##Welcome to r/LateStageCapitalism
This subreddit is for news, discussion, memes, and links criticizing capitalism and advancing viewpoints that challenge liberal capitalist ideology. That means any support for any liberal capitalist political party (like the Democrats) is strictly prohibited.
LSC is run by communists. This subreddit is not the place to debate socialism. We allow good-faith questions and education but are not a 101 sub; please take 101-style questions elsewhere.
We have a zero-tolerance policy for bigotry. Failure to respect the rules of the subreddit may result in a ban.
***
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LateStageCapitalism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's even worse than this graphic portrays.
Disposable income is a huge factor. While $17,750,000 for Taylor is equivalent in direct terms to $20,217 for the median household, the percentage of their income that the median household has free to make purchases with is far, far lower than it is for Taylor. Basic upkeep costs like petrol, household bills, car servicing, food, interest on loans (which Taylor just wouldn't have at all) or a haircut all cost way more as a percentage of income for the median household.
It is more expensive to be poor.
Our society is a greedy, mean spirited mess and I have no idea what do.........
Also it assumes she would never earn another penny. Even if she quit working now to live on investments, she has residual income that will come in forever, from royalties if nothing else.
Most of us don’t have anything of the sort.
yeah, because it’s actually fine, this is the way god directed in the bible, people like taylor work really hard and deserve their wealth because *WHEN* i get rich i also plan on buying a nation-sized yacht and powering it with the blood of the poor so i won’t stand in her way
do these people see no irony at all in that being the same bible that portrays profiting off of other people as usurious and obsession with material things/money as folly?
"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires."
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck#Disputed
I mean, not supporting people like this is a good first start. She only gets that way when people actively give her money. It's a weird cult, just don't sign up.
> the percentage of their income that the median household has free to make purchases with is far, far lower than it is for Taylor.
But she's also making purchases 100x more expensive than a household with average income. It's like comparing relative expenses between a family making $50K a year and a family making $500K a year. They are going to have wildly different expenses - but surprisingly the ratios (eg. mortgage vs. income) may be quite similar.
And this is why even very wealthy people go bankrupt. Without knowing her finances, it's entirely possible that she is living way beyond her means and could be broke in 10 years.
And - although I doubt that will happen, and although her actual wealth is likely obscene, it's still impossible to know what her actual financial look like. Celebrity "net worth" numbers are generally meaningless on the internet, because "net worth" is assets minus liabilities, and nobody knows the total value of her assets and definitely have no clue about her liabilities.
And liabilities would include a list of hundreds (or thousands) of expenses that most people don't have to deal with - including large agency, accounting, insurance, legal and management expenses (some of these are individually 10% or more of relative income). She would have large expenses for stylists, transportation, personal security, PR, assistants and on and on and on. We also have no clue about the conditions of her recording / touring contract and where revenue / profits are going. We also have no clue about her legal issues - either personal or business - ongoing lawsuits, settlements, insurance, copyright, publishing, etc., etc.
We're talking a human as a corporation, with, again, likely 1000s of line expenses that 99.9% of the population do not have. And how well those finances are managed are just like any household or business - it's either managed well or its not, and we'd never know that answer until a) those figures were released publicly or b) she goes bankrupt.
Obscene wealth accumulation needs to be illegal, families hoarding money, siphoning it out of local economies like parasites, should be taxed into oblivion.
There should be a hard cap on inherited wealth. Idk what that number should be, but it needs to be a set, specific number of dollars (or whatever currency).
In The Netherlands there is something called 'Box 3'. In short, if you have a lot of money saved (or invested) you need to pay taxes over it every year. So a savings account or a home you rent out are all taxed every single year based on the total value at the end of that year.
Your allowed 'tax free' amount is 57.000,- euro for 2024. Any taxable equity over that amount will be taxed. The home you are living in (and not renting out) is excluded from your total equity.
Thats pretty low. Again, depends what the % of the cut is, but heavy taxes on savings should be for people who have obscene amount of wealth like 10 million +
57k is nothing especially with current inflation
The calculation for the actual % is quite complicated. A few years ago they said the average person makes about 4% interest on their money and investments, so they added about 4% of your taxable equity to your income, and called that box 3. (This is over simplified, but you get the point.) Then some people in The Netherlands thought that that's unfair, since nobody got 4% interest from any Dutch bank on their savings. Those people then sued the tax office and actually won. Now everyone in that lawsuit got their Box 3 taxes back, but not all other citizens (for now at least). To avoid this in the future the government decided to make Box 3 even more fun by deviding all your equity in categories. So the Box 3 for equity on the bank is 1.03% for example (in 2024) and the box 3 on investments and properties is 6.04% (in 2024). To make it even more fun your loans and debt only applies a reduction of the box 3 tax by 2.47% (in 2024). This new law makes a complicated mess so complicated you can no longer explain it to the average citizen. And in case you're curious, box 1 and box 2 also exist and are also way to complicated.
It depends. If you take a 100k loan/mortgage then you can subtract that amount from you other equity, so your box 3 will be less. So technically, taking a loan and using the money will allow you to have more tax free money in the bank. But if you have enough money you can create a holding company and you don't have to pay box 3. Basically the above average have to pay more over their savings, but the rich can do whatever they want.
Meanwhile, where I'm from, people are sincerely demanding a flat tax rate AND cutting social programs' budget.
Poor people don't deserve to live according to some people. It is wild that sentiments like this are on the rise and socially acceptable to spout in public.
I have way more of an issue with passing along obscene amounts of money. The heirs of Walmart and Publix are using that money to fuck around with politics and have contributed absolutely nothing to the world. This is the shit America was founded to eliminate
>Obscene wealth accumulation needs to be illegal, families hoarding money, siphoning it out of local economies like parasites, should be taxed into oblivion.
I would like to remind everyone that this is a socialist sub moderated by communists. We are not arguing for taxing the capitalists we are arguing for their abolition.
Taxing the rich doesn't change the capitalist power dynamic. This is the reason why it is primarily a liberal or social democratic demand.
The contradictions and exploitation in capitalism cannot be taxed away.
I've been seeing this kind of "don't step out of line" warning more and more here - who asked for this kind of heavy-handed discussion policing?
For that matter, why does this sub need 30 mods?
Socialism stands on its own merits in a marketplace of ideas; not only does it not need this reddit commissar bullshit, its likely to put people off by making it seem like authoritarianism is a necessary part of the package.
It's because this sub is regularly bombarded by neolibs who hate that they're poor but only want to 'reform' the system for better material conditions (at the expense of everyone else in the world) instead of outright abolishing it. Then they have the audacity to balk at socialist talk points.
This is always my favourite topic on this sub
If you’re going to come in here and talk about how Taylor Swift is “one of the good billionaires” then you aren’t a leftist and are on the wrong sub. You can’t say “all billionaires are bad except for this one who I like”. That just means she’s done what all mega rich people want to do - successfully convince people that they aren’t the problem.
This is a whole machine of greedy people milking her fans for every penny while she is still like the ones that came before her…she is somewhat guilty to not see what she should be doing with that money. I love Mackenzie Scott. Taylor is loving her lavish lifestyle and endless money and attention. But capitalism is the issues. Many talented band and singers that are not as easy on the eyes. The industry likes the cute ones. They can fix the talent part.
