, they would soon take over and distort the market in their own interests, at the expense of the average citizen. And just what do we see in modern America?
What you DON'T want is government abusing its power and starting to run industries - which is what I grew up with in England, what the East Germans had to suffer for 40 years, and what Russia still suffers from. That's socialism (and I do wish Bernie would stop using that word, it's so confusing to people).
Government should keep to its very important lane: raising taxes, regulating markets, maintaining the armed services, and providing Medicare and Social Security.
I agree with Daniel Solomon, EA is just a new variant of "greed is good."
They comprehend the >point< of Smith about as well as they do the >point< their bloody bible! On the other hand, I am open to the notion of public sector control over essential, strategic goods and services, while letting the private sector busk their ball games, toys, vacation packages, and other, non-essential goods and services.
Right you are. The problem in UK and East Germany 50 years ago was that government took over even those industries capitalists were interested in, such as automobile manufacture, resulting in the Mini Metro in the UK and its East German equivalent, the Trabant, while West Germans were making BMW, Mercedes and Audis.
Yeah DZK, Reagan was a menace! He had a few ideas, most of them really harmful, then found guys who could force them through while he mouthed platitudes like "morning in America" and whined about "welfare queens" and undermined our government by telling folks how the government is designed to hurt the people. He just made things up or made one case mean millions. Yep, he was pretty racist and sexist too, but his grandfatherly roleplaying made lots of people not hear the words behind the character he was playing.
I always called McReagan "the cowboy actor," which is >exactly< the kind of "old ranger" role he played throughout his presidency. Believe me, I took notice and exception to the Republicans running an actor, and I always wondered if Bush I was the one feeding the cowboy actor his lines. That's the point at which I started becoming politically conscious, vowing I'd >never< vote Republican, seeing that between ol "Tricky Dickie" and the cowboy actor, the Republicans were clearly deceitful.
I don't really consider myself a Democrat. They're simply the only realistic option. They've just pissed me off a lot less than the Republicans. Excluding the covid policies, which I generally - but not completely - agree with, I'm >really< not a fan of their "nanny state" proclivities, while mostly ignoring the FDA - except for making sure it enforces their tobacco hobby-horse in economically blackmailing smokers to quit. (Argue as loud and as long as they want, we're waaaay past convincing me I'm wrong about that and similar policies. For example, maybe if there were considerably less nanny-state, there would have been far more cooperation from the public in a pandemic - where it counts >the most!<) I also think they'd better make damn sure that if they legislate breaking the impending rail strike, that the railroads are forced to implement remedies to the unions' safety & working conditions grievance. The 7 days extra sick-leave the Dems are giving them is a shit booby prize, where the workers risk being fired for actually taking them - which is among the grievances, in the first place! Like the Kroger festivities, it's not really about money, as breakers might wish to portray it. The impending rail strike puts Dems in general, and Biden in particular in perilous waters, and the Democrats >really need to step-up in support of the unions, otherwise they risk >losing it all.<
Reagan has not been the only President for the past 50yrs. Clinton and Obama have been equally guilty..... And neither did anything to refute the McReagan lies.. In fact they promoted his lies...
Let me see . . . Clinton was under siege over the Whitewater-gate investigation from day-one of his presidency, and still trying to be bi-partisan, while Obama was attempting to dig us out of the same economic hole left by Bush II that Bush I left for Clinton, only in his case, ol' Tweety was coming on the scene with his lyin' allegations about his - Obama's - US citizenship. The Republicans finally showed themselves for >exactly< what they think of bi-partisanship when it came time to seat a new SCOTUS justice under Obama.
Don't try to hustle me with the equivalence con. The Republicans were in it to win it all along, and Republican fingerprints are all over everything for the last 50 years, even back to Nixon - that paradigm of Republican Southern Strategy virtue. Democrats never ruled without finding themselves under continuous siege from strenuous Republican dissent, were consistently nobbled in the midterms, while Republicans have >always< wished to silence >any< dissent in order to rule alone as effectively a one-party government. (They'll need a fig-leaf of collaborators >calling themselves< Democrats.) They're about to prove me exactly right in the next session of Congress. End of discussion.
Yes. It's much cheaper to donate a Little League baseball field than to pay fair taxes or succumb to regulatory oversight, and it provides the ROI of good will.
Unfortunately, not enough - especially at this point. Taxing the wealth is the only way to equalize generations of free and unearned money, because the wealth gap is so large that its power overshadows all income tax systems. We no longer speak of millionaires since 2016, but of billionaires and today hundreds of billions. (1 billion is 1000 million)
Agreed. And I think now is the time to begin talking about it, as Biden has. Unfortunately there are two DINOs in his Senate, but hopefully Warnock wins and we can begin anew.....
Ruth, just so. Between 1948 and 1980 America prospered like no other nation in history, and it was not DESPITE high taxation but BECAUSE of high taxation. Massive infrastructure projects, such as the interstate highways, were put in place, which spawned an incredible car industry, which had knock-on effects on auto supply chains, which in turn stimulated other unrelated parts of the economy. Business boomed. Why, America even put a man on the moon. Total Adam Smith.
Then along came that horse's ass Ronald Reagan, preaching the anti-government nonsense. Taxes were lowered substantially and so began the slow four-decade long transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top 0.1%, with the purchase of Congress (Citizens United) and the acceleration of wealth transfer, along the way, to the point where even the merest hint of raising taxes on the wealthy arouses cries of Socialism! Socialism!
Bullshit, its capitalism, capitalism, the way Smith intended it. But the great American public is so docile and so brainwashed it just cannot seem to shake the monkey off its back.
Yes and no. It was actually economists at the University of Chicago who sold neo-liberalism. The goal was to make economies more open to trade and competition in order to be efficient and provide cheaper goods. To some extent it worked and shifted manufacturing off shore were labor was cheaper so goods were too. t lifted many out of poverty...BUT it failed to provide compensation and a second chance to workers left behind in developed countries. And Government were gutted leaving us open to the incompetence we now endure. And as you said wealth concentrated at the top while cuts to services and infrastructure made our everyday lives more and more difficult.
The uber economists at the IMF admitted neo-liberalism "did not deliver" around 2016 but right wing governments have turned into an ideology aided by those who profited the most. And now as Shakespeare said. "Nothing gets done until nothing gets done."
I actually think Smith made a minor mistake in his advocacy for free trade. You can trade freely with rich economies on your doorstep (e.g., Canada), but not with dirt poor economies on your doorstep (e.g., Mexico) or your factories will ship. Ross Perot was right. The point about taxation remains good, however. Taxation is important because it redresses the inequality generated by a system that over-rewards those at the top. And if you doubt that, consider Exhibit A, Mark Zuckerberg.
Free trade acts came with conditions that broke basic principles of democracy. It was poorly managed in silos with finance and trade playing their uber role over environment and social well-being. Agree taxation is the key but highly unpopular. And hard to make it popular unless politicians understand that evidence based policy making can work for them and"working for them" means reaching outcome based goals to improve our quality of life.. We know how to make better and more effective public policy and have since the 70's. More than annoying.
Although this is not a response or comment directly relevant to today's discussion topic, or even the comment I'm responding to, it's about what underpins the justification for the existence of philanthropy: https://youtu.be/ofFR1mD2UOM
It also got me thinking about what's now becoming clear to me is another "big lie" we seem to have accepted and internalized without question. Why the bloody hell have we accepted the notion of "neo-liberal" economics, when in fact it's a conservative principle that should be, and should have always been called "neo-conservative ‽"
Because the GOP has developed a sociopathic strategy to hijack every term they actually stand against. It takes an especially twisted group of minds that denigrate terms such as 'patriotism,' 'liberalism,' 'charitable-giving,' to the point that any rational, sane person would move as far away as they can from those tainted hoax-terms, lest they be associated with what is ACTUALLY occurring. It effectively leaves us (the actual majority) with no position to express in the public arena. We are the disenfranchised masses with NOBODY brave enough to rise to leadership to attempt to clean up a corrupted political dichotomy. If you think about it, few people vote FOR a candidate they believe in; rather, they've been brainwashed to fear-vote AGAINST the guy who will do the most damage. Literally, democrats tell me (an ex-dem turned green) all the time that if I don't keep voting dem, it's my fault that their opponents win and ruin it all. At no point do dem politicians have to take ownership (despite MULTIPLE opportunities) for aiding and abetting criminal politicians who take laundered(?) lobby money in exchange for legalizing taking lobby bribes(?)..... Establishment-dems get collared leftist extremists by actual right-winger extremists, and rather than take strategic steps to demonstrate why that is a good thing, instead they compromise away their constituency's civil rights to chase after their abusive-partners' approval/affection by running into their arms and call themselves centrists - but who now stand WITH the opposition while confused voters blame each other. That's how it happens - how we came to this pornographic illusionary version of 'democracy' whose plan is to get us to voluntarily walk straight into the arms of fascism. Egregious as it is, it has occurred many times over human history. We are doomed to repeat it over and over because, it seems, humans have enough gumption to take up arms against dictators, just not enough collective decency to STOP greedy fascists while they slow-motion train wreck the decent, hard-working, folks they want to destroy. Yay america.
I CONSTANTLY say we can’t vote every two or four years and sit on OUR butts and let the people who were voted in sit with their thumbs up THEIR butts and then expect anything different the next time. It actually took the Republicans about 40 years to orchestrate what they’ve got going here -- from the ground UP. But another bit of reality on their side is, they are willing to be shady, and outright dishonest, and give each other aid and comfort in doing it.
Our outrage at Mitch McConnell and how he’s packed the courts -- our outrage a MTG snd Gozar and the like -- is all on the Left, The Republicans never criticize them because they are doing what Republicans want them to do. Roiling up the garbage.
I’m not saying the Left [never mind Democrats -- the party is in thrall to Wall Street] should start behaving badly. But it is a sad sad commentary when integrity cannot win over chicanery. If that’s how it is, then what?
While what you say is true I think your analysis leaves out the greatest reason to be hopeful: human nature. We are genetically programed for justice, sociality, and exploration. Yes, we have other genetically programed dispositions like greed and violence but over the arc of human history they are less influential than the first I mentioned. Consider the path of humanity a coiled spring. We seem to be going in a circle, we seem to revisit the same territory over and over again. But in reality, over the span of generations, with each repetition of the circle we find humanity rising. Societies have become more just, less prone to violence, and more safe. We continue to see wars but there are greater constraints on war, we continue to have disease but we have more effective treatments, we continue to see greed but we agree to regulations that curb its excesses. So, yes you are entirely correct that it is not enough to vote, we need to push our elected leaders in the right direction, making them aware that we are watching and creating an environment conducive to their acting. We may not see the full fruit of our labors but future generations will, even if they don't know what brought them to that point.
