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A comment on The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates Is a Menace to Society. Parent comment

Re:The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates ... by coldtea on Wednesday May 26, 2021 @02:22AM (#27287055)
>Anytime an article talks about the supposed paper billions someone is making they inevitably fail to point out how that wealth is actually being put to work. For some reason there’s this notion that billionaires just sit on their wealth like dragons hoarding gold.

Well, them "putting the wealth to work" is even worse. This means a single person gets to use their money to dictate policies, which is not of their business in a democratic society (much less in foreign countries they don't belong to).

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Re:The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates ... by Nevermark on Wednesday May 26, 2021 @02:33AM (#27287130)
I think you are conflating the power to organize resources toward meeting a market need with political corruption.

The latter is a problem, the former is not. They are not the same thing.

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Re:The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates ... by coldtea on Wednesday May 26, 2021 @03:18AM (#27287383)
Involvenment in policy (re agriculture, environment, Africa, vaccine, etc), sponsoring "think tanks" and symposiums, controlling policy through "charity", etc. is not a "market need".
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Re:The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates ... by ffggvv on Wednesday May 26, 2021 @02:32AM (#27287119)
policies shouldn’t be able to dictated by wealth in the first place or this wouldn’t be an issue.

one solution to this is campaign finance reform. another is to not make your government powerful enough to make policies like that because they will always be corrupted

but actually bill gates isn’t very involved at all in electoral politics and as far as i know doesn’t really donate

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Re:The Faux Generosity of the Super-Wealthy: Why Bill Gates ... by coldtea on Wednesday May 26, 2021 @03:19AM (#27287392)
>but actually bill gates isn’t very involved at all in electoral politics and as far as i know doesn’t really donate

That's because electoral politics are a sham. He'll get his way with the one or the other candidate/party anyway, and his reach and policy influence is global...

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