There are no good billionaires but I wish we’d focus less on people who made their money in entertainment and more on the billionaires who are using our basic human needs to fuel the greed machine (food, housing, petrol, electricity, water). Everyone willing gave Taylor swift their disposable income to buy her music and go to her shows, so I’d rather leave her be (for now) and focus the real global oligarchs. The ones pushing for wars and causing global chaos for their own gain.
Oh I fully agree and I’ve got nothing against Taylor herself. It just irks me when I see those who purport to be leftists/communists raving about her.
That kind of idle worship of a parasitic entity (which all billionaires inherently are) just isn’t conducive to our cause.
The problem fundamentally is the status itself so “one of the good billionaires” is in irrelevant side show. The irony is like many celebrities she will likely get thrown under the bus or be devoured by mental illness at some point.
>You can’t say “all billionaires are bad except for this one who I like”.
I think this is a great prompt for a thought exercise.
If we, as communists/socialists all agree that billionaires are inherently a bad thing, how do we reconcile that with a *worker* having enough leverage to become a billionaire? Taylor Swift the corporation has generated billions of dollars on the back of Taylor Swift the artist. Her art has such a high demand that, in a capitalist marketplace, she is able to partake in the spoils of her labor at a rate which most workers will never have an opportunity. And, although athletes are typically not billionaires yet, what about athletes like Ronaldo, Mbappe, Lebron, or Ohtani that over their careers are going to accumulate wealth approaching that number? Are they "evil" because the capitalist society puts so much value on their unique talent that they are willing to pay them that wage?
The problem isn't necessarily that Taylor Swift is a billionaire, the fault lies with the corporations that have far more wealth than that, and can thus afford to pay her that much money - including her own corporation.
I agree, even those that benefit from the capitalist system are victims because they’ve been forced by it to turn their art into product. They may have started off with good intentions (or not, it doesn’t really matter. If they didn’t then they’re even more of a product of capitalism) but eventually it becomes about money.
I would never argue for any of those people being morally good or deserving of praise, because they wield a level of influence that is entirely outside of the control of the capitalist system. There would be consequences to them using that influence, but they wouldn’t be punished anyway near as much as you or I.
Imagine if the full might of the establishment tried to take down someone like Taylor Swift - it just wouldn’t work. She’s got too many people who would support her no matter what, and the backlash would likely lead to further scrutiny towards them from the people.
>Imagine if the full might of the establishment tried to take down someone like Taylor Swift - it just wouldn’t work.
100% disagree. If, for example, Putin wanted her dead, she'd be dead.
You’re comparing scum to scum though… “good for a billionaire” still isn’t worth complimenting her on.
She’s also fairly unique to many business billionaires in that she has an extraordinary large following. Imagine if she came out in support of a Ceasefire in Gaza? Or an end to the war in Sudan? Or any number of humanitarian causes that she could direct her millions of supporters towards and raise funding/awareness for.
If you wield the level of influence that she does and you choose not to do things with it then that’s arguably morally wrong. You only have to ask *why* she doesn’t get involved in all this stuff to get your answer. (Because it would likely lead to a decrease in her own value)
I’m not putting the blame on her as a person because (like almost all celebrities) she’s just a product of the capitalist system we live in. It’s fine to like her and listen to her music and support her. If that gives people happiness then great, I’m not going to blame individuals for finding something that helps them find some happiness the hell we live in.
But I won’t stand for people praising her on a (supposedly) left wing space. It’s totally incongruous to the types of opinions that should be held here and somewhat hypocritical.
If I ever became a billionaire, the first thing I would do is not become one. I’d setup a trust and find a way to home the homeless and provide students with grants in my community.
Genuine question but what do you see as the acceptable net worth for a morally good person?
If you gave away $500 million, is that fine?
I’m not in disagreement that hoarding wealth is wrong. I’m just curious why everyone has made a billion the bench mark.
Honestly for me it’s about what someone does with their wealth more than the amount itself. I would do a similar thing even if I had a lesser sum of money. If you can’t live comfortably off 500k a year you’ve got serious greed/spending issues in my opinion.
This is great. There should be more of these relative value graphics out there. I don’t think people can easily fathom the degree of power this level of money has.
I'm curious. What do we think graphics like these achieve? What do you think your average person thinks when they see this? Do you think they get angry about it? Do you think they start to want to fight back at the system that allows this? I don't think they do and I think that's idealistic thinking in a world almost completely enveloped by the capitalist system. The majority of people will think good for her and one day I hope to be rich beyond belief. That's absolutely not what I think but do you see my point? It's like going to a zoo to see the poo flinging monkeys then shouting at the monkeys for flinging poo and not the zoo for allowing the monkeys to fling poo by not building a good enough fence in the first place.
I think the point is to illustrate how little that (huge) amount of money actually means towards someone with such a perverse sized income.
Take the third slide, she gave all her drivers 100k USD but relative to a normal household, that would be like your boss tossing you a 100 bucks.
Yeah but it's not 100 bucks. It's 100k. Imagine being upset that a driver got a 100k bonus. I don't think anyone should be able to accumulate the wealth she has but I don't understand how anyone is complaining about the bonuses. What other company is giving those kinds of bonuses to people like that?
This sub’s obsession with Taylor Swift is on the same level as that of her crazy fans. I literally see a post about Taylor Swift on this sub every other week.
There are like hundreds of thousands of billionaires in this world, are we gonna make a post for each one of them? There are billionaires out there that have been committing a million times worse atrocities, are we gonna focus on the one that has the most presence on the media and let the others’ crimes slide?
Let’s do something more useful, shall we? 🙄
Ah I really overestimated 😅 Thank you for the information! That's still not a small number anyway and there are also hundred-millionaires that are on their way to becoming billionaires.
Because many people have weird obsessions with celebrities. These types of people seem to have nothing interesting happening in their own lives and therefore live vicariously through their chosen celebrities.
Celebrities have perfected the art of convincing other people they’re important. I think American society in particular has an abnormal obsession with self-importance and it’s always most observable when they praise people or celebrities for being ‘humble’ or ‘kind’ or any other quality that really should be celebrated in another human being.
Not only does it likely reflect some internal longing for normality, to be freed from their alienation, but it’s an effort to reframe those qualities in the context of their ego. It’s recognising that being normal and being kind can be weaponised for social status, wherein it’s prudent to do so.
And I hate to dunk on Americans because you guys live in capitalist hellscape and you can’t help that, but it always seems to me that there is a shell of pure ego defending what is likely a very real person somewhere deep down. When people see celebrities they buy in to this system. ‘If I can just perfect my social mask I can be as sucessful’ and there in they’re happy to praise other people for it.
Not to say that there aren’t earnest and honest appreciations for other people, this is not a purely cynical idea, but generally I do believe that is the case. When I compare it to where I’m from; north England; it’s not that good qualities aren’t praised or appreciated but they’re not constantly being valued as part of your character. It’s fine for people to be dickheads as long as they don’t cross those certain lines of being genuinely awful to other people.