After years of pondering, I realized that greed is not a fundamental human trait but a symptom of people not knowing what they need to be truly happy -- so whatever they're doing, it's never enough. Unfortunately, money is the perfect vehicle for such dysfunction. In and of itself, money is useless -- you can't eat it, live in it, wear it -- but it enables the illusion that, "soon as I figure out what I want, then I'll have all the resources needed to get it - big time!" But of course those who make it to the top, then get on drugs, becomes self-destructive, or just go nuts, illustrate that is a fool's mission.
'W Carpenter' has the correct idea Bill Miller: per Piketty there has, historically, been greater returns to capital than there was growth (the "Re(C) > g" formula); if economics is a dismal (soft) science, it is in its infancy - and a more equitable, just society tends to drift away from that historical relationship of regressive greed...
PG, I think from studies of social media, lies travel much faster and farther than facts. It seems we are either programmed to want to hear lies or our society encourages it. Dems may not want to move into the realm of lying, cheating, deception, gaslighting, etc. which Republicans have pretty much come to depend on these past 50 years or so, but we need to call them out when we hear it and demand our media of all kinds do the same and stop pussy-footing around with lines like "no real evidence, not really true, not sure if it means what they think it means," etc. and say "that was a lie." or ask "why did you feel you needed to lie about that, Senator?" If gaslighting is going on, explain why it is called that and how it is dishonest. Average people are not used to hearing those terms on a regular basis when used correctly. Republicans use them to cover up what they are doing and are rarely called on it. Fox Not Really News needs to be held accountable for the lies and maligning of people, in short to clean up their act.
Great post!! Everyone not on the take is labeled a extreme leftist nutcase.  where is the pushback? Most people don’t want the best government money can buy, yet the train keeps rolling. Sad. 
True enough! In early television, somewhere in the early '50s, there was a weekly series called "Gaslight Theater." I think we could characterize the whole Republican platform, from around the time of McReagan as "Gaslight Theater." The only real difference with the Republican platform is it has gotten exponentially more intense since Obama. (Let's just not forget the WMDs of "Bush II" or even his father's "family values" relative to the "culture wars." That was "classic" Republican Gaslight Theater.)
You say "Because the GOP has developed a sociopathic strategy to hijack every term they actually stand against." - but it seems more likely that such a strategy has been fixed upon because "if you believe in nothing, you'll fall for anything" - and the weight of the facts show that bad thinking led to bad policies which cannot even bear their own weight (let alone the natural use of language to repeat them yet again); regardless, however, as an American outrage is the correct sentiment.
DZK, I always wondered about the title "neo-liberal." I never found anything liberal about it from its beginning. I wonder if it was meant to distract folks from the fact that everything about it is quite conservative, you know that old practice of calling things exactly opposite of what they really are.
Yep, Bryan, I missed that too. You'd have thought I would have gotten it by all the attention the rich ones get when they just hint they are going to give something away.
"Now" in the sense of the phenomena being brought to yet another generation of Americans - as the idea at work is assuredly nothing new, a la Carnegie, Gates, etc.-
We’ve seen the same behavior from the their-infamy-precedes-them Koch brothers, who for decades have thrown around tons of money, mainly at cultural institutions ranging from museums to PBS programming, for only one reason:
To buy respectability.
Like so many things, respectability is largely, if not entirely, in the eye of the beholder, and the clear-eyed see it for what it is. Rapacious billionaires like the Kochs can buy the Vatican for all the good it will do them. Appearances are one thing, a deep-seated stink is quite another.
They don't only try to buy respectability. They also seek to control reporting on PBS, as well as fund university programs to indoctrinate students with their greed-is-good ideology.
Exactly what I was going to say. The Kochs and their ilk throw money around to influence and corrupt rather than to buy respect. But their 40 year project to own the American government and its wealth has been hijacked by Russian oligarchs, depraved middle-east royalty and the most corrupt, sociopathic “politician” in U.S. history they thought they could control. Ultimately I doubt any of them will succeed because they’re all ignoring mother nature.
I anxiously anticipate celebrating the death of every Koch - and their spawns, intentional and illegitimate. Sadly, the evil they sowed in their vulgar lifetimes of obscene wealth-hoarding has taken root and spread like crabgrass - nearly impossible to beat back without full-on warfare.
"On November 13, 2020, reports in several media published statements made during an interview with the Wall Street Journal by Koch about his regret that he had contributed significantly to the development of hyper-partisanship in the United States. Koch added that he intended to work with Democrats, moderate Republicans, and liberals to facilitate bipartisanship."
He failed. And given the self-promotion lies they tell so readily, SO easily, I cannot and will not accept his "regrets" as my responsibility. .... Evil thrives when good people sit (silently) by and do nothing to stop it. The "media" you referenced? Corporate owned, corporate scripted, little more than public-relations for wealth-hoarders. I'm resolute in my position, but appreciate your right to state yours. Too bad people with dark skin, homosexual preferences, and now, women seeking medical privacy are being systematically removed from conversations. No corporate "media" will lead with those headlines.
Ah, but Koch sponsors “Nova”, which I’m sure will never air a documentary about the science of climate change, the oil industry, and the politicians who it has in its pockets.
The kochs (one brother still alive) use their fossil fuel wealth to give right wing influence at private universities (that are happy to get their big “donations”. They influence tv programming and much more. Dangerous to the core.
Think of the Sackler's, Musk, Bezos, et al. It is money for the insatiable thirst for more money. An ingrained belief that the masses are to be used, consumed, abused and discarded for their personal pleasure. Their purchased media to repeat the message of these messiah billionaires who are so glorious in their attainment of great wealth, adventures and good deeds. For some, the obvious silence of what they are doing that is not so good is deafening.
i've been reading about macaskill's "ethics" daily for a month or so, and have found that the more i read, the more my concerns grow about this false philanthropy/philosophy. another feature of this false philanthrophy is that the filthy-rich (white) man is the ultimate arbiter of who should receive his monetary gifts, and how much. rich men are the group of people who are least connected to ordinary people, least likely to know what would be truly helpful to them, and who are LEAST invested in helping society. instead, they are only concerned with exploiting everyone they possibly can to extract even just a measly $8 per month from (along with access to their bank accounts!), so they can do what they wish with it -- usually, this means exploiting even more people and extracting their money from them. in the end, they want to "greenwash" (with cash, of course) their images as evil grifting sociopaths by donating staggering sums of money to particular charities that they see eye-to-eye with -- all to great public fanfare, of course.
We previously had a philsophical round of this with Peter Drucker and his focus on non-profits as the way to solve social problems. Seems like there is often a spokesperson to dress up any flawed theory.
I have been a student of Peter Drucker along with many colleagues for decades. Drucker was one of the brightest minds in management thinkng for well over a half a century.
Where he got it wrong, in my mind and many who I have worked with, was believing that philonthropy could solve the big social problems. This came out in several articles and writings in the late 1980s. It is a prominent part of his 1990 book on non-profits.
So GrrlScientist, you are not amenable to the idea of quantifying the good that charities do (i.e. by independent evaluation) to make them comparable on an apples-to-apples basis? Aren't effective altruists the leading proponents of such methodology (which, as a consequence, should also lead to better governance & accountability)?
How 'bout the philanthropy of supporting and regularly paying a fully progressive income tax, without buying politicians that will build in loopholes to slither through? How 'bout using the millions they pay in political contributions and tax lawyers to help feed and build livable housing for the needy? How 'bout the philanthropy of taking 2 times the top wage they pay their workers instead of 400 times the top wage they pay them? That's just to get started.
I don't care two whoops in hell what those who are paid to say nice things about these revered philanthropists say about them - much less a "charitable philosophy of the obscenely rich." Cram your complimentary biographies of them and their philanthropic ideology up the darkest, smelliest recess of your "book shelf." Machiavelli >himself< advises the tyrant to be charitable in the service of appearing righteous! Half a lifetime ago it became clear to me that philanthropy is and always has been a shabby little PR stunt calculated to have names appear on monuments and buildings, that did incidental good to distract from the overall damaged caused in the acquisition of such obscene wealth. And don't get me started on church-sponsored charity!
This "EA" nonsense puts me in mind of a quip I used to hear on the workroom floor. When someone complained "the least you could do is ..." about some lack of cooperation, the response "never let it be said I didn't do >the least I could do<" is >exactly< my view of EA! Simply stated, the greedy and avaricious - I distinguish between the two terms - need some way to assuage feelings of guilt in whatever residual conscience they have remaining. They even frequently like to ponce as christians, while >their christ himself< already tells them they have a snowballs chance in hell of getting into their mythical heaven.
True charity is humble and anonymous, where "no good deed goes unpunished." That is, true charity - like true righteousness - expects no reward.
DZ, as always you have a way with words . . . The absolute absurdity of the machinations of these "philanthropers" is frightfully obvious to critical thinkers. Thanks for your observasions . . .carry on.
I appreciate the valid critique of Effective Altruism yet there are other problematic dynamics at work with the concept and practice. First, why should a relatively small proportion of the population dictate social priorities... ie who/what is provided support, under what conditions? Second, does not EA undermine democracy if the relatively few wealthy are making decisions that are more appropriately suited for civil governance, ie a democratic process that includes regulation and equitable administration of tax collection? Third, the gender and racial implications of who defines priorities of EA are pretty obvious.
I used to think that unionizing was a positive thing. I’m not so sure any more. Why should people have to negotiate with an employer to be paid sufficiently? Amazon would collapse in a week if the workforce went on strike. Bezos may have had the idea but he is totally dependent on employees for making the business function. If he can’t figure out the value of his employees, why should he be trusted to figure out the value of philanthropical choices.
The market could make the collective bargaining power of a union irrelevant - but we're not there yet (as our world is far from perfect & requires a political economy - which, e.g. given America's history of structural racism, does not reflect equitable participation - let alone access to opportunity).
Rishi Copra. While I certainly agree with your assessment, Rishi, in order for us to see other possibilities, they need to be introduced into the forum.
