Hey asshole, find where I said otherwise.

1) The idiotic “joke” is about millionaires not billionaires. If you have an average or above average income for an individual with a college degree and don’t retire with a seven figure net worth, barring extenuating circumstances, you were financially irresponsible. Seven figures is not difficult. People in their…

It’s totally possible. Is it likely though? How many people posting here in the land of the struggle do you really think have an effective rate over 15%?

1) If you are self-employed you pay the employee and employer portions of FICA. That means it roughly doubles except the Medicare part has no cap.

He referred to Howard as “hip-hop university”.

Property tax is between you and your local government. The federal government didn’t demand a dime from you in relation to your home because it doesn’t do that.

1) The US taxes income. Bezos’ change in net worth is due to the growth of his assets. We do not tax the growth of assets. We tax the resulting income after liquidation.

The reason it’s possible for Jeff Bezos to be worth 160 billion dollars is that America, like virtually every other industrialized country in the world, does not tax wealth. We tax income. Bezos isn’t avoiding taxes by leaving his stash in the form of Amazon stock. He’s deferring them.

America has been a pretty authoritarian place if you’re not white for the overwhelming majority, maybe even entirety, of its existence...

When you say “him and his company” are you saying you believe Jeff Bezos, the individual, pays a tax rate that is lower than or otherwise not even at parity with what you, an individual, pay?

Jeff Bezos is worth 163 billion dollars primarily because he is (or at least was) the largest single shareholder for Amazon. What do taxes have to do with that? How does taxation of income have anything to do with the value of assets he has by virtue of being a founder?

When you say “in billionaire terms” how many billionaires have any significant degree of liquidity relative to their overall net worth? Wealth is built with assets. Who is holding that much cash?

Your curiosity is indicative of a significant issue.

Amazon’s cash flow and Jeff Bezos’ wealth are not the same thing.

The latter is an input for the former. Research and synthesize then take informed, productive, action. That’s the story for knowledge workers.

Detroit is an entity that wants Ford to do something because it believes it will benefit materially. So Ford is trying to turn that leverage into a material advantage as any intelligent worker would in a corresponding situation.

Ummm when I have more than one otherwise acceptable job offer I most definitely pit them against each other and demand tribute because fuck working for anything less than the maximum I can get?

It’s not any more of a grift than you going to your boss and saying you can give me X or I’m going to find someone that will. It’s business. It’s your boss’ job to evaluate whether you’re worth X or not.

Countdown until another GMG site posts an article about the power of unions and the little guys banding together to take down the “petulant” millionaire...

It’s interesting when an article on a GMG property implies that upgrading these things every year or two is so normal that the people that don’t (read: the adults in the room) need to be reassured that not engaging in financially ignorant behavior is in fact ok.