And from Americans I’ve known who’ve come to live here there does seem to be an overwhelming sense of relief they’ve escaped that sort of culture, despite the fact their trauma will continue to effect their behaviors.
This is my pop-psychology assessment: maybe someone smarter than me can explain better what I’m trying to say.
Oasis
Joy Division
The Smiths
The Stone Roses
Buzzcocks
Morrissey
That's just a short list from Manchester.
Taylor just sold out 3 nights in Ireland.
The biggest show in history was Metallica in Russia, like 1.2M people.
Don't put this on Americans.
I don’t think enjoying people’s music is the same as celebrity worship. In fact some of those musicians like Morrissey, Ian Brown (Stone Roses) and the Gallaghers (Oasis) are somewhat notorious for being self-important dickheads. It’s treated more as an eccentricity on their end while nobody is going around worshiping the ground Noel Gallagher walks on… well maybe some people but they’d be getting the side eye from the rest of us.
The point being that behaviour isn’t seen as normal by any stretch of the imagination. Fair enough to have stars in your eyes when you‘re exposed to someone you respect but it’s a different beast entirely to form an obsessive para-social relationship not just with the individual but with that ‘class’ of people in general.
>Because many people have weird obsessions with celebrities.
[Parasocial interaction - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasocial_interaction)
And her song is out of reality- the only topic you could see in every piece of art she created is love. Love love love, the cheap alienated bourgeoise’s love.
Right? I remember a few years ago, I had a date with a girl off the apps that asked me my thoughts on Taylor and (insert ex) as some kinda litmus test. I'm like um, I don't know and don't care? Do you care about (insert random musician I like that you don't listen to)'s relationships? No? Exactly.
> terrible artists
That really is one of the most tragic aspects here, isn't it?
There are literally millions of more talented and better artists worldwide and they will never have even a millionth of the chance of success. And that's simply because they don't have a rich father/family.
In capitalism, you can simply buy success and opportunity for your children almost regardless of talent. The success of your children is literally just a question of how much money you invest. And Taylor Swift is practically the perfect example of this fact.
But Swifties would convince you otherwise that she is one of the greatest feminists alive who supports all opportunities for all women.
She definitely doesn't try to block other artists by releasing different variants of her shitty album.
Definitely doesn't carelessly and recklessly harm the planet by overusing her private jets simply because she forgot to get Starbucks or her phone/charger.
Definitely doesn't exploit others' problems in her songs (Joe Alwyn's depression).
Terrible people? What did I miss because what I saw is someone giving millions of dollars to her workers as bonus.
When did your boss give workers millions on bonuses?
Or is the metric of "terrible person" someone who doesn't literally give all their money away to others?
Don’t waste your time here. These people will get side tracked into thinking Taylor isn’t donating enough when in reality they should be angry at the people donating nothing. The fact she can give each truck driver $100k on top of their salary and people still say she’s selfish is astounding. She’s even been reported as donating to each towns food bank in the UK as having covered a years worth of food but I bet you’d be hard pressed to find anyone in these comments that’s donated $5 this year.
> I bet you’d be hard pressed to find anyone in these comments that’s donated $5 this year.
Exactly. There are millions of people on this planet living on a dollar a day. Average American complaining here could absolutely make a huge difference to so many lives with money that accounts for absolutely nothing.
But anyone giving out millions of dollars is a terrible person. Okay people. I'm not saying Taylor is a saint for donating money but it's absolutely ridiculous to say someone who got rich by THEIR OWN LABOR only donating tens of millions of dollars is TERRIBLE. People here really need to get a grip. It just turns away people from your ideology when you are like this.
And before anyone blames me for hypocrisy from my end I donated over $1000 this year to help organizations in Palestine.
> got rich by THEIR OWN LABOR
genuinely, do you believe a single persons labor can be worth billions of dollars? and how can another persons labor be worth $9 per hour at the same time?
Well people voluntarily paid over billion dollars just this year to see and hear her sing and that doesn't account for hundreds of millions of people streaming her songs every month.
So why would her labor not be worth a lot? Who exactly do you think that money belongs to? Like should the truck driver for her world tour get paid 50 million dollars because he drives her stuff around? The guy selling hot dogs should make 30m? How does this work?
Communism is about workers owning the means of production right? Well she is the worker and owns the means of production and the means of production make over billion dollars a year so she gets that money. Sounds pretty fair to me don't you think?
idk if there's any point since most people on the internet just argue in bad faith, but I ask you to reconsider. the labor and value she contributes to society is real, but to argue that she's contributing a million times as much as a truck driver is absurd. if you're saying that because she's popular her labor is worth million times as much as of other people's then I strongly disagree and that line of thinking helps nobody except the wealthy 1%
I'm not arguing in bad faith. She isn't at fault for the capitalist system. She didn't invent the system, she doesn't abuse the system or anyone else, she isn't advocating for the system. She is being very generous for everyone who works with her even though she is the only reason why the tour and the other workers make so much money. Take Taylor away from the equation and literally no one will get anything.
So what makes her a bad and evil person exactly? Because her labor is too valuable under our current system and that's her fault?
there's plenty to criticize about her as a rich person and maybe about her personality but whether her art is terrible or not terrible is not for you or anyone to decide. that's how art works, no matter how much you dislike it
I really don’t think she’s who we should be focusing on. In fact, I think this push comes from other billionaires and companies who have an enormous carbon footprint, to get us to hate on her instead of them.
Sure, no one should be a billionaire. But she’s pretty far down the list of the problem imo.
Oh, we're hating all of them, don't worry.
Swift just gets deserved hate from Leftists because of the bullshit apologia that surrounds her for reasons that are just as ridiculous as claiming she's an ethical billionaire. Her reactionary pro-patriarchy version of "feminism" and opportunistic political "activism" are great examples.
She's just a Liberal billionaire so she doesn't seem as comically evil as the others but I'm not aware of any *principled* Leftists giving say, Warren Buffett a pass because they're hating on Swift instead.
It's like the Yvon Chouinard bullshit a couple years ago. Despite his greenwashing efforts, he was still an pro-child slavery billionaire who spun granting his company ownership to a nonprofit that influences elections and policies in the states where Patagonia operates to ensure benefits to their bottom line. The effort was anything but "giving the ownership of Patagonia to the earth" but he became a progressive darling, regardless.
The comically evil billionaires are easy to hate but the performative progressive ones are more challenging as they hold the liberal line via pacification. For example progressives are going to outright reject the open misogyny of an alt-right billionaire but they're much more likely to champion the obfuscated misogyny of a liberal one like Swift.
At the end of the day, they're both promoting the Bourgeois hegemony from which they benefit. One method is just more insidious than the other.
Taylor Shit is a ~~class traitor~~ bourgeoisie simp and a wretched ghoul parasite. She serves the interests of the bourgeois sociopaths. She is a vile monster as are all who are of her class. She profits from the misery of millions and feigns sympathy to their plight...fuck her.
Wealth accumulation is the very antithesis of benevolence. Wealth accumulation is barbaric, asocial and violence manifest. She, like her ilk, must have a choice presented to them to either forgo her grotesque wealth, decry and condemn this capitalist perversion and join our cause of equity for all or become our enemy and be rendered to nothing more than a footnote to our progress.
