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The rich aren't your role models
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- thegrim33 3mo ago[flagged]
- sillysaurusx 3mo agoIt’s been 28 minutes since it was submitted. Chill. The algorithm needs time to work. It’s a feature, not a flaw, that posts can skyrocket to the top of the front page. It’s why HN has fresher news.
- Loocid 3mo agoRecency matters. If this post stops getting points it will drop off very fast. The 273 point post is 9 hours old.
- himata4113 3mo agoIt will get flagged and die, read the guidelines or contact hn directly if you have issues with this. There's no comments for the reasons you've described.
- shaewest 3mo agoI mean, 30 points in 30 minutes at the time of writing, seems like reason enough to be high up on the front-page, even if it's botted that's little time for admins to review
- AndrewKemendo 3mo agoI upvoted it and I don’t usually vote up stories but this is exactly what we need to see. As reference my article that said more or less the same as this article, was #1 on the front page for almost a whole day in 2024: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39569747 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39569747 I’m excited to see the sea change in political sentiment and how people are talking, so I’m 100% here for it.
- boznz 3mo agoThis is a technical site (or was at one point in time), I for one would be happy with zero of this shit.
- AndrewKemendo 3mo agoYou can’t separate the two, technology accumulates productivity, but the more important point is how the productivity is distributed
- fzeroracer 3mo agoThis technical site for years had a large contingent of users fellating every action Musk did (just look at the cyber truck thread here all those years ago). Now criticism of Musk and his immense amounts of often ill-gotten wealth is tantamount to partisanship.
- ynac 3mo agoHave to say, the headline alone had me reaching for the pointy hat. Wonder if it was the statistical anomalie or the content that got the parent comment to post?
- AndrewKemendo 3mo agoI think people are starting to actually realize that they have been scammed and what Zinn, Chomsky, Bookchin, Sagan et al have been shouting about was always right
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- NDlurker 3mo agoIf you think it's a "partisan, hate-filled/inducing rant" maybe you should rtfa, because it's not.
- happytoexplain 3mo agoSometimes it's hard to distinguish "hate-filled" from "spot-lighting the immorality of people or systems from which I benefit or with which I ideologically concur".
- wyrdcurt 3mo agoPartisan? I saw no mention of any political party. Hate-filled? Are you sure you don't just disagree? Not arguing that it deserves to be on top or anything, but I thought HN encourages substantive commentary over complaints about the algorithm. Personally I think it's obscene for any individual to be a trillionaire, and in my experience, that's not necessarily partisan; there are many people across the political spectrum(s) who would agree.
- frasermarlow 3mo agoI agree that a system in which we reward one man for building a vast loss-making empire is fundamentally broken and will eventually need to correct course. Elon Musk is not the problem, the irrational valuations of his (and his team's) work are. This said, the article is not terribly articulate in it's arguments and clings to an anachronistic view of how capital markets currently allocate wealth (and I am deliberately avoiding saying "how capital markets work" because I can't see this model working too long past this current wave of massive hyped up IPOs). Also, just to throw spice into the conversation, I bought into the IPO and cashed out above $160. So thanks for that.
- filup 3mo agoWas that guy a billionaire? Sounds like a billionaire comment.
- waterTanuki 3mo ago> A completely partisan, hate-filled/inducing rant, posted by an account which effectively makes this type of thing 50% of the type of content they submit. Yet the algorithm has it at the very top of HN. You realize you're making a political statement in and of itself? There's no such thing as enlightened centrism.
- zephen 3mo agoHe's not a centrist in any case: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508905 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508905
- bugjoey 3mo agoYep, this is tiresome. Antirez (Redis author) was going to write an alternative to HN, I'm looking forward to that. To this point, I think that a simple Bayesian span detector could help a lot.
- _alternator_ 3mo agoLikely due to fairly low traffic this time of day, so easy to get momentum. Also, maybe marxists hang out in HN on Sunday night? But yeah a quick skim shows it's not really worth reading. If you want Marxism, read Marx. It's odd to me that the "excess value theory of labor" still has so many adherents, but at least get it from the source.
- singpolyma3 3mo agoDid you read TFA? It is neither hate filled nor a rant.
- coffepot77 3mo agoWealth inequality is not a partisan issue. And how Silicon Valley should morally use it’s wealth and technical power seems highly relevant to this crowd where CEO worship is common. But looks like you got this flagged
- zephen 3mo ago> A completely partisan, hate-filled/inducing rant Those of us who live in reality might or might not find it a bit over the top, but fully understand that if a relatively accurate description of reality, hyperbolic or not, appears to induce hate, then it is, in fact, reality itself that induces the hate. Your take on this is not at all surprising, given your risible description of the modern conservative: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508905 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48508905
- fzeroracer 3mo agoI wonder what it would take to shake America of the whole 'temporarily embarrassed millionaire' problem. At this point I assume even a hard economic crash pioneered and gleefully supported by the rich isn't enough of a cold water splash. I think that mentality is too locked in for a large subset of Americans. Musk has been increasingly getting more and more rancid and that doesn't seem to deter his supporters at all.
- Empact 3mo agoLeftists ask “why don’t Americans hate capitalism,” while Americans live in one of the most prosperous and advanced societies in the world.
