Everybody should have access to clean water. I mean everybody. If I was the President I'd happily enforce that with all powers available.
Then I'd start working my way up the hierarchy of needs...
Elon could single-handedly end world hunger. But he doesn’t.
Well, billionaires should not exist. But ending world hunger takes way more than just money. There is enough food already, it's just not evenly distributed. And even in areas where we send aid, local power plays and corruption prevent the fair distribution. Ending world hunger is a hugely complex issue, unfortunately. Of course I'm not saying we shouldn't try or try different approaches. It's just not as simple as saying "feeding all hungry people costs x money, and some billionaire could pay for that"
One yacht? That's amateur numbers!
https://luxurylaunches.com/transport/gabe-newell-luxury-yachts.php
Oh yummy! Confusion.
Wow, I did not know that. He could definitely drop the percentage he takes from Indy developers. I always thought his 30%, was scummy. Now moreso.
From all developers honestly but just from indies would be great considering they already have it in their contract that the % goes down after X$ of sales (which benefits larger devs).
Valve makes enough money to pay their employees more than the competition while also having surplus to have tons of side projects that will lead to nothing and making the boss a billionaire... I don't mind the first two, but that last bit means money coming out of our pockets and going towards buying yachts...
(Disclaimer: I hate all billionaires, this applies to all platforms, we overpay for games [and most other things] in general because there's billionaires at the top of the creation/distribution chain)
never beileve billionaires when they act like they need more money
People can have mega yachts precisely because others don’t get 3 meals a day. That’s how the system is designed to work.
Not because the capital spared from denied meals (or production thereof) are going directly towards yachts, but because the capitalist mode of production requires the threat of starvation to force us into unfavourable compensation for our labour.
Really, we could easily do both at this point (and more), but since greed knows no limits, there is also no limit to what pain the capitalist class will impose on us in order to extract surplus value.
We already produce enough food for a billion more people than what exists, but still around a billion live in starvation to deter the rest of us.
Cooking Mama has an ideal outcome - Great
Cooking Mama's idea of getting there was whatever the fuck the USSR was doing... - Not Great
Just Tax the rich while maintaining a strong democracy, it's not hard.
you don’t get to communism through “social democracy” XD
any concessions given by the rich in bourgeois “democracies” are funded by outsourcing some of the exploitation to the imperial periphery/global south
Clean water and a freaking shitter too!
And shelter.
A well functional and hygienic three set bathroom is also essential. That is a shitter, a bathtub/shower and sink. You probably knew that of course.
It does make total sense.
Bezos needed to de-construct a bridge in the Netherlands because his new build yacht wouldn't go through. Fokker paid for it too, probably a fraction of that floating monstrosity. We did not like it one bit but the city of Rotterdam pulled their pants down and bended over.
Did he pay for it to be rebuilt taller or is there just not a bridge now?
All I can find is articles about how they did NOT tear down the bridge because the locals were obviously outraged. The city would have done it.
It's a historic railroad bridge that has not been used for a while, steel construction, and it has been taken apart and put together many times before, sometimes for maintenance. IIRC the current mayor promised the people not to do it again, and then came Bezos, and then they didn't take it apart, they installed the yacht's masts downstream instead.
This is the bridge in question: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Hef
Money hoarding is obscene. And worshipping money hoarders is gross.
Don't forget healthcare as well!
And a place to sleep.
More than just a place to sleep; a place to call your own. And every place I've rented did not feel like my own; most corporate rental contracts make it very clear that this is their property, don't you dare make it feel like home, you only get to temporarily reside there by the grace of their good will (and by paying out your nose, ears, eyes, and ass for the privilege).
If you're working 40 hours a week and you STILL can't afford basics like food, shelter and healthcare, then your economy (and your employer) sucks.
employer == economy
You can't have an economy if the "consumer class" stops consuming. If people have no confidence in the economy, they stop spending money. An economy only works if people SPEND money, not if a tiny number of people hoard it.
I eat my breakfast from a bowl. Checkmate yachters!
Does this also apply to say, smartphones?
Weird gotcha. What is this the early 2000s when smartphones were rich people toys?
You think that there aren't people who might need a Smartphone for work or medical emergencies? That is a non-zero number, so no. However should we have everyone's base needs met before others get past a certain point before luxury goods? Yes. Should we be able to do that now AND have luxury goods? Also Yes. Is it alright for people to have a Billion Dollars before that? Definitely No.
Or any matter of things on a global scale instead of national.
I'm a citizen of the Earth before I'm the citizen of any Nation, but it's hard to remember that.
This probably does apply to smart phones, TV, consumer computers. Its hard to look at socialism and answer the question of what would it look like but at a guess: planned obsolescence would be out the window. No one is upgrading to an ai powered refrigerator because their old one is broke. No one is buying the newest smart phone because they're older model died(Hyperbole), Yet we live in a system of yearly releases of similar tech that we mindlessly consume. This consumption is a by product of the capitalist system. Purely manufactured to make money.
So in my imagined full communist world. We have phone. Phones that last longer, they are geared to be easily upgraded, dissembleable and actually future proofed unlike what we have now.
Is this true even if a person on an island spends their whole life building a wooden mega yacht for themself?
If someone can manage to build themselves a mega yacht from scratch they can keep it
Phew. I could sense people sharpening their pitch forks. This my yacht and I’m keeping it.
Hmm, so we could say the real problem is when someone has wealth disproportionately larger than what they contributed to the world?
That makes sense to me
nah we should let the poors die then sell their body parts
what!? There's no way. This reads like an elongated onion post, whats up?
Makes sense. But what about couples and families?