Rishi. Unions themselves are not my point. Unions evolved out of a system of imbalance between employers and employees. If employers really respected their employees….and understood that without employees no business could function……then paying them adequately would be a given, not a point of contention.
As long as the Union leaders are not corrupt, then the ability to bargain for and have a contract with your employer is the proper way to do business with them. After all, all the higher ups have contracts which guarantee them certain rights and benefits, why shouldn't the average worker have the same?
Cathie, I’m not being dismissive of unions. What I said was that I think it unfortunate that working people have to negotiate with employers to be fairly paid. If we really operated inside a moral and ethical (and compassionate) economic system, greed would not be allowed to dominate. No one would think it appropriate for owners and managers to make many times the money as sub-management employees. I’m clear we are not anywhere near this yet, but I’m introducing the idea that we could promote an economic system where luxurious living by a few is not more important than decent living conditions for most. I’m appalled that billionaires think they are somehow entitled to their lifestyles while others are homeless or living in substandard conditions. I find that unconscionable.
What a delightful coincidence! Thanks, Robert, for the skewering of FTX and the seductive glamor of vast wealth. The day before Giving Tuesday, I read on the op-ed page of my newspaper an essay by Marc A. Thiessen, who said "Climate reparations are insanity" because poor nations will do better building general well-being through the use of fossil fuels than with green energy. Mr. Thiessen is a libertarian who appears to wish better lives for the world's poor, but in his essay he argues that fossil fuels are essential to prosperity, resilience and longevity. I say that fossil fuels have made many rich but have impoverished countless more and have destroyed and sickened much of our world.
We also should not forget the "resource curse", the distortion caused by having a pile of resources in your country which inevitably flow upwards and not outwards to the citizens of a country. The crazed rule of Turkmenistan's Niyazov is a wonderful case study in how far off the rails a country can stray.
I used to give creativity workshops to large corporations. One of our team members always began the sessions by asking the participants three questions:
1. What is your main goal in life? They would usually respond, “To make as much money for my company as I can.”
2. What is your main goal for yourself? They would usually respond, “To make as much money for myself as I can.”
3. What will you contribute to society? They were completely silent since they had never thought about that.
kind of sickening isn't it? The answer for number 1 is canned as as the proper response when a boss is listening. Number 2 is pure honesty. And that they haven't even considered number 3, hardens the fact that the wrong people are in charge in a lot of big businesses.
For sure! Your third point is seldom if ever thought about.
IF, and it’s a big IF, we all paid a fair amount in taxes think of all we could accomplish: humanitarianly, educationally, infrastructurally, etc. I’m dreaming 💭 dreaming, 💭dreaming💭. Why we’d be the greatest country in the world 🌎. 💤
So let's say MacAskill makes his billions and donates it to healthcare. Fine, but unless some other young person foregoes the temptation of hedge fund management and becomes a doctor instead, who's going to save those 140 lives in that poor country - and all the others that MacAskill's billions are supposed to be saving? In other words, it doesn't work if everyone does it.
Yes but private equity groups are buying medical practices and effectively making doctors slaves to the "bottom line" and return to investors. Why would a young person want to invest 10 years of their life to become a MD and then only be a good as their financial numbers of last month? It's very disturbing.
Exactly. When blind profiteering seems to have become the primary purpose of countless industries in America, including many that inherently should always be non-profit out of basic principle... it seems we've completely lost the plot as a country.
I'm tired of seeing every single product, service, or industry I interact with seem to be in an accelerating race to the bottom in terms of quality and value, just so quarterly profits can continue to increase exponentially. Particularly when you start to identify how so much of our economic "growth" is just the ultra rich moving around shells on the table of the big money wall street casino so the brokers can get their trade and transaction fees. What are they actually *contributing* to society through these actions? Not one damn useful thing, yet they are compensated exceedingly well for basically destroying everything else.
Try telling anyone raised (steeped?) in the rhetoric of Ronald Reagan that their work-a-day job on Wall Street is a net negative (it's "un-American")...
True. And it always makes me think of this Upton Sinclair quote:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!”
The self serving myopia of the "moneyed elite" kind of undermines the idea that any of them are truly geniuses. Anyone with even a bit of the long view should be able to see the path they've put us on is dysfunctional and destructive to maintaining a civilized society or a decently habitable planet for long.
Someone defending effective altruism would refer you to the linked text - and tell you that a given doctor (in the first world) can expect, after controlling for all the runny noses & coughs, to save three lives in the course of their practice; that fact is then used to suggest that someone with a passion for medicine consider practicing in the third world (e.g. as some choose to do when volunteering with Doctors Without Borders)...
"It" is not so cut-and-dry, indeed - more lives could be saved from a malarial vaccine.
Our daughter probably beat the average you note before she entered med school. She set up a clinic near Port au Prince with some of the Haitian doctors who worked with Paul Farmer and Partners in Health. The issues were often trauma from accidents, issues of maternal health, and untreated childhood infectious diseases.
Med schools are starting to change and focus students on service rather than money. It's a start but the next generation of doctors may well not be focused on high income alone. Let's hope!
If you take $100 from someone's pocket and give them back $5; have you 'enriched' their pocket? If profits are derived from environmentally unhealthy practices like pollution or pesticide use there are costs that will impact the common good. Harms must be remedied. It really is not charitable behavior in the long run.
I live near Laughlin Nevada. The casinos publish big pictures of the big winners. Effective advertising because no one thinks about that money, and much more coming from the losers. The urge to identify as a winner is stronger than logic, apparently.  Lucky it’s just a local problem,,,right?
This is getting too long but I have to include a little story from Oroville California. When a casino open nearby many local stores went out of business. The bumpkinesk locals didn’t have money to squander on food clothes etc. after going to the casino. No one tells the untold stories.
Earl ; Sadly no one is laughing in Laughlin, Nevada. Actually, I have read that casinos don't usually help the local communities over time. There is a relatively new one in nearby Springfield, MA. MGM. I have never been. If I can't afford to 'play' the stock market, gambling isn't appealing either. Much better things to do with any 'discretionary' money I think I have.
I strongly advise interested people to read the story of Andrew Carnegie, possibly the greatest original American philanthropist tycoon. His story has all the elements: genius, political influence, union-busting, anti-imperialism, peace advocacy, generosity, etc...
Exactly my point. Although he was in Europe during the Homestead Steel plant massacre, he certainly profited from anti-labor practices. You simply can’t minimize all of his tariff manipulation and other capitalist greed. It’s a nuanced story, made all the more interesting by his astonishing generosity.
I'd frankly be more "astonished" if a single one of these tycoons prioritized paying their workers well, giving them proper benefits, and paid their taxes fairly and forthrightly without using their money to tip the political and economic landscape ever more in their own favor.
Without any other qualification or condition, I find it “astonishing” that anybody has given away 90% of their wealth, let alone a ruthless capitalist.
Doesn't that depend on how big the remaining 10% is and when they gave it away? After all, ultimately we all 'give away' our wealth - whether we want to or not!
The captains of industry were exploitive and that is how they made their money - off the backs of their exploited labor. He treated his employees like garbage. Many died due to unsafe working conditions. He was a union buster. The employees went out on strike. It was a disaster with people dying (Pinkerton fiasco). So originally not the heart of a philanthropist.
It is likely that as he aged he was starting to think about his own legacy and had a change of heart. Guys with huge egos like to have things named after them. Perhaps he felt he needed to assuage his guilt for his prior behaviors?
In my opinion it would be better to solve the root cause of these problems. They could be part of the solution of healthcare for example to provide universal healthcare for the masses. To cut back the ridiculous over charges and bill padding. The problem is, that is how a lot of these guys make their money - by exploiting the rest of us and throwing money at politicians and people with power to manipulate the system. It's a vicious cycle.
A pet peeve I have this time of year are these companies that hit you up for a donation to a cause of their choosing and then give the money to the cause and act like they are doing something altruistic for the holidays. You know what would be even better? The company can give their own giant donation to the cause of their choosing and not try and guilt customers into giving a buck at checkout.
Instead of encouraging anyone to make gobs of money so they can contribute large sums to charities, why don’t we create a system where money is spread out in such a way that all of us can live in decent conditions. Why is it equitable for Jeff Bezos to live in luxury while someone else lives in slum housing? Even if Bezos decides to donate for upgrading that slum housing, it occurs to me that he’s going to use it to feel smug. Why not pay his employees a living wage so they can enjoy the self-esteem and independence of providing decent housing for themselves?
Agree and this was going to be my point - in so far as poverty or inequality is curable in the first place, isn’t it the burden of the state to fix it and not random rich people?
... and if the state cannot carry its burden (e.g. in places which are impoverished & beset by violence)? Plenty of EA scholarship expounds upon quantifying the merit of doing good now (e.g. in QUALYs) - whether for moral reasons or scientific ones (can it be ignored so easily?)...
I am currently working on a strategic narrative for a business school to radically reimagine the way businesses can make a net positive impact on our society. I have cast my inspiration net far and wide to help inform my point-of-view, including two of Mr. Reich's books (The Common Good + Aftershock), a host of books on Effective Altruism and Equality/Inequality. I so appreciate this take of recognizing the negative side of Ends justifying the Means when that blind rush to make obscene sums of money "to do good" backfires and has the exact opposite impact on a whole lot of regular people. My research has also led to some very positive and promising perspectives that I feel moved to share with this crowd. I highly recommend Reich's "The Common Good" if you want a straightforward understanding of how the (mostly) Republican-led U.S. legislation has gutted the middle class over the last 40 years, rigging wealth accumulation to remain (and grow) at the top of the hierarchy), by stealing all the benefits that used to accrue to the middle class (wages, pensions, benefits) and claiming the theft as "profits" for shareholders. I also recommend "Less is More" by Jason Hickel--but be prepared to be angry beyond measure at the extortionist approach to Capitalism we are currently experiencing where "growth for growth's sake" is the central maxim. While the writing is poetic and plain-spoken, it is very difficult reading because the data and path we're on to 2050 is dystopian and maddening and too many of us are asleep while the vocal few dominate the media with the same tropes to protect their status quo. There is hope, though, so I encourage a full read. Finally, for this capsule reading list, the hope: "Manifesto for a Moral Revolution," by Jacqueline Novogratz. I heard her on the Global Exchange podcast led by the University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/global-commerce-exchange/id1535478469?i=1000520279645), and just started reading this most intelligent, most hopeful, most practical + "liveable" treatise for change in this world. It is just the palate cleanser my intellect needed. It is the North Star for future generations to revitalize our Planet and our shared Humanity.