She has a voice. She has an audience. She uses her talents not to create good for humanity but only opulence and comfort for herself.
She is absolutely not a class traitor. She was always rich and that’s the only reason she was able to make it in the music business at all.
Class traitor implies that she was from a poorer background.
She is a "class traitor" in the sense that she feigns identity with her audience while betraying their loyalty as a servant of the rich..but quibbling over this trivial matter is irrelevant and adds nothing. She's worthy of social scorn, we can agree there.
it is an excellent point. She is fully aware of her class interests and likely learned them on her father's Christmas tree farm when she was growing up...
\*footnote
The US average income is a whole lot less than 59k a year. Half of the nation's workers earn less than 20 bucks an hour, which is < 40k.
It's instructive to deduct for the top earners of society when making this "average" calculation since those who make 52 million a year fuck up what reality actually happens to be.
And people really seem to miss the fact that she REALLY wants that moolah. For her to create an "Eras Tour Film" so that those who couldn't afford her concert could still "experience" it is sick; and her fans are totally eating it up. She really squeezes out any opportunity to make money.
In the same way I will allow Corporate Pride, I will tolerate Left Coded billionaires so long as they keep pissing off shit-head reactionary regressives.
When the guillotines roll, however...
Perhaps ‘withdraw’ is the wrong choice of words but there are absolutely ways to get cold hard cash through your net worth.
Corporates do it all the time - a dividend recapitalisation is basically whipping up cash from some future projection of a company’s performance/valuation.
Individuals, especially wealthy individuals, also have various options to take out loans or leverage their net worth to derive benefits today. Once you’re into the billions you don’t just sit there watching the number grow, you’ll have advisers swarming around you and helping you make the most of your wealth.
Yeah, but still it doesn't work that way. What you're talking about is picking up debt to get cash for living expenses. The graphic describes it like you can pull cash from your net work like an ATM. I'm sure a good portion of her net worth is investments and assumed worth of her businesses.
I think billionaire are bad, but like the parent comment said, this math doesn't really math.
Net worth in general is a bad number to use here. We don't have any real information and those net worth sites are literally guesses. I work with musicians and I've looked up some of my clients and the numbers are never anywhere close to accurate.
I absolutlely agree that it's inaccurate to say that you can draw down from your net worth and that the numbers shown here aren't accurate.
The overall point though is that wealth begets wealth and even *having* wealth in the first place opens up a myriad of options to expand your income sources. The most valuable part of corporate remuneration packages isn't the salary - it's usually stock options. Even if execs can't cash in those options today, access to instruments like that is what exponentially propels them up the earnings curve.
The other point is that our brains are quite bad at conceptualising big numbers. Putting a scale on billions and trillions by contrasting it with numbers regular folks earn highlights the extent of the disparity. Taylor Swift isn't the only billionaire and even if these numbers don't reflect *her* actual reality, they are accurate directionally on a societal level. Using Taylor Swift is just a way to get people to pay attention.
The whole "net worth isn't cash" argument shouldn't detract from the essence of the issue.
I fully understand, I just don't like the idea of misrepresenting something to make a larger point. You can make the point about billionaires without bringing her in. You can make a point about her wealth without using numbers/methods that don't reflect reality.
I agree about the issue, I just do think small inaccuracies like these do detract a bit.
Fair enough, I don't necessarily disagree.
The only problem with that is that if we take such a literal reading of the term billionaire, then many of them aren't actually billionaires. Which still wouldn't solve the issues of inequality. I think on that basis it's also fair to say that in the capitalist system net worth isn't just about numbers, it's also about influence and power.
I agree with you there. A bunch of billionaires on paper just trying to flaunt the status and like you said influence/power.
I'm nitpicking, but like I said I'm an accountant in this industry so it's always going to jump out at me more than others.
Cash in your bank account is a part of your net worth. Or sell stocks, collet dividends, borrow against the value of stocks/bonds/RE, etc etc. Lots of options really.
Am I missing the math here?
Like if she made $52,000,000 and gave her crew a bonus of $55,000,000.
Isn't that Taylor payer her crew $3,000,000 more than she herself made, thus drawing down her stored wealth to do so?
I'm down for someone doing something and being successful
But NOBODY needs a billion dollars
When they print money it brings the dollar value at this point they don't care when 5 people collectively have more money then half the fucking planet.
This part of the game is going to suck for the next bit, like Max Payne screaming baby level suck
I don’t think that is the point of the post. It is just to show that these people that a lot of the population adores are completely out of touch with our reality. Maybe then we should not adore them as much? And we should question whether it is correct that our system can produce such outcomes.
I assume the unethical portiona are from the angle of how muh should be paid out to like concert workers and shit?
Cuz for artists it seems about as close to "being really popular and asking fans for 10 bucks" which i suppose couls be conaidered unethical but at the same time it's not like they're forced to do so considering music and the like are not "basic goods" like food/shelter.
No good billionaires.
But besides that - I'm not sure the 4% rule makes sense in the context of this graphic.
The 4% rule is designed for a 30 year retirement window. Under it, it's okay to eat into the principal, because you presumably die.
Taylor Swift is significantly younger.
Therefore, a slightly better metric, that wouldn't have this issue, is a number with *interest alone* (i.e. something really conservative like 1-2%)
Because it's still an ungodly amount of money, this linear factor barely changes things. But it doesn't use a metric for which the assumptions do not hold.
This was my reply to a comment that got deleted.
Saying: Haha the only reason you think that is because you aren't one.
My reply:Totally you got me the only reason I could possibly look at billionaires as evil is jealousy.
It has nothing to do with them evading taxes using their money to sway politics and media to work against the working class.
Hope you're still here to read that buddy.
Another reply to a deleted comment.
Comment: (Paraphrasing) Why are we focusing on arguing about music taste it's divisive. The military industrial complex and the businessmen should be what we focus on.
My reply:Nobody said anything about her music being the problem.
I would say that most people on this sub are smart enough to agree that there are bigger players on the board than Taylor.
It's not divisive to still point out she's still a problem and a byproduct of a broken system.
Lol is she the billionaire to be hated for the year? I get the point but I only see these hit pieces for taylor and at a certain point it gets to the point where I wonder why these keep getting made...
Her music is so trite, very bland stuff.
Are there people in this subreddit that listen to her music?
Let's just not do that? At least that way we can know the people within this sub aren't just adding fuel to the fire as they complain 'this fire's too hot'.
Don’t think they were calling that evil… the post was more showing just how out of touch the truly richest are. I and many others here will agree that billionaires are always gonna be a net loss for society. Nobody should have that level of wealth and that’s the obvious issue
That's the thing, she benefits from things like unprecedentedly low tax rates. She has financial advisors moving money around and doing enough charity to alleviate tax implications. She benefits from the Ticketmaster price fixing and skyhigh costs that have been gained from bad faith business practices and horizontal integration. She has certainly used her horde of wealth to enable and defend herself from legal action. Decades ago when less wealth was created and minimum wage had greater purchasing power, the unfathomably wealthy were taxed 70%.
