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submitted 4 months ago by udon@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

Elaborate and explain

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[-] breecher@sh.itjust.works 2 points 4 months ago

Unfortunately that is not how the figures really are. Way too many of those 8 billions will willingly simp and fight the rest of us in the name of those billionaires.

[-] irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 4 months ago

8 billion temporarily embarrassed millionaires.

[-] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Ok, let’s look at this…

IF billionaires were removed from the picture, what would be the result?

There would be investment assets in various holding entities that would then be what, up for grabs? Sold off? Put in probate? Trillions in stock alone would suddenly be ownerless. How would that affect the market and the regular person’s investments?

Multiple BoD positions and CEO positions opening up. How would those be compensated? Just make more people rich?

Material possessions originally worth absurd sums now up for grabs to nobody who could realistically afford to use or maintain them (yachts, palatial homes, etc). Manufacturers of luxury goods would vanish (stupidly expensive watches, clothes, cars).

How would you prevent some other greedy, power-hungry f_cks from taking up the reins and putting us right back where we started? There is no point in civilization’s history where greedy f_cks haven’t existed, so how do you prevent their grubby fingers from tipping the scales right back in favor of piling all the money and power in their corner?

What are the unintended consequences?

(This is NOT an argument implying we should keep billionaires, just asking realistically and pragmatically what the result would be should they no longer exist)

[-] shovingleopardnsfw@lemmynsfw.com 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The implication that they would all be killed or completely stripped of assets is the problem you’re trying to solve, however, that doesn’t have to be the action taken. Perhaps instead, the 8 billion people of the world decide to enact a society that insists that such accumulation of wealth is obscene and should be curtailed. Perhaps systems could be introduced to make the wealthy more accurately contribute to the society they profit off.

Billionaires become billionaires through exploitation. Exploitation of workers, financial systems, and political power for personal gain. Make them pay for all these things.

Pay for education of the people they use to build their companies. Pay for the healthcare of the entire population, which they degrade with their business practices. Pay for the infrastructure that enables them to do business. The roads, the safety nets, the national parks, the air quality, the water supply, the land they use. Make them pay to replace and repair, fully, any damage their business causes. Polute the stream, pay to fix it. Dig the ground for ore, repair the ground so it can be used again. Make them replace what they take from society for little or no cost because their goods are only affordable because they do not reflect the true cost of production. Make their businesses pay for all these things, and the cost of production will rise to include the true cost of production. At the moment, the shortfall is paid for by we, the people, which enables them to become billionaires. Exploitation.

We don’t have to kill anyone, or strip anyone of all their assets in some revolutionary action. We just have to make them pay the true cost of their exploitation.

Tax the rich. Use those taxes to repay their exploitation. Increase the cost of doing business to include the cost of repairing the impact.

People can still become very wealthy. But society will also become much stronger through the use of the extra revenue to benefit all.

To make this happen will take a revolution, but it doesn’t need to include guillotines, it just needs people to become aware. Sadly, the politicians and media are also owned by the billionaires, making the final step of collective uprising extremely difficult. But humans have done it many times before in the face of adversity, perhaps it can happen again.

[-] TheThrillOfTime@lemmy.ml 1 points 4 months ago

Nationalize the assets

[-] DarkSpectrum@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

With modern drones and AI tech?

[-] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 4 months ago

I was just yesterday talking to someone about how AI drones, specifically exactly AI drones, will be a pivotal piece of technology in a way I think even beyond nukes in some sense. With a decent AI drone swarm, it's not hard to imagine a SINGLE person dominating an entire population. The dictator's purest dream - none of those pesky military generals getting uppity.

[-] Tinidril@midwest.social 1 points 4 months ago

The most successful method the wealthy have used to subvert social movements is infiltration. When a drone swarm can do that, then drone swarms will be what I worry about.

[-] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 4 months ago

homer patting Bart on the shoulder meme

The most successful method so far!

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[-] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

Don't worry, the entire system is collapsing from mismanagement.

[-] stickly@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

Trick question, we all lose

[-] vane@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

3000 billionaires because you can't convince everybody to ditch school. You can't change people. Pharaoh, Hammurabi. Those are thousands of years of genetic obedience.

[-] mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 4 months ago

I don't know if I like assuming that obedience is a genetically heritable trait. I've heard racists use this assumption to argue that racially Chinese people are more likely to be sneaky servile backstabbers because that's what their genetics are selected for due to their political past.

Controversial statement incoming: I also don't want to preemptively rule out the possibility of obedience, or anything else, being genetically heritable - even if it could lead to these uncomfortable conclusions. I think scientific studies should be done about such things to answer the questions of whether these personality traits are heritable, come what may of that knowledge. But to my relief, from the studies I've seen, personality traits heritability is on very shaky ground in most cases.

[-] Valmond@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

Seems like the billionaires are winning 🤷🏼‍♀️ ?!

[-] WanderWisley@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

4% of a bee hive vs all the billionaires.

[-] Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 months ago

What are we measuring. Like just a braw? A unanimouse revolution?

[-] mvirts@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

Billionaires only have power because people do things for them in exchange for money

[-] auginator@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago

Have the billionaires for lunch.

[-] DeathsEmbrace@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The likelihood we would have to have commanders with armies we could do an entire war with artillery, tank, infantry and air bombardment with jets they would be dead in days.

[-] Allero@lemmy.today 1 points 4 months ago

I'd want to say "8 billion people", but right now 3000 billionaires lead on.

After all, they maintain their position by masterfully playing people off each other and setting things up to be on top. They have all the resources to extend their influence.

If 8 billion people could turn billionaires voices off for anything larger than a day, then yeah, 8 billion all the way, and 3000 will run out FAST.

But the latter know this, and will never let this happen. We should.

[-] zeropointone@lemmy.world 0 points 4 months ago

The billionaires. There are many reasons, but my favorite is the Matthew effect.

[-] tetris11@lemmy.ml 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Matthew effect.

For anyone wondering, the effect describes the uncanny ability for rich people to put on red outfits and act like blind devils whilst bending the law in their favor as they bask in their own self-proclaimed peity

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this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2025
117 points (96.8% liked)

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