Thank you for taking this on! As a business school graduate of the 80’s I was taught that the only way to measure the success of a business (and therefore myself as a business owner) was by the bottom line. After reading Marjorie Kelly’s Divine Right of Capital I woke up to the fallacy and decided to restructure my IT business as a social enterprise where 1/3 of distributed profits go to employees, 1/3 to community nonprofits, and 1/3 to shareholders. Now that I’m retired I’m working on a way to “sell” my company to a Perpetual Trust so that it can’t be sold for parts by this same machine. It’s been suggested to me that I should just sell it for the most money I can get and then use that money for good, but I am holding on to the idea that (like Patagonia founder, but on a far smaller scale) I can help more by creating an example/template for others to follow. I’d love to talk more with you if I can help! Kate@KateEmery.com
I looked into that, but found there were problems as a “fiduciary” needs to be assigned and then, if a M&A firm finds a buyer that will give a good price (planning to strip the company for parts) the fiduciary is then required by law to sell the company as it’s in the best interests of the stakeholder/employees… EVEN if the employees don’t want it. So I decided to try a different route.
I don't practice anymore but you should get a second opinion.
I don't know that's true if you are not a regulated company. If all the shareholders agree, they can do what they want. Private companies may issue stock and have shareholders, but their shares do not trade on public exchanges and are not issued through an initial public offering (IPO).
I used to work for a company that had an ESOP. Depending on the actions of the board of directors, it can become too strong a mechanism for just keeping wages lower upfront. Not everyone can afford to work for $13 an hour or less for three years just to get vested in the stock. It becomes an intentional treadmill of turnover, because management can't offer salaries high enough to keep new hires, and corporate likes it that way because then very few new people actually get to keep their company allocated stock.
I'm not much on "moral" revolutions.I have more hope in altering institutions and improvement of living conditions that empower people to make better choices. I will take a look at what you offered.
I agree! Here’s a link to a recent New Yorker Article in which I was featured discussing this topic. https://www.kateemery.com/post/let-s-start-an-evolution. We have to evolve our definition of success to embrace more than just profit… I think of it as evolution rather than a moral revolution, and it does involve altering institutions but starts with our waking up to the deficiencies of our current capitalistic system.
I am much more favorably impressed with a wealthy man like Warren Buffett than with Musk, SBF, Bezos and their ilk. He lives in a small home, drives an older car and lives modestly. Earning gobs of money infects the thinking of the aquisitors in many ways, not the least of which is the fixed delusion they are better than others who they can (ab)use to do their bidding both within their empires and outside them. In his apology to America after the massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, BP chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg told us how much he cares for "the small people". I hope this was just a malapropism from English being a second language, but I suspect he was fluent in English and just said the quiet part out loud.
I agree with Elizabeth Warren's call for a wealth tax to rebalance the scales. Let those denied a seat at the table get to pick the menu for a change rather than just being on it.
When Warren Buffett bought Heinz, small investors like me got screwed. My desires and other considerations meant nothing, he was a "big boy" and I was just one of "the small people" who don't count!
Presumably that outcome should have motivated management to avoid practices that would allow the company to become undervalued & vulnerable to takeover, no? (Why should management get a free pass on screwing shareholders?)
Wealth is not the problematic object. True wealth is the wealth of caring relationship, gratitude, wisdom, friends, health, food to eat, water to drink and bathe with, a healthy environment that is cared for, and the cultivated capacity to deeply love beyond a self-agenda.
If one is fortunate enough to have material resources then that is also wealth. Fulfillment, and meaning in life that doesn't harm others, is wealth.
It is the confusion in the mind that comes from delusionally thinking material wealth and unbridled sensual "fulfillment" is what will finally make us happy.
This is simply ignorant, wrong thinking of a lazy, unreflective mind that is self-cherishing.
Human beings have some important mind-heart training to do in being fully human. If any religion, or whatever, helps one to see that and get to work: very fine!
Thank you! I’ve been thinking we need to use another metric for success than $$$ but I think you’re onto something, and that it is perhaps easier to change our definition of wealth. Kinda like the word sexy… over the years our definitions of what defines sexy has changed but we use the same word. Here’s to hoping that in the not too distant future our definition of wealthy embraces caring, gratitude, wisdom, friends, a healthy body, community, and planet!
This post is more of an indictment of our capitalist economy, and its tendency to produce and tolerate negative externalities, than it is of EA per se.
As far as I can see, the papier-mâché altruism that MacAskill advocates is just pragmatism with no outcomes to justify the practice -- no demonstrated ends to support the means.
And SB-F's espousing of MacAskill's "effective altruism" has been exposed as simply the cynical selling of a feel-good catchphrase to lure the undiscerning, another part of the glitzy razzle-dazzle today's Ponzi-scheme crypto-scammers cloak themselves in.
To see some actual philanthropy at work, have a look at what the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation does (see https://www.gatesfoundation.org/about/foundation-fact-sheet for starters). The foundation has actually granted more than $65 _billion_ to work in various ways around the world. We can agree or disagree about whether it's spending the money in the right ways, whether Bill Gates is a good guy, blah blah blah. But there's no arguing that the foundation is putting its money where its mouth is and is getting measurable, positive results.
And you don't get any chest-thumping and puffery from them about MacAskill and "effective altruism" -- just a lot of hard work that produces results on the ground.
"Our mission is to create a world where every person has the opportunity to live a healthy, productive life."
"We believe our foundation can help repair the market so that it works for more people. With our partners, we look for innovative ways to close these gaps so everyone has access to the products and services they need to thrive."
Shouldn't we be careful to draw a distinction between the (academic) philosophy of philanthropy and the (less academic) practice of charitable giving - which, incidentally, has as much room for improvement (in many cases via concepts championed by EA, like quantification & independent evaluation) as Microsoft software...?
So ... in addition to green-washing and art-washing (among others) contrived to convince the general public that individual/corporate greed is actually benefitting society at large, we now have greed-washing? Bezos, Musk, SBF (really, who does that to his own name?!), et. al. are good, not bad. Their riches are for us, not them. They do it for the common good, not for their own. Wow. And I thought they were just a bunch of wankers when they're actually on my side. How did I miss that?
Great post as usual! Thanks!
Wankers indeed!
Tax...The...Rich.
Taxing the rich just seems such a no-brainer. I make x, I pay y. I make xx, I pay yy. What’s the issue? Oh, yeah … it’s not so simple because of politics. Which is, of course, theory put into practice these days.
EA is just another rationalization to express that greed may be good. The main issue is whether these folks should get tax breaks.
Using statistics, MacAskill uses the term "longtermism," to argue that only by positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority–that, when making at least some of our most important moral decisions, we should be particularly concerned with the effects of our actions many generations into the future.
I was amazed to find how young he is and that "MacAskill" is not really his name, and that he has an institute at Oxford. Apparently, the institute and Robert have views in common.
"We find a good short and medium-term instrumental case for lower economic inequality. We then argue, somewhat speculatively, that we have instrumental reasons for inequality reduction from a longtermist perspective too, because greater inequality could increase existential risk. We thus have instrumental reasons for reducing inequality, regardless of which time-horizon we take. We then argue that from most consequentialist perspectives, this pro tanto reason also gives us all-things-considered reason. And even across most non-consequentialist views in philosophy, this argument gives us either an all-things-considered or at least weighty pro tanto reason against inequality."
https://globalprioritiesinstitute.org/economic-inequality-and-the-long-term-future-andreas-t-schmidt-university-of-groningen-and-daan-juijn-ce-delft/
I think Couch/ MacAskill is to philanthropy what Lawerence Summers or Jason Furman are to economics. They tell the rich and powerful what they want to hear, wrap it up in academic gibberish, and then see their career soar...
I hope Oxford see's through his grift and does not make him a Tenured Professor.
Daniel, I am always impressed by your comments and have subscribed to your newsletter on Substack. When might you expect to activate your newsletter; I am eager to begin reading it.
Likewise; further - to add to the point - the fact that more folks aren't asking why such avarice isn't met with a full tax burden is beyond a joke (forgive the 'Laffer' pun)...
Daniel, I may be naive, but, the super rich should only be able to take a charity write-off at the same level as everyone else. If they give more it should come from their own personal already-taxed income. It would mean more that way. Exchanging tax payments for gifts to some nebulous charity is not a fair exchange.
Ruth
Why do the super Rich need to have such high incomes in the first place? It makes far more sense to tax them at 90% for income over $10M. They will then have the incentive to leave the money in their company and pay employees more money or spend more money on R&D which creates more jobs.
Who the heck cares what charity rich people care about. I sure don't. I'd rather that the people working for them in their companies get paid more money
BP
American voters have had 40yrs of media telling then that "the government" is the problem. That is the default that most Americans assume is true. So higher taxes simply does not compute.
It may be clear to you and I that higher taxes are needed. But it is not clear to the vast majority of voters... Keep fighting to change the minds of Americans. Don't give up.
You know more of Piketty than I do, but not only is he correct in his assessment of the need for progressive taxation, even a wealth tax, but he is only echoing one Adam Smith, a compatriot of MacAskill, who said it all 200 years before MacAskill first breathed on his own.
Americans have been brainwashed into believing the government-is-always-the-problem BS, ever since Reagan and his wretched sidekick Milton Friedman stood Smith on his head. Wrong! Smith was an advocate of strong government, in large part because he wanted the wealthy to pay taxes at a HIGHER rate then the less wealthy. Without that check on the power of the wealthy, they would soon take over and distort the market in their own interests, at the expense of the average citizen. And just what do we see in modern America?
What you DON'T want is government abusing its power and starting to run industries - which is what I grew up with in England, what the East Germans had to suffer for 40 years, and what Russia still suffers from. That's socialism (and I do wish Bernie would stop using that word, it's so confusing to people).
Government should keep to its very important lane: raising taxes, regulating markets, maintaining the armed services, and providing Medicare and Social Security.
I agree with Daniel Solomon, EA is just a new variant of "greed is good."
They comprehend the >point< of Smith about as well as they do the >point< their bloody bible! On the other hand, I am open to the notion of public sector control over essential, strategic goods and services, while letting the private sector busk their ball games, toys, vacation packages, and other, non-essential goods and services.
