Time to give back?
We had some friends over for dinner tonight, during which someone mentioned the preposterous idea of “giving back”. For example, an otherwise seemingly intelligent person can make a remark that a billionaire like Bill Gates is “giving back” with his charitable efforts and such a comment can pass without anyone challenging it. The fact is, Bill Gates has done things which have resulted in so much wealth and prosperity in the world that the idea of him “giving back” is ludicrous. His benevolence is no bad thing, of course, but it is not “giving back”. He did not take his wealth from anyone, so who does he have to compensate?
Perhaps Bill Gates was a bad example to use, though, if David Tebbutt is right:
You can’t help wondering whether Bill would actually be the poorest man in the world if he had to recompense all the users for the time they’d wasted struggling in the more arcane reaches of his software edifice.
Filed under: Life
Well, not nearly enough people realize that in giving, they receive. Nor do people realize that in producing, they give.
Oh, I thought someone was saying it as an example of a preposterous thinking some people have about people who make lots of money. I obviously missed the fact that they meant it seriously. The whole idea of ‘giving back’ is something that only the person doing it can say. Otherwise it smacks of the fixed wealth fallacy.
Although I am no fan of Bill Gates, I do think it is a ludicrous statement. And I like David Tebbutt’s twist on it.
No, Adriana, nobody meant it seriously - they were pointing out the idiocy of other people in thinking that the likes of Gates or Carnegie had any obligation to ‘give back’.
And yes, the fixed wealth fallacy does come into play. I never cease to be surprised at how many people actually believe it.
Giving back is not all about $, it can be as simple as going to Arby’s and getting 5 sandwiches for $5.95 and passing them out to those in need walking from Arby’s to the Government Square bus station, stopping and talking to someone who just wants someone to listen to them, smiling when someone says hi, etc.
Mark, we’re taking issue with the phrase ‘giving back,’ which assumes there is a debt to be paid. There isn’t.
“To much has been given, much is owed.”
First off, “giving back” does not imply there is a debt owed. Somebody is a wee bit too sensitive.
I think it’s funny that people think someone like Gates earned all his billions and billions of dollars. He worked hard, no doubt, and he got lucky. Nobody is worth all the money that Gates has “earned.”
“Giving back” is a moral judgment, which is fine to make for those who have the wealth (like Gates and Warren Buffet) to give or the poor souls or strongly suggest it be given back. They can be wrong, ignored or otherwise looked over (the rich have done that for centuries), but I think the right thing to do is to remind people to give back. Even guilt them into giving back. Not a thing wrong with that.
Who specifically is being sensitive, Joe?
Who has ‘given’ to Gates? Who is owed? Please be specific.
It is a fallacious comment to make, for reasons already covered by me and Adriana. Why on earth do you think that Gates has not earned his money? The onus is on you to explain such a bizarre statement.
I think it’s funny that some people don’t recognise the rewards of efforts applied against risk coupled to potential as being Earned. If it had been hand-me-down money or title I could agree, however in the cases of Gates or Buffet, inheritance doesn’t apply. What you are implying is that Gates somehow took a cut of of his customers creative works facilitated by Micro$oft products. I would say that his software aided in his customers creativity.
He got lucky? How does luck create a moral requirement at any level for someone to redistribute their results to those who have not invested along side against the risk? Should his customers given Gates more money had his products failed?
Poor souls ??!? pfft. If these poor souls feel as if they were slighted to the point of fraud in their exchange of money for software, then they should file a class action suit. See the EU.
It matters not whether Gates earned, inherited, found or simply won his money playing the lottery. So long as he came by it honestly then he owes no debt and has no moral obligation to give anything back. This business of successful people ‘giving back’ is an ideological attempt to insinuate either that they are of a class with criminals who really should be giving things back - specifically to their victims.
In the case of successful entreprenuers operating in a free market, then they have already given much that is valuable to the world and been rewarded accordingly. If they then want to give to charity fine, that is nice of them, but it is utterly wrongheaded to conflate charity with some kind of social debt.