GortonBlue62
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 26 Nov 2015
- Messages
- 2,973
And the people that are employed by Microsoft and other huge companies have jobs that wouldn't have existed without Gates et al.There are plenty of perfectly decent rich people. The problem isn't the people, it's the system. We congratulate super rich people for giving money to charity to pay for the services that can't exist because of all of the tax they avoid (and in many cases, are legally obliged to avoid if they're the director of a company).
Bill Gates is your typical example of a philanthropic rich person. I have no doubt he genuinely cares and attempts to use his vast fortune to change things for the better. And yet how many countries does Microsoft avoid tax in? How many nurses haven't been hired or kids haven't been educated properly because of that? How many Americans have to get into massive debt for an education because the government "can't afford" to fund the universities any more?
The ones like you talk about tend to be smaller scale. The bloke who runs Timpsons is another example. But for every one of them, there are plenty of selfish bastards, and there are plenty of people put into positions where they're obliged to be selfish bastards or lose their jobs.
Those employees pay tax and spend money in the local communities. Schools (not the local bog standard comprehensive), car dealerships (that double garage won't fill itself), travel agents (trophy wife needs at least three holidays a year), etc.
Even if modern day robber barons were all as bad as you think, I'd say their contribution to society is overwhelmingly positive.
You are aware, I hope, that Bradley Hardacre and Alan B'Stard were fictional characters in sit coms, and that Brass and The New Statesman weren't documentaries?
Anyway I'm going back to worrying about the PL case against us.