Right you are. The problem in UK and East Germany 50 years ago was that government took over even those industries capitalists were interested in, such as automobile manufacture, resulting in the Mini Metro in the UK and its East German equivalent, the Trabant, while West Germans were making BMW, Mercedes and Audis.
It's a fine line.
That was Ronald McReagan's platform slogan. Make that 50 years - and more, from his time as governor of California.
Yeah DZK, Reagan was a menace! He had a few ideas, most of them really harmful, then found guys who could force them through while he mouthed platitudes like "morning in America" and whined about "welfare queens" and undermined our government by telling folks how the government is designed to hurt the people. He just made things up or made one case mean millions. Yep, he was pretty racist and sexist too, but his grandfatherly roleplaying made lots of people not hear the words behind the character he was playing.
Ruth
Spot on.
But his economic policy's were not rolled back by either Clinton or Obama. They continued on his path and that is my concern.
We need to stop voting for Presidents that use "Neo Liberal" economists to advise them.
I always called McReagan "the cowboy actor," which is >exactly< the kind of "old ranger" role he played throughout his presidency. Believe me, I took notice and exception to the Republicans running an actor, and I always wondered if Bush I was the one feeding the cowboy actor his lines. That's the point at which I started becoming politically conscious, vowing I'd >never< vote Republican, seeing that between ol "Tricky Dickie" and the cowboy actor, the Republicans were clearly deceitful.
I don't really consider myself a Democrat. They're simply the only realistic option. They've just pissed me off a lot less than the Republicans. Excluding the covid policies, which I generally - but not completely - agree with, I'm >really< not a fan of their "nanny state" proclivities, while mostly ignoring the FDA - except for making sure it enforces their tobacco hobby-horse in economically blackmailing smokers to quit. (Argue as loud and as long as they want, we're waaaay past convincing me I'm wrong about that and similar policies. For example, maybe if there were considerably less nanny-state, there would have been far more cooperation from the public in a pandemic - where it counts >the most!<) I also think they'd better make damn sure that if they legislate breaking the impending rail strike, that the railroads are forced to implement remedies to the unions' safety & working conditions grievance. The 7 days extra sick-leave the Dems are giving them is a shit booby prize, where the workers risk being fired for actually taking them - which is among the grievances, in the first place! Like the Kroger festivities, it's not really about money, as breakers might wish to portray it. The impending rail strike puts Dems in general, and Biden in particular in perilous waters, and the Democrats >really need to step-up in support of the unions, otherwise they risk >losing it all.<
DZK
Reagan has not been the only President for the past 50yrs. Clinton and Obama have been equally guilty..... And neither did anything to refute the McReagan lies.. In fact they promoted his lies...
Let me see . . . Clinton was under siege over the Whitewater-gate investigation from day-one of his presidency, and still trying to be bi-partisan, while Obama was attempting to dig us out of the same economic hole left by Bush II that Bush I left for Clinton, only in his case, ol' Tweety was coming on the scene with his lyin' allegations about his - Obama's - US citizenship. The Republicans finally showed themselves for >exactly< what they think of bi-partisanship when it came time to seat a new SCOTUS justice under Obama.
Don't try to hustle me with the equivalence con. The Republicans were in it to win it all along, and Republican fingerprints are all over everything for the last 50 years, even back to Nixon - that paradigm of Republican Southern Strategy virtue. Democrats never ruled without finding themselves under continuous siege from strenuous Republican dissent, were consistently nobbled in the midterms, while Republicans have >always< wished to silence >any< dissent in order to rule alone as effectively a one-party government. (They'll need a fig-leaf of collaborators >calling themselves< Democrats.) They're about to prove me exactly right in the next session of Congress. End of discussion.
Yes. It's much cheaper to donate a Little League baseball field than to pay fair taxes or succumb to regulatory oversight, and it provides the ROI of good will.
Unfortunately, not enough - especially at this point. Taxing the wealth is the only way to equalize generations of free and unearned money, because the wealth gap is so large that its power overshadows all income tax systems. We no longer speak of millionaires since 2016, but of billionaires and today hundreds of billions. (1 billion is 1000 million)
Agreed. And I think now is the time to begin talking about it, as Biden has. Unfortunately there are two DINOs in his Senate, but hopefully Warnock wins and we can begin anew.....
Michael, I am with you on this one! Tax the rich as much as possible. In the past when it was done, the nation prospered!
Ruth, just so. Between 1948 and 1980 America prospered like no other nation in history, and it was not DESPITE high taxation but BECAUSE of high taxation. Massive infrastructure projects, such as the interstate highways, were put in place, which spawned an incredible car industry, which had knock-on effects on auto supply chains, which in turn stimulated other unrelated parts of the economy. Business boomed. Why, America even put a man on the moon. Total Adam Smith.
Then along came that horse's ass Ronald Reagan, preaching the anti-government nonsense. Taxes were lowered substantially and so began the slow four-decade long transfer of wealth from the middle class to the top 0.1%, with the purchase of Congress (Citizens United) and the acceleration of wealth transfer, along the way, to the point where even the merest hint of raising taxes on the wealthy arouses cries of Socialism! Socialism!
Bullshit, its capitalism, capitalism, the way Smith intended it. But the great American public is so docile and so brainwashed it just cannot seem to shake the monkey off its back.
Yes and no. It was actually economists at the University of Chicago who sold neo-liberalism. The goal was to make economies more open to trade and competition in order to be efficient and provide cheaper goods. To some extent it worked and shifted manufacturing off shore were labor was cheaper so goods were too. t lifted many out of poverty...BUT it failed to provide compensation and a second chance to workers left behind in developed countries. And Government were gutted leaving us open to the incompetence we now endure. And as you said wealth concentrated at the top while cuts to services and infrastructure made our everyday lives more and more difficult.
The uber economists at the IMF admitted neo-liberalism "did not deliver" around 2016 but right wing governments have turned into an ideology aided by those who profited the most. And now as Shakespeare said. "Nothing gets done until nothing gets done."
Are we there yet? I think so.
I actually think Smith made a minor mistake in his advocacy for free trade. You can trade freely with rich economies on your doorstep (e.g., Canada), but not with dirt poor economies on your doorstep (e.g., Mexico) or your factories will ship. Ross Perot was right. The point about taxation remains good, however. Taxation is important because it redresses the inequality generated by a system that over-rewards those at the top. And if you doubt that, consider Exhibit A, Mark Zuckerberg.
Free trade acts came with conditions that broke basic principles of democracy. It was poorly managed in silos with finance and trade playing their uber role over environment and social well-being. Agree taxation is the key but highly unpopular. And hard to make it popular unless politicians understand that evidence based policy making can work for them and"working for them" means reaching outcome based goals to improve our quality of life.. We know how to make better and more effective public policy and have since the 70's. More than annoying.
Bryan Padrick ; Greedwashing! Good one!
Although this is not a response or comment directly relevant to today's discussion topic, or even the comment I'm responding to, it's about what underpins the justification for the existence of philanthropy: https://youtu.be/ofFR1mD2UOM
It also got me thinking about what's now becoming clear to me is another "big lie" we seem to have accepted and internalized without question. Why the bloody hell have we accepted the notion of "neo-liberal" economics, when in fact it's a conservative principle that should be, and should have always been called "neo-conservative ‽"
Because the GOP has developed a sociopathic strategy to hijack every term they actually stand against. It takes an especially twisted group of minds that denigrate terms such as 'patriotism,' 'liberalism,' 'charitable-giving,' to the point that any rational, sane person would move as far away as they can from those tainted hoax-terms, lest they be associated with what is ACTUALLY occurring. It effectively leaves us (the actual majority) with no position to express in the public arena. We are the disenfranchised masses with NOBODY brave enough to rise to leadership to attempt to clean up a corrupted political dichotomy. If you think about it, few people vote FOR a candidate they believe in; rather, they've been brainwashed to fear-vote AGAINST the guy who will do the most damage. Literally, democrats tell me (an ex-dem turned green) all the time that if I don't keep voting dem, it's my fault that their opponents win and ruin it all. At no point do dem politicians have to take ownership (despite MULTIPLE opportunities) for aiding and abetting criminal politicians who take laundered(?) lobby money in exchange for legalizing taking lobby bribes(?)..... Establishment-dems get collared leftist extremists by actual right-winger extremists, and rather than take strategic steps to demonstrate why that is a good thing, instead they compromise away their constituency's civil rights to chase after their abusive-partners' approval/affection by running into their arms and call themselves centrists - but who now stand WITH the opposition while confused voters blame each other. That's how it happens - how we came to this pornographic illusionary version of 'democracy' whose plan is to get us to voluntarily walk straight into the arms of fascism. Egregious as it is, it has occurred many times over human history. We are doomed to repeat it over and over because, it seems, humans have enough gumption to take up arms against dictators, just not enough collective decency to STOP greedy fascists while they slow-motion train wreck the decent, hard-working, folks they want to destroy. Yay america.
Much truth you tell here, particularly your Wittgensteinian insights.
“The limits of my language means the limits of my world.”
― Ludwig Wittgenstein
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/7672.Ludwig_Wittgenstein
... and that was before Chomsky & the Bush administration's weaponization of grammar...
= /
Classic "Gaslight Theater," as I mention elsewhere in this discussion.
Fran Kluntz
at her Best.
I CONSTANTLY say we can’t vote every two or four years and sit on OUR butts and let the people who were voted in sit with their thumbs up THEIR butts and then expect anything different the next time. It actually took the Republicans about 40 years to orchestrate what they’ve got going here -- from the ground UP. But another bit of reality on their side is, they are willing to be shady, and outright dishonest, and give each other aid and comfort in doing it.
Our outrage at Mitch McConnell and how he’s packed the courts -- our outrage a MTG snd Gozar and the like -- is all on the Left, The Republicans never criticize them because they are doing what Republicans want them to do. Roiling up the garbage.
I’m not saying the Left [never mind Democrats -- the party is in thrall to Wall Street] should start behaving badly. But it is a sad sad commentary when integrity cannot win over chicanery. If that’s how it is, then what?