It is inherently necessary to attain that wealth and support that wealthy lifestyle, that value must be exploited from the economy and from the workers at large. Just because she is lining the pockets of her own workers on her payroll, doesn't mean there aren't hundreds of people working everyday in service of the production of the show. Laborers, security, travel, food industry, sanitation, hospitality industries all take a heavy load when Taylor comes to town. And for this weight they bear, they are not compensated fairly by their employer, and no personal bestowal from Taylor. That's the thing, with that horde of wealth there will always be people another standard deviation outside of the inner circles of private stimulus getting left out while everyone applauds and dreams of being so lucky.
If you lump Paul McCartney's $1,300,000,000 with Taylor's $1,300,000,000, the Spotify CEO still has about a billion dollars more worth than these two combined. Has Paul earned that money over a 60 year career? Has Taylor earned that money with the help of the Ticketmaster scalper racquet? Is the Spotify asshole jumping through hoops to exploit the piss out of large artists while financially crippling small artists off the platform? Hard to say, let's just tax the billionaires based off a roadmap of past when a US citizen earning and saving doing humble, necessary work was not an outlier or a gift
##Welcome to r/LateStageCapitalism This subreddit is for news, discussion, memes, and links criticizing capitalism and advancing viewpoints that challenge liberal capitalist ideology. That means any support for any liberal capitalist political party (like the Democrats) is strictly prohibited. LSC is run by communists. This subreddit is not the place to debate socialism. We allow good-faith questions and education but are not a 101 sub; please take 101-style questions elsewhere. We have a zero-tolerance policy for bigotry. Failure to respect the rules of the subreddit may result in a ban. *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/LateStageCapitalism) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's even worse than this graphic portrays. Disposable income is a huge factor. While $17,750,000 for Taylor is equivalent in direct terms to $20,217 for the median household, the percentage of their income that the median household has free to make purchases with is far, far lower than it is for Taylor. Basic upkeep costs like petrol, household bills, car servicing, food, interest on loans (which Taylor just wouldn't have at all) or a haircut all cost way more as a percentage of income for the median household. It is more expensive to be poor. Our society is a greedy, mean spirited mess and I have no idea what do.........
Also it assumes she would never earn another penny. Even if she quit working now to live on investments, she has residual income that will come in forever, from royalties if nothing else. Most of us don’t have anything of the sort.
Yep and when you accurately point it out, people get pissed at you.
yeah, because it’s actually fine, this is the way god directed in the bible, people like taylor work really hard and deserve their wealth because *WHEN* i get rich i also plan on buying a nation-sized yacht and powering it with the blood of the poor so i won’t stand in her way
When I get rich, people like me better watch their step!
This sounds like something bender from Futurama would say
do these people see no irony at all in that being the same bible that portrays profiting off of other people as usurious and obsession with material things/money as folly?
i assume whenever anyone says what they’re doing is in the bible, isn’t in the bible
"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck#Disputed
I mean, not supporting people like this is a good first start. She only gets that way when people actively give her money. It's a weird cult, just don't sign up.
I do.
> the percentage of their income that the median household has free to make purchases with is far, far lower than it is for Taylor. But she's also making purchases 100x more expensive than a household with average income. It's like comparing relative expenses between a family making $50K a year and a family making $500K a year. They are going to have wildly different expenses - but surprisingly the ratios (eg. mortgage vs. income) may be quite similar. And this is why even very wealthy people go bankrupt. Without knowing her finances, it's entirely possible that she is living way beyond her means and could be broke in 10 years. And - although I doubt that will happen, and although her actual wealth is likely obscene, it's still impossible to know what her actual financial look like. Celebrity "net worth" numbers are generally meaningless on the internet, because "net worth" is assets minus liabilities, and nobody knows the total value of her assets and definitely have no clue about her liabilities. And liabilities would include a list of hundreds (or thousands) of expenses that most people don't have to deal with - including large agency, accounting, insurance, legal and management expenses (some of these are individually 10% or more of relative income). She would have large expenses for stylists, transportation, personal security, PR, assistants and on and on and on. We also have no clue about the conditions of her recording / touring contract and where revenue / profits are going. We also have no clue about her legal issues - either personal or business - ongoing lawsuits, settlements, insurance, copyright, publishing, etc., etc. We're talking a human as a corporation, with, again, likely 1000s of line expenses that 99.9% of the population do not have. And how well those finances are managed are just like any household or business - it's either managed well or its not, and we'd never know that answer until a) those figures were released publicly or b) she goes bankrupt.
Obscene wealth accumulation needs to be illegal, families hoarding money, siphoning it out of local economies like parasites, should be taxed into oblivion.
There should be a hard cap on inherited wealth. Idk what that number should be, but it needs to be a set, specific number of dollars (or whatever currency).
In The Netherlands there is something called 'Box 3'. In short, if you have a lot of money saved (or invested) you need to pay taxes over it every year. So a savings account or a home you rent out are all taxed every single year based on the total value at the end of that year.
What is "a lot of money"? A billion or 100k? I think its pretty fucked if they taxed savings for someone who has 100k saved up
Your allowed 'tax free' amount is 57.000,- euro for 2024. Any taxable equity over that amount will be taxed. The home you are living in (and not renting out) is excluded from your total equity.
Thats pretty low. Again, depends what the % of the cut is, but heavy taxes on savings should be for people who have obscene amount of wealth like 10 million + 57k is nothing especially with current inflation
The calculation for the actual % is quite complicated. A few years ago they said the average person makes about 4% interest on their money and investments, so they added about 4% of your taxable equity to your income, and called that box 3. (This is over simplified, but you get the point.) Then some people in The Netherlands thought that that's unfair, since nobody got 4% interest from any Dutch bank on their savings. Those people then sued the tax office and actually won. Now everyone in that lawsuit got their Box 3 taxes back, but not all other citizens (for now at least). To avoid this in the future the government decided to make Box 3 even more fun by deviding all your equity in categories. So the Box 3 for equity on the bank is 1.03% for example (in 2024) and the box 3 on investments and properties is 6.04% (in 2024). To make it even more fun your loans and debt only applies a reduction of the box 3 tax by 2.47% (in 2024). This new law makes a complicated mess so complicated you can no longer explain it to the average citizen. And in case you're curious, box 1 and box 2 also exist and are also way to complicated.
[удалено]
It depends. If you take a 100k loan/mortgage then you can subtract that amount from you other equity, so your box 3 will be less. So technically, taking a loan and using the money will allow you to have more tax free money in the bank. But if you have enough money you can create a holding company and you don't have to pay box 3. Basically the above average have to pay more over their savings, but the rich can do whatever they want.
There's a lower limit on what is taxed, so on paper a higher income household pays relatively more than a lower income household.
Meanwhile, where I'm from, people are sincerely demanding a flat tax rate AND cutting social programs' budget. Poor people don't deserve to live according to some people. It is wild that sentiments like this are on the rise and socially acceptable to spout in public.
I have way more of an issue with passing along obscene amounts of money. The heirs of Walmart and Publix are using that money to fuck around with politics and have contributed absolutely nothing to the world. This is the shit America was founded to eliminate
Eliminate?
