How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their way out of criticism

Re:How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their... by jessaustin on Tuesday October 06, 2015 @07:00AM (#10338024)

If I were a student, alumnus, or professor of FSU, this would be quite annoying. However, from the outside, does this matter? Koch can't buy all the universities. I'm not aware that the FSU econ department is especially influential. It seems unlikely that Koch will be able to influence the direction of economic research or opinion through an action like this. Mostly he'll just be able to avoid the seeming embarrassment of the holder of the Chuck Koch Endowed Chair in Economics writing some paper that says, "Koch Industries sucks!"

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their... by rayiner on Tuesday October 06, 2015 @08:04AM (#10338240)

You don't need to buy out every university. You just need to buy out enough to "create a debate."

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their... by bdavisx on Tuesday October 06, 2015 @07:41AM (#10338146)

>Koch can't buy all the universities.

They are billionaires. And this was only a $1.5 million dollar donation, so how many can they afford to buy this way? I'm thinking it's enough to have a real impact on higher education in the U.S.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their... by Jgrubb on Tuesday October 06, 2015 @10:03AM (#10338936)

I agree. I remember seeing some chart laying out the ROI of lobbying and how campaign contributions can be more or less directly connected to future government contracts worth 1000x of what they "contributed". Seems pretty logical to make the same "investment" in swaying public opinion on the legality/ethics of such a campaign finance system in the first place.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How the Koch brothers and the super-rich are buying their... by jimkri on Tuesday October 06, 2015 @10:17AM (#10339021)

Here is the list of the Universities Koch was donated too: http://www.kochfamilyfoundations.org/pdfs/CKFUniversityProgr...

Koch is definitely having a impact on higher education, look at all the major universities he is involved in.

[ Parent | on HN ]