While what you say is true I think your analysis leaves out the greatest reason to be hopeful: human nature. We are genetically programed for justice, sociality, and exploration. Yes, we have other genetically programed dispositions like greed and violence but over the arc of human history they are less influential than the first I mentioned. Consider the path of humanity a coiled spring. We seem to be going in a circle, we seem to revisit the same territory over and over again. But in reality, over the span of generations, with each repetition of the circle we find humanity rising. Societies have become more just, less prone to violence, and more safe. We continue to see wars but there are greater constraints on war, we continue to have disease but we have more effective treatments, we continue to see greed but we agree to regulations that curb its excesses. So, yes you are entirely correct that it is not enough to vote, we need to push our elected leaders in the right direction, making them aware that we are watching and creating an environment conducive to their acting. We may not see the full fruit of our labors but future generations will, even if they don't know what brought them to that point.
After years of pondering, I realized that greed is not a fundamental human trait but a symptom of people not knowing what they need to be truly happy -- so whatever they're doing, it's never enough. Unfortunately, money is the perfect vehicle for such dysfunction. In and of itself, money is useless -- you can't eat it, live in it, wear it -- but it enables the illusion that, "soon as I figure out what I want, then I'll have all the resources needed to get it - big time!" But of course those who make it to the top, then get on drugs, becomes self-destructive, or just go nuts, illustrate that is a fool's mission.
'W Carpenter' has the correct idea Bill Miller: per Piketty there has, historically, been greater returns to capital than there was growth (the "Re(C) > g" formula); if economics is a dismal (soft) science, it is in its infancy - and a more equitable, just society tends to drift away from that historical relationship of regressive greed...
I hope you are correct. Makes sense to me.
Don't forget their revered Ronald McReagan's so called 11th Commandment:
"Thou shalt not speak any ill of a fellow Republican."
PG, I think from studies of social media, lies travel much faster and farther than facts. It seems we are either programmed to want to hear lies or our society encourages it. Dems may not want to move into the realm of lying, cheating, deception, gaslighting, etc. which Republicans have pretty much come to depend on these past 50 years or so, but we need to call them out when we hear it and demand our media of all kinds do the same and stop pussy-footing around with lines like "no real evidence, not really true, not sure if it means what they think it means," etc. and say "that was a lie." or ask "why did you feel you needed to lie about that, Senator?" If gaslighting is going on, explain why it is called that and how it is dishonest. Average people are not used to hearing those terms on a regular basis when used correctly. Republicans use them to cover up what they are doing and are rarely called on it. Fox Not Really News needs to be held accountable for the lies and maligning of people, in short to clean up their act.
Great post!! Everyone not on the take is labeled a extreme leftist nutcase.  where is the pushback? Most people don’t want the best government money can buy, yet the train keeps rolling. Sad. 
It's sure no coincidence that Merriam Webster's word of the year is GASLIGHTING.
True enough! In early television, somewhere in the early '50s, there was a weekly series called "Gaslight Theater." I think we could characterize the whole Republican platform, from around the time of McReagan as "Gaslight Theater." The only real difference with the Republican platform is it has gotten exponentially more intense since Obama. (Let's just not forget the WMDs of "Bush II" or even his father's "family values" relative to the "culture wars." That was "classic" Republican Gaslight Theater.)
You say "Because the GOP has developed a sociopathic strategy to hijack every term they actually stand against." - but it seems more likely that such a strategy has been fixed upon because "if you believe in nothing, you'll fall for anything" - and the weight of the facts show that bad thinking led to bad policies which cannot even bear their own weight (let alone the natural use of language to repeat them yet again); regardless, however, as an American outrage is the correct sentiment.
= )
Wow - well written and precisely nailed. thank you.
A little more background for your consideration: https://youtu.be/o5q2XQnsfqM
students of Orwell
and Goebbels
they Learned
quite well.
Thank-you for that link. Interesting information.
DZK
Great video. We need more Prof Mattei and less Prof MacAskill.
Thanks for introducing me to Clara Mattei via youtube. Very compelling.
DZK, I always wondered about the title "neo-liberal." I never found anything liberal about it from its beginning. I wonder if it was meant to distract folks from the fact that everything about it is quite conservative, you know that old practice of calling things exactly opposite of what they really are.
Ruth
From a marketing stand point i totally hear you.
But the definition in the dictionary is:
"favoring policies that promote free-market capitalism, deregulation, and reduction in government spending."
Make no mistake--wankers are EXACTLY what they are!
Yep, Bryan, I missed that too. You'd have thought I would have gotten it by all the attention the rich ones get when they just hint they are going to give something away.
"Now" in the sense of the phenomena being brought to yet another generation of Americans - as the idea at work is assuredly nothing new, a la Carnegie, Gates, etc.-
We’ve seen the same behavior from the their-infamy-precedes-them Koch brothers, who for decades have thrown around tons of money, mainly at cultural institutions ranging from museums to PBS programming, for only one reason:
To buy respectability.
Like so many things, respectability is largely, if not entirely, in the eye of the beholder, and the clear-eyed see it for what it is. Rapacious billionaires like the Kochs can buy the Vatican for all the good it will do them. Appearances are one thing, a deep-seated stink is quite another.
They don't only try to buy respectability. They also seek to control reporting on PBS, as well as fund university programs to indoctrinate students with their greed-is-good ideology.
Exactly what I was going to say. The Kochs and their ilk throw money around to influence and corrupt rather than to buy respect. But their 40 year project to own the American government and its wealth has been hijacked by Russian oligarchs, depraved middle-east royalty and the most corrupt, sociopathic “politician” in U.S. history they thought they could control. Ultimately I doubt any of them will succeed because they’re all ignoring mother nature.
Exactly! You put the fine point on my concluding observation on true charity, the part about not expecting reward.
Avie Hern ; the Vatican has nothing to do with virtue.
You got that right Laurie. The Vatican is in the image of the mafia controlling trump, not virtuous!
😄
Same!
The Kochs are big fossil-fuel guys, aren’t they? (I realize one of them has died.)
I anxiously anticipate celebrating the death of every Koch - and their spawns, intentional and illegitimate. Sadly, the evil they sowed in their vulgar lifetimes of obscene wealth-hoarding has taken root and spread like crabgrass - nearly impossible to beat back without full-on warfare.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Koch
"On November 13, 2020, reports in several media published statements made during an interview with the Wall Street Journal by Koch about his regret that he had contributed significantly to the development of hyper-partisanship in the United States. Koch added that he intended to work with Democrats, moderate Republicans, and liberals to facilitate bipartisanship."
Too bad he didn't recant half his lifetime earlier.
He failed. And given the self-promotion lies they tell so readily, SO easily, I cannot and will not accept his "regrets" as my responsibility. .... Evil thrives when good people sit (silently) by and do nothing to stop it. The "media" you referenced? Corporate owned, corporate scripted, little more than public-relations for wealth-hoarders. I'm resolute in my position, but appreciate your right to state yours. Too bad people with dark skin, homosexual preferences, and now, women seeking medical privacy are being systematically removed from conversations. No corporate "media" will lead with those headlines.
Ah, but Koch sponsors “Nova”, which I’m sure will never air a documentary about the science of climate change, the oil industry, and the politicians who it has in its pockets.
The kochs (one brother still alive) use their fossil fuel wealth to give right wing influence at private universities (that are happy to get their big “donations”. They influence tv programming and much more. Dangerous to the core.
profiteering from their Toxicity
whilst trashing the Biosphere
on the SOLE inhabitable
Planet for many Miles
.
Hard it is
to see them as
any kind of Assets.
Well said
Think of the Sackler's, Musk, Bezos, et al. It is money for the insatiable thirst for more money. An ingrained belief that the masses are to be used, consumed, abused and discarded for their personal pleasure. Their purchased media to repeat the message of these messiah billionaires who are so glorious in their attainment of great wealth, adventures and good deeds. For some, the obvious silence of what they are doing that is not so good is deafening.
I think I instantly fell in love with your mind power. Keep spreading those excellent thoughts.
What about the Michigan Dejoys?
You mean DeVos
Or the Mercers!
Right. Possibly the worst, but they are still going strong.
i've been reading about macaskill's "ethics" daily for a month or so, and have found that the more i read, the more my concerns grow about this false philanthropy/philosophy. another feature of this false philanthrophy is that the filthy-rich (white) man is the ultimate arbiter of who should receive his monetary gifts, and how much. rich men are the group of people who are least connected to ordinary people, least likely to know what would be truly helpful to them, and who are LEAST invested in helping society. instead, they are only concerned with exploiting everyone they possibly can to extract even just a measly $8 per month from (along with access to their bank accounts!), so they can do what they wish with it -- usually, this means exploiting even more people and extracting their money from them. in the end, they want to "greenwash" (with cash, of course) their images as evil grifting sociopaths by donating staggering sums of money to particular charities that they see eye-to-eye with -- all to great public fanfare, of course.
eat the rich.
We previously had a philsophical round of this with Peter Drucker and his focus on non-profits as the way to solve social problems. Seems like there is often a spokesperson to dress up any flawed theory.
"we"? who's we? did you write something about this somewhere? link, please?
I have been a student of Peter Drucker along with many colleagues for decades. Drucker was one of the brightest minds in management thinkng for well over a half a century.
Where he got it wrong, in my mind and many who I have worked with, was believing that philonthropy could solve the big social problems. This came out in several articles and writings in the late 1980s. It is a prominent part of his 1990 book on non-profits.
So GrrlScientist, you are not amenable to the idea of quantifying the good that charities do (i.e. by independent evaluation) to make them comparable on an apples-to-apples basis? Aren't effective altruists the leading proponents of such methodology (which, as a consequence, should also lead to better governance & accountability)?
How 'bout the philanthropy of supporting and regularly paying a fully progressive income tax, without buying politicians that will build in loopholes to slither through? How 'bout using the millions they pay in political contributions and tax lawyers to help feed and build livable housing for the needy? How 'bout the philanthropy of taking 2 times the top wage they pay their workers instead of 400 times the top wage they pay them? That's just to get started.
I don't care two whoops in hell what those who are paid to say nice things about these revered philanthropists say about them - much less a "charitable philosophy of the obscenely rich." Cram your complimentary biographies of them and their philanthropic ideology up the darkest, smelliest recess of your "book shelf." Machiavelli >himself< advises the tyrant to be charitable in the service of appearing righteous! Half a lifetime ago it became clear to me that philanthropy is and always has been a shabby little PR stunt calculated to have names appear on monuments and buildings, that did incidental good to distract from the overall damaged caused in the acquisition of such obscene wealth. And don't get me started on church-sponsored charity!
