coffeecloud

Its beautifully written C code. Very readable and grokable.

K

> That must be why there were no successful companies in the United States before 1965.

Of course there were. There were also lots of successful companies before we had highways or municipal plumbing. So I’m not sure what point you are trying to make here.

>Tesla is paying them that much, because Tesla--and all employers and employees--are funding Medicare via earmarked taxes on income.

Tesla benefits because every employer has been paying in. Anyone can freely go work in a Tesla factory because they know they will receive the same health benefits at the end of their working life if they go work there. They also benefit because their current employees don’t need to pay for the cost of their parents healthcare, which Tesla most likely did not pay for.

Regarding your quote. Was your intention to imply that I’m a totalitarian because I’m using a slightly different definition of a word than you? That seems a bit severe.

Let’s ask Wikipedia about infrastructure:

> One way to describe different types of infrastructure is to classify them as two distinct kinds: hard infrastructure and soft infrastructure.[4] Hard infrastructure is the physical networks necessary for the functioning of a modern industrial society or industry.[5] This includes roads, bridges, and railways. Soft infrastructure is all the institutions that maintain the economic, health, social, environmental, and cultural standards of a country.[5] This includes educational programs, official statistics, parks and recreational facilities, law enforcement agencies, and emergency services.

I don’t think it’s by any means a stretch to say Medicare or the FDA are institutions that maintain economic/health standards.

There is a broader definition of "infrastructure." For example, Medicare is infrastructure that is directly related to the success of any company in the United States.

Has Tesla ever received a check from Medicare? Probably not. But the fact that Medicare exists means that Tesla's factory workers don't need to be paid at levels that reflect they need to 100% self-fund their retirement.

Has Salesforce ever asked for regulation or assistance from the FDA? Probably not. But because the FDA exists, Saleforce's employees don't have to spend time verifying their medication is authentic and does what it claims to do, so they can spend more focus on their work for Salesforce.

Even beyond government: how much do you think a Ford or Chevy have benefited from the US's culture? They certainly don't sell many large consumer trucks Europe or Asia. That profit exists because of the ideals and beliefs Americans have about how they should live their lives and what type of car they need to do that. Yes someone made the truck, and the truck maker should reap most of the benefits, but some of that profit should feed back into society that supported it.

Sure, we probably spend too much on the military and there exists some cronyism that we should strive to stamp out, but make no mistake that anyone with 100M in investable wealth has earned it with substantial help from the society we have all built together.

Yup, the 50% of the population that has managed to extract zero wealth from the system aren’t asked to put very much back in. Makes sense to me.

Who got more out of the system: someone getting weekly $400 check or someone who has managed to acquire 100M in assets?

People on welfare aren’t getting nearly as much out of the system as people who have amassed massive wealth, so they should put in substantially less.

A new type of tax on the absolute wealthiest of the wealthy is not "taxing everyone to death." I'm sure there are some great ways we can reduce/improve government spending, but that is completely separate from the idea that the mega-rich should be paying more.

My point was that just because we impose a new tax on unfathomably wealthy people, it doesn't mean that we are inherently going to impose that tax on normal people. We can't be so scared of our own shadow that we are paralyzed into inaction. So scared of new taxes imposed on ourselves that we don't try to tax the uber wealthy. At the end of the day this is a democracy (obv with flaws, but still a democracy.) If politicians start taxing your 100k investment fund the way they are taxing a 100M investment fund, vote them out.

k

"Your opinions are completely, totally, objectively false. Here are 3 of my opinions and unsubstantiated conjectures that prove so."

It’s simply pay for use. The more someone uses the system, the more they pay back into it. Anyone with more than 100M in assets has used the system a shit ton and owes a lot back into it.

We all earned the money. Nobody makes 100M in a vacuum. That sort of profit only comes from taking full advantage of a country's infrastructure, its educated population, its safety from invasion. We all provide the society that allows someone to amass that much wealth, and we all deserve a piece of the pay out.

Yup I totally agree, because bad things can happen we shouldn't try to do anything. Much simpler.

What you see on youtube is not what the judge and jury see in court.

If cops wanted to win the trust of the public and work alongside their fellow citizens to keep their communities safe, they would welcome to use of body cams and hold themselves accountable to a high standard of integrity.

Stuff like this certainly makes it seem like cops are more interested protecting their own power and their cushy pension packages and their corrupt fringe benefits.