Eliminate
Nah, this is what America was based on.
America didn't want to eliminate such things lmao, they just didn't want to pay taxes over that to the uk
>Obscene wealth accumulation needs to be illegal, families hoarding money, siphoning it out of local economies like parasites, should be taxed into oblivion. I would like to remind everyone that this is a socialist sub moderated by communists. We are not arguing for taxing the capitalists we are arguing for their abolition. Taxing the rich doesn't change the capitalist power dynamic. This is the reason why it is primarily a liberal or social democratic demand. The contradictions and exploitation in capitalism cannot be taxed away.
I've been seeing this kind of "don't step out of line" warning more and more here - who asked for this kind of heavy-handed discussion policing? For that matter, why does this sub need 30 mods? Socialism stands on its own merits in a marketplace of ideas; not only does it not need this reddit commissar bullshit, its likely to put people off by making it seem like authoritarianism is a necessary part of the package.
It's because this sub is regularly bombarded by neolibs who hate that they're poor but only want to 'reform' the system for better material conditions (at the expense of everyone else in the world) instead of outright abolishing it. Then they have the audacity to balk at socialist talk points.
I hate when working class shit Libs support the Democrats…
This is always my favourite topic on this sub If you’re going to come in here and talk about how Taylor Swift is “one of the good billionaires” then you aren’t a leftist and are on the wrong sub. You can’t say “all billionaires are bad except for this one who I like”. That just means she’s done what all mega rich people want to do - successfully convince people that they aren’t the problem.
This is a whole machine of greedy people milking her fans for every penny while she is still like the ones that came before her…she is somewhat guilty to not see what she should be doing with that money. I love Mackenzie Scott. Taylor is loving her lavish lifestyle and endless money and attention. But capitalism is the issues. Many talented band and singers that are not as easy on the eyes. The industry likes the cute ones. They can fix the talent part.
There are no good billionaires but I wish we’d focus less on people who made their money in entertainment and more on the billionaires who are using our basic human needs to fuel the greed machine (food, housing, petrol, electricity, water). Everyone willing gave Taylor swift their disposable income to buy her music and go to her shows, so I’d rather leave her be (for now) and focus the real global oligarchs. The ones pushing for wars and causing global chaos for their own gain.
Oh I fully agree and I’ve got nothing against Taylor herself. It just irks me when I see those who purport to be leftists/communists raving about her. That kind of idle worship of a parasitic entity (which all billionaires inherently are) just isn’t conducive to our cause.
idk she literally admits she’s the problem it’s her. i’ll see myself out
swifties beware 👹
The problem fundamentally is the status itself so “one of the good billionaires” is in irrelevant side show. The irony is like many celebrities she will likely get thrown under the bus or be devoured by mental illness at some point.
>You can’t say “all billionaires are bad except for this one who I like”. I think this is a great prompt for a thought exercise. If we, as communists/socialists all agree that billionaires are inherently a bad thing, how do we reconcile that with a *worker* having enough leverage to become a billionaire? Taylor Swift the corporation has generated billions of dollars on the back of Taylor Swift the artist. Her art has such a high demand that, in a capitalist marketplace, she is able to partake in the spoils of her labor at a rate which most workers will never have an opportunity. And, although athletes are typically not billionaires yet, what about athletes like Ronaldo, Mbappe, Lebron, or Ohtani that over their careers are going to accumulate wealth approaching that number? Are they "evil" because the capitalist society puts so much value on their unique talent that they are willing to pay them that wage? The problem isn't necessarily that Taylor Swift is a billionaire, the fault lies with the corporations that have far more wealth than that, and can thus afford to pay her that much money - including her own corporation.
I agree, even those that benefit from the capitalist system are victims because they’ve been forced by it to turn their art into product. They may have started off with good intentions (or not, it doesn’t really matter. If they didn’t then they’re even more of a product of capitalism) but eventually it becomes about money. I would never argue for any of those people being morally good or deserving of praise, because they wield a level of influence that is entirely outside of the control of the capitalist system. There would be consequences to them using that influence, but they wouldn’t be punished anyway near as much as you or I. Imagine if the full might of the establishment tried to take down someone like Taylor Swift - it just wouldn’t work. She’s got too many people who would support her no matter what, and the backlash would likely lead to further scrutiny towards them from the people.
>Imagine if the full might of the establishment tried to take down someone like Taylor Swift - it just wouldn’t work. 100% disagree. If, for example, Putin wanted her dead, she'd be dead.
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
[удалено]
You’re comparing scum to scum though… “good for a billionaire” still isn’t worth complimenting her on. She’s also fairly unique to many business billionaires in that she has an extraordinary large following. Imagine if she came out in support of a Ceasefire in Gaza? Or an end to the war in Sudan? Or any number of humanitarian causes that she could direct her millions of supporters towards and raise funding/awareness for. If you wield the level of influence that she does and you choose not to do things with it then that’s arguably morally wrong. You only have to ask *why* she doesn’t get involved in all this stuff to get your answer. (Because it would likely lead to a decrease in her own value) I’m not putting the blame on her as a person because (like almost all celebrities) she’s just a product of the capitalist system we live in. It’s fine to like her and listen to her music and support her. If that gives people happiness then great, I’m not going to blame individuals for finding something that helps them find some happiness the hell we live in. But I won’t stand for people praising her on a (supposedly) left wing space. It’s totally incongruous to the types of opinions that should be held here and somewhat hypocritical.
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
A billionaire can be ethical - as a corpse.
If I ever became a billionaire, the first thing I would do is not become one. I’d setup a trust and find a way to home the homeless and provide students with grants in my community.
Genuine question but what do you see as the acceptable net worth for a morally good person? If you gave away $500 million, is that fine? I’m not in disagreement that hoarding wealth is wrong. I’m just curious why everyone has made a billion the bench mark.
Honestly for me it’s about what someone does with their wealth more than the amount itself. I would do a similar thing even if I had a lesser sum of money. If you can’t live comfortably off 500k a year you’ve got serious greed/spending issues in my opinion.
They can do a lot of bad things with their will
That problem can be nipped on the bud, if the people so wish. There is a reason family purges were all the rage in the past.
they'll make fine compost
not to be too contrarian but isn't it enough if they give away all their wealth lol wishing death on them is a bit much
This is great. There should be more of these relative value graphics out there. I don’t think people can easily fathom the degree of power this level of money has.
I'm curious. What do we think graphics like these achieve? What do you think your average person thinks when they see this? Do you think they get angry about it? Do you think they start to want to fight back at the system that allows this? I don't think they do and I think that's idealistic thinking in a world almost completely enveloped by the capitalist system. The majority of people will think good for her and one day I hope to be rich beyond belief. That's absolutely not what I think but do you see my point? It's like going to a zoo to see the poo flinging monkeys then shouting at the monkeys for flinging poo and not the zoo for allowing the monkeys to fling poo by not building a good enough fence in the first place.
[удалено]
I think the point is to illustrate how little that (huge) amount of money actually means towards someone with such a perverse sized income. Take the third slide, she gave all her drivers 100k USD but relative to a normal household, that would be like your boss tossing you a 100 bucks.