This "EA" nonsense puts me in mind of a quip I used to hear on the workroom floor. When someone complained "the least you could do is ..." about some lack of cooperation, the response "never let it be said I didn't do >the least I could do<" is >exactly< my view of EA! Simply stated, the greedy and avaricious - I distinguish between the two terms - need some way to assuage feelings of guilt in whatever residual conscience they have remaining. They even frequently like to ponce as christians, while >their christ himself< already tells them they have a snowballs chance in hell of getting into their mythical heaven.
True charity is humble and anonymous, where "no good deed goes unpunished." That is, true charity - like true righteousness - expects no reward.
DZ, as always you have a way with words . . . The absolute absurdity of the machinations of these "philanthropers" is frightfully obvious to critical thinkers. Thanks for your observasions . . .carry on.
Your last paragraph is the very definition of "Christian" charity as stated in the Bible. Excellent comment!
Occasionally, I betray a little, residual Jesuit influence from my waaaay distant past!
I appreciate the valid critique of Effective Altruism yet there are other problematic dynamics at work with the concept and practice. First, why should a relatively small proportion of the population dictate social priorities... ie who/what is provided support, under what conditions? Second, does not EA undermine democracy if the relatively few wealthy are making decisions that are more appropriately suited for civil governance, ie a democratic process that includes regulation and equitable administration of tax collection? Third, the gender and racial implications of who defines priorities of EA are pretty obvious.
MFree. I completely concur.
I used to think that unionizing was a positive thing. I’m not so sure any more. Why should people have to negotiate with an employer to be paid sufficiently? Amazon would collapse in a week if the workforce went on strike. Bezos may have had the idea but he is totally dependent on employees for making the business function. If he can’t figure out the value of his employees, why should he be trusted to figure out the value of philanthropical choices.
The market could make the collective bargaining power of a union irrelevant - but we're not there yet (as our world is far from perfect & requires a political economy - which, e.g. given America's history of structural racism, does not reflect equitable participation - let alone access to opportunity).
Rishi Copra. While I certainly agree with your assessment, Rishi, in order for us to see other possibilities, they need to be introduced into the forum.
Can not unions make that a possibility? (Hoffa won't allow it...?)
Rishi. Unions themselves are not my point. Unions evolved out of a system of imbalance between employers and employees. If employers really respected their employees….and understood that without employees no business could function……then paying them adequately would be a given, not a point of contention.
As long as the Union leaders are not corrupt, then the ability to bargain for and have a contract with your employer is the proper way to do business with them. After all, all the higher ups have contracts which guarantee them certain rights and benefits, why shouldn't the average worker have the same?
Cathie, I’m not being dismissive of unions. What I said was that I think it unfortunate that working people have to negotiate with employers to be fairly paid. If we really operated inside a moral and ethical (and compassionate) economic system, greed would not be allowed to dominate. No one would think it appropriate for owners and managers to make many times the money as sub-management employees. I’m clear we are not anywhere near this yet, but I’m introducing the idea that we could promote an economic system where luxurious living by a few is not more important than decent living conditions for most. I’m appalled that billionaires think they are somehow entitled to their lifestyles while others are homeless or living in substandard conditions. I find that unconscionable.
What a delightful coincidence! Thanks, Robert, for the skewering of FTX and the seductive glamor of vast wealth. The day before Giving Tuesday, I read on the op-ed page of my newspaper an essay by Marc A. Thiessen, who said "Climate reparations are insanity" because poor nations will do better building general well-being through the use of fossil fuels than with green energy. Mr. Thiessen is a libertarian who appears to wish better lives for the world's poor, but in his essay he argues that fossil fuels are essential to prosperity, resilience and longevity. I say that fossil fuels have made many rich but have impoverished countless more and have destroyed and sickened much of our world.
We also should not forget the "resource curse", the distortion caused by having a pile of resources in your country which inevitably flow upwards and not outwards to the citizens of a country. The crazed rule of Turkmenistan's Niyazov is a wonderful case study in how far off the rails a country can stray.
That is a great point! (A country like Nigeria would be an egalitarian paradise were fossil fuels all that were needed for prosperity!)
I used to give creativity workshops to large corporations. One of our team members always began the sessions by asking the participants three questions:
1. What is your main goal in life? They would usually respond, “To make as much money for my company as I can.”
2. What is your main goal for yourself? They would usually respond, “To make as much money for myself as I can.”
3. What will you contribute to society? They were completely silent since they had never thought about that.
kind of sickening isn't it? The answer for number 1 is canned as as the proper response when a boss is listening. Number 2 is pure honesty. And that they haven't even considered number 3, hardens the fact that the wrong people are in charge in a lot of big businesses.
perhaps they might make them employee-owned.
For sure! Your third point is seldom if ever thought about.
IF, and it’s a big IF, we all paid a fair amount in taxes think of all we could accomplish: humanitarianly, educationally, infrastructurally, etc. I’m dreaming 💭 dreaming, 💭dreaming💭. Why we’d be the greatest country in the world 🌎. 💤
So let's say MacAskill makes his billions and donates it to healthcare. Fine, but unless some other young person foregoes the temptation of hedge fund management and becomes a doctor instead, who's going to save those 140 lives in that poor country - and all the others that MacAskill's billions are supposed to be saving? In other words, it doesn't work if everyone does it.
Yes but private equity groups are buying medical practices and effectively making doctors slaves to the "bottom line" and return to investors. Why would a young person want to invest 10 years of their life to become a MD and then only be a good as their financial numbers of last month? It's very disturbing.
Exactly. When blind profiteering seems to have become the primary purpose of countless industries in America, including many that inherently should always be non-profit out of basic principle... it seems we've completely lost the plot as a country.
I'm tired of seeing every single product, service, or industry I interact with seem to be in an accelerating race to the bottom in terms of quality and value, just so quarterly profits can continue to increase exponentially. Particularly when you start to identify how so much of our economic "growth" is just the ultra rich moving around shells on the table of the big money wall street casino so the brokers can get their trade and transaction fees. What are they actually *contributing* to society through these actions? Not one damn useful thing, yet they are compensated exceedingly well for basically destroying everything else.
the Citizenry is here solely to be
farmed and Harvested commodified strip-
mined & put out to pasture in hopes of a Speedy demise
.
the Profiteers won
but they're far
from Finished
Try telling anyone raised (steeped?) in the rhetoric of Ronald Reagan that their work-a-day job on Wall Street is a net negative (it's "un-American")...
True. And it always makes me think of this Upton Sinclair quote:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!”
The self serving myopia of the "moneyed elite" kind of undermines the idea that any of them are truly geniuses. Anyone with even a bit of the long view should be able to see the path they've put us on is dysfunctional and destructive to maintaining a civilized society or a decently habitable planet for long.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49005196-the-life-you-can-save
Someone defending effective altruism would refer you to the linked text - and tell you that a given doctor (in the first world) can expect, after controlling for all the runny noses & coughs, to save three lives in the course of their practice; that fact is then used to suggest that someone with a passion for medicine consider practicing in the third world (e.g. as some choose to do when volunteering with Doctors Without Borders)...
"It" is not so cut-and-dry, indeed - more lives could be saved from a malarial vaccine.
= /
Yes, very true.
Our daughter probably beat the average you note before she entered med school. She set up a clinic near Port au Prince with some of the Haitian doctors who worked with Paul Farmer and Partners in Health. The issues were often trauma from accidents, issues of maternal health, and untreated childhood infectious diseases.
Med schools are starting to change and focus students on service rather than money. It's a start but the next generation of doctors may well not be focused on high income alone. Let's hope!
If you take $100 from someone's pocket and give them back $5; have you 'enriched' their pocket? If profits are derived from environmentally unhealthy practices like pollution or pesticide use there are costs that will impact the common good. Harms must be remedied. It really is not charitable behavior in the long run.
I live near Laughlin Nevada. The casinos publish big pictures of the big winners. Effective advertising because no one thinks about that money, and much more coming from the losers. The urge to identify as a winner is stronger than logic, apparently.  Lucky it’s just a local problem,,,right?
This is getting too long but I have to include a little story from Oroville California. When a casino open nearby many local stores went out of business. The bumpkinesk locals didn’t have money to squander on food clothes etc. after going to the casino. No one tells the untold stories.

Earl ; Sadly no one is laughing in Laughlin, Nevada. Actually, I have read that casinos don't usually help the local communities over time. There is a relatively new one in nearby Springfield, MA. MGM. I have never been. If I can't afford to 'play' the stock market, gambling isn't appealing either. Much better things to do with any 'discretionary' money I think I have.
Isn't Oroville in the floodplain...?
I strongly advise interested people to read the story of Andrew Carnegie, possibly the greatest original American philanthropist tycoon. His story has all the elements: genius, political influence, union-busting, anti-imperialism, peace advocacy, generosity, etc...
But let’s not minimize Carnegie’s abhorrent labor practices, practices that added to his fortune that he was later able to give a way.
Exactly my point. Although he was in Europe during the Homestead Steel plant massacre, he certainly profited from anti-labor practices. You simply can’t minimize all of his tariff manipulation and other capitalist greed. It’s a nuanced story, made all the more interesting by his astonishing generosity.
I'd frankly be more "astonished" if a single one of these tycoons prioritized paying their workers well, giving them proper benefits, and paid their taxes fairly and forthrightly without using their money to tip the political and economic landscape ever more in their own favor.
Without any other qualification or condition, I find it “astonishing” that anybody has given away 90% of their wealth, let alone a ruthless capitalist.
Doesn't that depend on how big the remaining 10% is and when they gave it away? After all, ultimately we all 'give away' our wealth - whether we want to or not!
90% from a hundred billion
leaves you with a Paltry
TEN Billion.
.
I could conceivably
Live on that for
four thousand
years. quite
Comfort-
ably.
I see that now that I’ve had more coffee. 😆
Coffee is good. Aeropress has changed my life. Well, not actually. 😂
Yes!
It would be much better that workers lives were lifted up rather than being admired for money he earned off their backs.
It’s not really generosity when you control so much money that you didn’t actually earn. Investments make the uber-wealthy rich, not hard work.
These people CAN give away 90% of their wealth and still live like kings! Keep that in perspective.
The captains of industry were exploitive and that is how they made their money - off the backs of their exploited labor. He treated his employees like garbage. Many died due to unsafe working conditions. He was a union buster. The employees went out on strike. It was a disaster with people dying (Pinkerton fiasco). So originally not the heart of a philanthropist.