- juanani 3mo ago[dead]
- text0404 3mo agoUnfortunately, leftists rely on Americans ability to empathize with the plight of the vassal states in the world which have been pillaged and destroyed in service of the most prosperous and advanced societies. It is obvious at this point that Americans do not have empathy and will gladly accept the state of the world as long as they don't have to witness the injustice of it.
- hdaz0017 3mo ago"Americans live in one of the most prosperous and advanced societies in the world" for only a small % of the people that live in America! 1 - 2 million people are homeless! What next mr south african, will go for 100 trillion?
- derektank 3mo agoOne doesn’t have to imagine themselves a future millionaire to be wary of granting the state the ability to confiscate private property. There’s a very real risk that they’ll come for the modern equivalent of the kulaks next.
- mrtomservo 3mo agoI wonder if unchecked capital accumulation combined with cutting the social safety net and major public works will lead to commerce without customers: An economy built on consumption where nobody has the money to consume.
- AndrewKemendo 3mo agoIt’s all moving to a service economy for the wealthy as the only consumers. You can see this most dramatically in Las Vegas right now: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LHwU4lQ46nA https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LHwU4lQ46nA
- anon291 3mo agoThis is because America builds nothing anymore. Consider Disneyland. It's expensive as hell. But also there are more people in America than ever. You'd think they'd have built another one, but they haven't. Why?
- RajT88 3mo agoDisney world does not count?
- anon291 3mo agoWhen was Disney world built? Why can nothing be built anymore. Disney is but one example. People complain about data centers due to electricity. We have technology to generate infinite electricity yet the answer is to not build rather than build both the utilities and the data centers. Everyone would benefit from more availability of energy
- hdaz0017 3mo ago$7.01 trillion A deficit occurs when the federal government’s spending exceeds its revenues. The federal government has spent $1.25 trillion more than it has collected in fiscal year (FY) 2026 - another 1.25 trillion to go for the second half of the year.
- sillysaurusx 3mo ago[dead]
- boznz 3mo agoNeither are the politicians, or the influencers, or Hollywood, they all have an end-game, a message or something to sell, none of these people are better than you, yet people pick someone and agrees with everything they say. The world has lost the ability to critically think.
- Rzor 3mo ago>The world has lost the ability to critically think. Bold of you to assume it ever did.
- dataflow 3mo agoMostly off-topic, but I've wondered, is there a measure of wealth that involves first liquidating everything? And what is that for Musk? I don't find it meaningful to say someone has a net worth of $X if they can't actually liquidate their assets and pay off their liabilities to produce $X.
- YZF 3mo agoPresumably Elon can borrow a lot of money against his paper money. That would be more typical than trying to liquidate. But yes, there is no way he can actually fully cash out on his net wealth, and he probably wouldn't even know what to do with it if he could.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- recursivecaveat 3mo agoIt's usually not that different from just amount * marginal market value, such that its not generally worth worrying about the distinction. The main reasons you can't dump 1 trillion dollars of stock at once is it would be difficult to find enough buyer capital quickly, and announcing your intention to do that is going to drop the price as you're implying an overvaluation. Both of those problems can be solved if you just do it slowly in a pre-announced manner. A trillion is a thousand billions, so you could cash out 1 billion dollars annually until the 30th century assuming zero growth/inflation. So unless you're really worried about the optics of selling 0.1% of your holdings, or plan to spend more than 1 billion a year outside your business, you're not really constrained. Everything is liquid in a long enough time horizon. It just depends on what you mean by liquidating. Like do I have to sell my house today? In a week? Months? More flexibility = more value. For Musk the situation is definitely more extreme though. Since a significant part of that valuation is attached to him owning it, he would definitely take an abnormal level of haircut. Probably an unknowable investor sentiment question though.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- YZF 3mo agoWhat matters isn't Elon Musk (or any other person's) net worth. What matters is how this money is being deployed. If Elon has $1T in his basement and he's not doing things with this money then the net outcome is the removal of this money from the economy which is deflationary - makes your money go farther. If Elon invests it in things that produce broader value (e.g. create jobs, improve productivity, etc.) then it can be a net positive. It's not about the amount- it's about how it is deployed. One rich person (or country e.g.) can be your "oppressor" (more likely in non-democratic countries) and another could be your benefactor. Making money is the incentive we have in capitalism for individuals to create value. Capitalism isn't perfect but it's the best system we know of. In systems where we don't allow people to become rich (in theory) we typically produce less value and end up with most of the value concentrated into one dictator (e.g. Russia, China, Saudi Arabia). We can argue about taxation etc. but fundamentally this is the system that has proved to be the best for everyone. We can argue about checks and balances as well but again in practice having rich people and western democracy correlates with better outcomes for everyone historically. If you propose we get rid of this system you need to make a reasonable argument for an alternative that is better. If you're arguing that life isn't always fair and luck plays a role- well yeah.
- ggm 3mo agoI enjoyed seeing this refer to the Phaistos disc, because I have just come back from Heraklion and saw it in the flesh (clay) A reminder that deciphering Linear B was the work of a number of people and a brilliant book by John Chadwick discusses the statistics, and the application of numerical/statistical methods to the analysis That Chadwick and Ventris used, from the ground breaking work of Alice Klober. The problem with Linear A and the Phaistos disc, is that there isn't enough material to apply these kinds of methods. I believe most Linear A is tally records.
- amai 3mo agoWho are your role models?