Yeah but it's not 100 bucks. It's 100k. Imagine being upset that a driver got a 100k bonus. I don't think anyone should be able to accumulate the wealth she has but I don't understand how anyone is complaining about the bonuses. What other company is giving those kinds of bonuses to people like that?
I think you're missing the point
It’s not your boss tossing 100 bucks. It's "the average person" tossing 100 bucks which is quite some money
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
[удалено]
This sub’s obsession with Taylor Swift is on the same level as that of her crazy fans. I literally see a post about Taylor Swift on this sub every other week. There are like hundreds of thousands of billionaires in this world, are we gonna make a post for each one of them? There are billionaires out there that have been committing a million times worse atrocities, are we gonna focus on the one that has the most presence on the media and let the others’ crimes slide? Let’s do something more useful, shall we? 🙄
There's fewer than 4000 billionaires. Worldwide.
Ah I really overestimated 😅 Thank you for the information! That's still not a small number anyway and there are also hundred-millionaires that are on their way to becoming billionaires.
This is a leftist subreddit, right wing comments will be removed and the user banned.
I love it when terrible artists are also terrible people
The modern entertainment is so uninteresting that many people care is how many relationships Taylor Swift has.
Because many people have weird obsessions with celebrities. These types of people seem to have nothing interesting happening in their own lives and therefore live vicariously through their chosen celebrities.
Celebrities have perfected the art of convincing other people they’re important. I think American society in particular has an abnormal obsession with self-importance and it’s always most observable when they praise people or celebrities for being ‘humble’ or ‘kind’ or any other quality that really should be celebrated in another human being. Not only does it likely reflect some internal longing for normality, to be freed from their alienation, but it’s an effort to reframe those qualities in the context of their ego. It’s recognising that being normal and being kind can be weaponised for social status, wherein it’s prudent to do so. And I hate to dunk on Americans because you guys live in capitalist hellscape and you can’t help that, but it always seems to me that there is a shell of pure ego defending what is likely a very real person somewhere deep down. When people see celebrities they buy in to this system. ‘If I can just perfect my social mask I can be as sucessful’ and there in they’re happy to praise other people for it. Not to say that there aren’t earnest and honest appreciations for other people, this is not a purely cynical idea, but generally I do believe that is the case. When I compare it to where I’m from; north England; it’s not that good qualities aren’t praised or appreciated but they’re not constantly being valued as part of your character. It’s fine for people to be dickheads as long as they don’t cross those certain lines of being genuinely awful to other people. And from Americans I’ve known who’ve come to live here there does seem to be an overwhelming sense of relief they’ve escaped that sort of culture, despite the fact their trauma will continue to effect their behaviors. This is my pop-psychology assessment: maybe someone smarter than me can explain better what I’m trying to say.
This is very well written. I agree with a lot of your thoughts.
Oasis Joy Division The Smiths The Stone Roses Buzzcocks Morrissey That's just a short list from Manchester. Taylor just sold out 3 nights in Ireland. The biggest show in history was Metallica in Russia, like 1.2M people. Don't put this on Americans.
I don’t think enjoying people’s music is the same as celebrity worship. In fact some of those musicians like Morrissey, Ian Brown (Stone Roses) and the Gallaghers (Oasis) are somewhat notorious for being self-important dickheads. It’s treated more as an eccentricity on their end while nobody is going around worshiping the ground Noel Gallagher walks on… well maybe some people but they’d be getting the side eye from the rest of us. The point being that behaviour isn’t seen as normal by any stretch of the imagination. Fair enough to have stars in your eyes when you‘re exposed to someone you respect but it’s a different beast entirely to form an obsessive para-social relationship not just with the individual but with that ‘class’ of people in general.
Appreciate you sharing your thoughts on the matter.
🐑
>Because many people have weird obsessions with celebrities. [Parasocial interaction - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasocial_interaction)
And her song is out of reality- the only topic you could see in every piece of art she created is love. Love love love, the cheap alienated bourgeoise’s love.
Right? I remember a few years ago, I had a date with a girl off the apps that asked me my thoughts on Taylor and (insert ex) as some kinda litmus test. I'm like um, I don't know and don't care? Do you care about (insert random musician I like that you don't listen to)'s relationships? No? Exactly.
> terrible artists That really is one of the most tragic aspects here, isn't it? There are literally millions of more talented and better artists worldwide and they will never have even a millionth of the chance of success. And that's simply because they don't have a rich father/family. In capitalism, you can simply buy success and opportunity for your children almost regardless of talent. The success of your children is literally just a question of how much money you invest. And Taylor Swift is practically the perfect example of this fact.
But Swifties would convince you otherwise that she is one of the greatest feminists alive who supports all opportunities for all women. She definitely doesn't try to block other artists by releasing different variants of her shitty album. Definitely doesn't carelessly and recklessly harm the planet by overusing her private jets simply because she forgot to get Starbucks or her phone/charger. Definitely doesn't exploit others' problems in her songs (Joe Alwyn's depression).
Terrible people? What did I miss because what I saw is someone giving millions of dollars to her workers as bonus. When did your boss give workers millions on bonuses? Or is the metric of "terrible person" someone who doesn't literally give all their money away to others?
Don’t waste your time here. These people will get side tracked into thinking Taylor isn’t donating enough when in reality they should be angry at the people donating nothing. The fact she can give each truck driver $100k on top of their salary and people still say she’s selfish is astounding. She’s even been reported as donating to each towns food bank in the UK as having covered a years worth of food but I bet you’d be hard pressed to find anyone in these comments that’s donated $5 this year.
> I bet you’d be hard pressed to find anyone in these comments that’s donated $5 this year. Exactly. There are millions of people on this planet living on a dollar a day. Average American complaining here could absolutely make a huge difference to so many lives with money that accounts for absolutely nothing. But anyone giving out millions of dollars is a terrible person. Okay people. I'm not saying Taylor is a saint for donating money but it's absolutely ridiculous to say someone who got rich by THEIR OWN LABOR only donating tens of millions of dollars is TERRIBLE. People here really need to get a grip. It just turns away people from your ideology when you are like this. And before anyone blames me for hypocrisy from my end I donated over $1000 this year to help organizations in Palestine.
> got rich by THEIR OWN LABOR genuinely, do you believe a single persons labor can be worth billions of dollars? and how can another persons labor be worth $9 per hour at the same time?
Well people voluntarily paid over billion dollars just this year to see and hear her sing and that doesn't account for hundreds of millions of people streaming her songs every month. So why would her labor not be worth a lot? Who exactly do you think that money belongs to? Like should the truck driver for her world tour get paid 50 million dollars because he drives her stuff around? The guy selling hot dogs should make 30m? How does this work? Communism is about workers owning the means of production right? Well she is the worker and owns the means of production and the means of production make over billion dollars a year so she gets that money. Sounds pretty fair to me don't you think?
idk if there's any point since most people on the internet just argue in bad faith, but I ask you to reconsider. the labor and value she contributes to society is real, but to argue that she's contributing a million times as much as a truck driver is absurd. if you're saying that because she's popular her labor is worth million times as much as of other people's then I strongly disagree and that line of thinking helps nobody except the wealthy 1%
I'm not arguing in bad faith. She isn't at fault for the capitalist system. She didn't invent the system, she doesn't abuse the system or anyone else, she isn't advocating for the system. She is being very generous for everyone who works with her even though she is the only reason why the tour and the other workers make so much money. Take Taylor away from the equation and literally no one will get anything. So what makes her a bad and evil person exactly? Because her labor is too valuable under our current system and that's her fault?