It is likely that as he aged he was starting to think about his own legacy and had a change of heart. Guys with huge egos like to have things named after them. Perhaps he felt he needed to assuage his guilt for his prior behaviors?
In my opinion it would be better to solve the root cause of these problems. They could be part of the solution of healthcare for example to provide universal healthcare for the masses. To cut back the ridiculous over charges and bill padding. The problem is, that is how a lot of these guys make their money - by exploiting the rest of us and throwing money at politicians and people with power to manipulate the system. It's a vicious cycle.
A pet peeve I have this time of year are these companies that hit you up for a donation to a cause of their choosing and then give the money to the cause and act like they are doing something altruistic for the holidays. You know what would be even better? The company can give their own giant donation to the cause of their choosing and not try and guilt customers into giving a buck at checkout.
Instead of encouraging anyone to make gobs of money so they can contribute large sums to charities, why don’t we create a system where money is spread out in such a way that all of us can live in decent conditions. Why is it equitable for Jeff Bezos to live in luxury while someone else lives in slum housing? Even if Bezos decides to donate for upgrading that slum housing, it occurs to me that he’s going to use it to feel smug. Why not pay his employees a living wage so they can enjoy the self-esteem and independence of providing decent housing for themselves?
Agree and this was going to be my point - in so far as poverty or inequality is curable in the first place, isn’t it the burden of the state to fix it and not random rich people?
... and if the state cannot carry its burden (e.g. in places which are impoverished & beset by violence)? Plenty of EA scholarship expounds upon quantifying the merit of doing good now (e.g. in QUALYs) - whether for moral reasons or scientific ones (can it be ignored so easily?)...
Apparently its much more fun to lay off employees. Hmm. . . one could take that subject to to too many rabbit holes.
I am currently working on a strategic narrative for a business school to radically reimagine the way businesses can make a net positive impact on our society. I have cast my inspiration net far and wide to help inform my point-of-view, including two of Mr. Reich's books (The Common Good + Aftershock), a host of books on Effective Altruism and Equality/Inequality. I so appreciate this take of recognizing the negative side of Ends justifying the Means when that blind rush to make obscene sums of money "to do good" backfires and has the exact opposite impact on a whole lot of regular people. My research has also led to some very positive and promising perspectives that I feel moved to share with this crowd. I highly recommend Reich's "The Common Good" if you want a straightforward understanding of how the (mostly) Republican-led U.S. legislation has gutted the middle class over the last 40 years, rigging wealth accumulation to remain (and grow) at the top of the hierarchy), by stealing all the benefits that used to accrue to the middle class (wages, pensions, benefits) and claiming the theft as "profits" for shareholders. I also recommend "Less is More" by Jason Hickel--but be prepared to be angry beyond measure at the extortionist approach to Capitalism we are currently experiencing where "growth for growth's sake" is the central maxim. While the writing is poetic and plain-spoken, it is very difficult reading because the data and path we're on to 2050 is dystopian and maddening and too many of us are asleep while the vocal few dominate the media with the same tropes to protect their status quo. There is hope, though, so I encourage a full read. Finally, for this capsule reading list, the hope: "Manifesto for a Moral Revolution," by Jacqueline Novogratz. I heard her on the Global Exchange podcast led by the University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/global-commerce-exchange/id1535478469?i=1000520279645), and just started reading this most intelligent, most hopeful, most practical + "liveable" treatise for change in this world. It is just the palate cleanser my intellect needed. It is the North Star for future generations to revitalize our Planet and our shared Humanity.
###
Thank you for taking this on! As a business school graduate of the 80’s I was taught that the only way to measure the success of a business (and therefore myself as a business owner) was by the bottom line. After reading Marjorie Kelly’s Divine Right of Capital I woke up to the fallacy and decided to restructure my IT business as a social enterprise where 1/3 of distributed profits go to employees, 1/3 to community nonprofits, and 1/3 to shareholders. Now that I’m retired I’m working on a way to “sell” my company to a Perpetual Trust so that it can’t be sold for parts by this same machine. It’s been suggested to me that I should just sell it for the most money I can get and then use that money for good, but I am holding on to the idea that (like Patagonia founder, but on a far smaller scale) I can help more by creating an example/template for others to follow. I’d love to talk more with you if I can help! Kate@KateEmery.com
If your employees agree with your philosophy, how about an ESOP with a reverter?
In the old days, used "key man" life insurance to perpetuate businesses.
https://wwd.com/eye/people/legging-it-with-lloyds-5715605
Supermodel legs... but "key man" - who knew? (Learned something new today; thank you Daniel Solomon!)
= D
I looked into that, but found there were problems as a “fiduciary” needs to be assigned and then, if a M&A firm finds a buyer that will give a good price (planning to strip the company for parts) the fiduciary is then required by law to sell the company as it’s in the best interests of the stakeholder/employees… EVEN if the employees don’t want it. So I decided to try a different route.
I don't practice anymore but you should get a second opinion.
I don't know that's true if you are not a regulated company. If all the shareholders agree, they can do what they want. Private companies may issue stock and have shareholders, but their shares do not trade on public exchanges and are not issued through an initial public offering (IPO).
Companies also can be rolled into a charitable trust. https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/private-foundations/charitable-trusts
I used to work for a company that had an ESOP. Depending on the actions of the board of directors, it can become too strong a mechanism for just keeping wages lower upfront. Not everyone can afford to work for $13 an hour or less for three years just to get vested in the stock. It becomes an intentional treadmill of turnover, because management can't offer salaries high enough to keep new hires, and corporate likes it that way because then very few new people actually get to keep their company allocated stock.
stiglitz, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_Nations_Fail, come to mind.
I'm not much on "moral" revolutions.I have more hope in altering institutions and improvement of living conditions that empower people to make better choices. I will take a look at what you offered.
I agree! Here’s a link to a recent New Yorker Article in which I was featured discussing this topic. https://www.kateemery.com/post/let-s-start-an-evolution. We have to evolve our definition of success to embrace more than just profit… I think of it as evolution rather than a moral revolution, and it does involve altering institutions but starts with our waking up to the deficiencies of our current capitalistic system.
I am much more favorably impressed with a wealthy man like Warren Buffett than with Musk, SBF, Bezos and their ilk. He lives in a small home, drives an older car and lives modestly. Earning gobs of money infects the thinking of the aquisitors in many ways, not the least of which is the fixed delusion they are better than others who they can (ab)use to do their bidding both within their empires and outside them. In his apology to America after the massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, BP chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg told us how much he cares for "the small people". I hope this was just a malapropism from English being a second language, but I suspect he was fluent in English and just said the quiet part out loud.
I agree with Elizabeth Warren's call for a wealth tax to rebalance the scales. Let those denied a seat at the table get to pick the menu for a change rather than just being on it.
When Warren Buffett bought Heinz, small investors like me got screwed. My desires and other considerations meant nothing, he was a "big boy" and I was just one of "the small people" who don't count!
Presumably that outcome should have motivated management to avoid practices that would allow the company to become undervalued & vulnerable to takeover, no? (Why should management get a free pass on screwing shareholders?)
"Jesus looked at him with love and said, 'Sell all you have and give to the poor. Then come follow me.'"
Mark 10:21
Wealth is the absolute corruptor of humanity.
Wealth is not the problematic object. True wealth is the wealth of caring relationship, gratitude, wisdom, friends, health, food to eat, water to drink and bathe with, a healthy environment that is cared for, and the cultivated capacity to deeply love beyond a self-agenda.
If one is fortunate enough to have material resources then that is also wealth. Fulfillment, and meaning in life that doesn't harm others, is wealth.
It is the confusion in the mind that comes from delusionally thinking material wealth and unbridled sensual "fulfillment" is what will finally make us happy.
This is simply ignorant, wrong thinking of a lazy, unreflective mind that is self-cherishing.
Human beings have some important mind-heart training to do in being fully human. If any religion, or whatever, helps one to see that and get to work: very fine!
Thank you! I’ve been thinking we need to use another metric for success than $$$ but I think you’re onto something, and that it is perhaps easier to change our definition of wealth. Kinda like the word sexy… over the years our definitions of what defines sexy has changed but we use the same word. Here’s to hoping that in the not too distant future our definition of wealthy embraces caring, gratitude, wisdom, friends, a healthy body, community, and planet!
That's what they say.
Morals mean nothing in economics. And that's the "moral" to the story."
This post is more of an indictment of our capitalist economy, and its tendency to produce and tolerate negative externalities, than it is of EA per se.
Farron Levy : It is informed by a concern for the common good, for sure.
To tag on to Prof. Reich's essay, also see WaPo's report a few days ago about SB-F's slippery dealings and extravagant lifestyle:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/24/ftx-bahamas-albany-fried/?commentID=3c53271f-6dbb-452b-be35-cdbd04525287
As far as I can see, the papier-mâché altruism that MacAskill advocates is just pragmatism with no outcomes to justify the practice -- no demonstrated ends to support the means.
And SB-F's espousing of MacAskill's "effective altruism" has been exposed as simply the cynical selling of a feel-good catchphrase to lure the undiscerning, another part of the glitzy razzle-dazzle today's Ponzi-scheme crypto-scammers cloak themselves in.
To see some actual philanthropy at work, have a look at what the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation does (see https://www.gatesfoundation.org/about/foundation-fact-sheet for starters). The foundation has actually granted more than $65 _billion_ to work in various ways around the world. We can agree or disagree about whether it's spending the money in the right ways, whether Bill Gates is a good guy, blah blah blah. But there's no arguing that the foundation is putting its money where its mouth is and is getting measurable, positive results.
And you don't get any chest-thumping and puffery from them about MacAskill and "effective altruism" -- just a lot of hard work that produces results on the ground.
Guilt? Anti-trust? Predatory pricing? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.
"Our mission is to create a world where every person has the opportunity to live a healthy, productive life."
"We believe our foundation can help repair the market so that it works for more people. With our partners, we look for innovative ways to close these gaps so everyone has access to the products and services they need to thrive."
Shouldn't we be careful to draw a distinction between the (academic) philosophy of philanthropy and the (less academic) practice of charitable giving - which, incidentally, has as much room for improvement (in many cases via concepts championed by EA, like quantification & independent evaluation) as Microsoft software...?
No.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/5564812-rishi-chopra?ref=nav_mybooks&shelf=negotiation