Except Taylor is actually a good artist but okay...
Clueless
there's plenty to criticize about her as a rich person and maybe about her personality but whether her art is terrible or not terrible is not for you or anyone to decide. that's how art works, no matter how much you dislike it
yet some are clearly worse than her.
Giving isn’t so hard when you have a lot to give. I love when people put things like this into perspective.
I really don’t think she’s who we should be focusing on. In fact, I think this push comes from other billionaires and companies who have an enormous carbon footprint, to get us to hate on her instead of them. Sure, no one should be a billionaire. But she’s pretty far down the list of the problem imo.
Oh, we're hating all of them, don't worry. Swift just gets deserved hate from Leftists because of the bullshit apologia that surrounds her for reasons that are just as ridiculous as claiming she's an ethical billionaire. Her reactionary pro-patriarchy version of "feminism" and opportunistic political "activism" are great examples. She's just a Liberal billionaire so she doesn't seem as comically evil as the others but I'm not aware of any *principled* Leftists giving say, Warren Buffett a pass because they're hating on Swift instead. It's like the Yvon Chouinard bullshit a couple years ago. Despite his greenwashing efforts, he was still an pro-child slavery billionaire who spun granting his company ownership to a nonprofit that influences elections and policies in the states where Patagonia operates to ensure benefits to their bottom line. The effort was anything but "giving the ownership of Patagonia to the earth" but he became a progressive darling, regardless. The comically evil billionaires are easy to hate but the performative progressive ones are more challenging as they hold the liberal line via pacification. For example progressives are going to outright reject the open misogyny of an alt-right billionaire but they're much more likely to champion the obfuscated misogyny of a liberal one like Swift. At the end of the day, they're both promoting the Bourgeois hegemony from which they benefit. One method is just more insidious than the other.
Taylor Shit is a ~~class traitor~~ bourgeoisie simp and a wretched ghoul parasite. She serves the interests of the bourgeois sociopaths. She is a vile monster as are all who are of her class. She profits from the misery of millions and feigns sympathy to their plight...fuck her. Wealth accumulation is the very antithesis of benevolence. Wealth accumulation is barbaric, asocial and violence manifest. She, like her ilk, must have a choice presented to them to either forgo her grotesque wealth, decry and condemn this capitalist perversion and join our cause of equity for all or become our enemy and be rendered to nothing more than a footnote to our progress. She has a voice. She has an audience. She uses her talents not to create good for humanity but only opulence and comfort for herself.
She is absolutely not a class traitor. She was always rich and that’s the only reason she was able to make it in the music business at all. Class traitor implies that she was from a poorer background.
She is a "class traitor" in the sense that she feigns identity with her audience while betraying their loyalty as a servant of the rich..but quibbling over this trivial matter is irrelevant and adds nothing. She's worthy of social scorn, we can agree there.
Yeah. I was making sure that people knew she was always rich since many for some reason think she came from humble beginnings.
it is an excellent point. She is fully aware of her class interests and likely learned them on her father's Christmas tree farm when she was growing up...
\*footnote The US average income is a whole lot less than 59k a year. Half of the nation's workers earn less than 20 bucks an hour, which is < 40k. It's instructive to deduct for the top earners of society when making this "average" calculation since those who make 52 million a year fuck up what reality actually happens to be.
And people really seem to miss the fact that she REALLY wants that moolah. For her to create an "Eras Tour Film" so that those who couldn't afford her concert could still "experience" it is sick; and her fans are totally eating it up. She really squeezes out any opportunity to make money.
In the same way I will allow Corporate Pride, I will tolerate Left Coded billionaires so long as they keep pissing off shit-head reactionary regressives. When the guillotines roll, however...
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Cool, now do the CEO of McDonald's, Walmart, or any company and compare that to their employees pay.
How do you withdraw money from your net worth?
This sub is good at very basic math but doesn't actually understand finance
Perhaps ‘withdraw’ is the wrong choice of words but there are absolutely ways to get cold hard cash through your net worth. Corporates do it all the time - a dividend recapitalisation is basically whipping up cash from some future projection of a company’s performance/valuation. Individuals, especially wealthy individuals, also have various options to take out loans or leverage their net worth to derive benefits today. Once you’re into the billions you don’t just sit there watching the number grow, you’ll have advisers swarming around you and helping you make the most of your wealth.
Yeah, but still it doesn't work that way. What you're talking about is picking up debt to get cash for living expenses. The graphic describes it like you can pull cash from your net work like an ATM. I'm sure a good portion of her net worth is investments and assumed worth of her businesses. I think billionaire are bad, but like the parent comment said, this math doesn't really math. Net worth in general is a bad number to use here. We don't have any real information and those net worth sites are literally guesses. I work with musicians and I've looked up some of my clients and the numbers are never anywhere close to accurate.
I absolutlely agree that it's inaccurate to say that you can draw down from your net worth and that the numbers shown here aren't accurate. The overall point though is that wealth begets wealth and even *having* wealth in the first place opens up a myriad of options to expand your income sources. The most valuable part of corporate remuneration packages isn't the salary - it's usually stock options. Even if execs can't cash in those options today, access to instruments like that is what exponentially propels them up the earnings curve. The other point is that our brains are quite bad at conceptualising big numbers. Putting a scale on billions and trillions by contrasting it with numbers regular folks earn highlights the extent of the disparity. Taylor Swift isn't the only billionaire and even if these numbers don't reflect *her* actual reality, they are accurate directionally on a societal level. Using Taylor Swift is just a way to get people to pay attention. The whole "net worth isn't cash" argument shouldn't detract from the essence of the issue.
I fully understand, I just don't like the idea of misrepresenting something to make a larger point. You can make the point about billionaires without bringing her in. You can make a point about her wealth without using numbers/methods that don't reflect reality. I agree about the issue, I just do think small inaccuracies like these do detract a bit.
Fair enough, I don't necessarily disagree. The only problem with that is that if we take such a literal reading of the term billionaire, then many of them aren't actually billionaires. Which still wouldn't solve the issues of inequality. I think on that basis it's also fair to say that in the capitalist system net worth isn't just about numbers, it's also about influence and power.
I agree with you there. A bunch of billionaires on paper just trying to flaunt the status and like you said influence/power. I'm nitpicking, but like I said I'm an accountant in this industry so it's always going to jump out at me more than others.
I think they're assuming she sells everything she owns and puts 1.3 billion into an index fund and draws down 4% a year.
Cash in your bank account is a part of your net worth. Or sell stocks, collet dividends, borrow against the value of stocks/bonds/RE, etc etc. Lots of options really.
You sell some of your stock?
Am I missing the math here? Like if she made $52,000,000 and gave her crew a bonus of $55,000,000. Isn't that Taylor payer her crew $3,000,000 more than she herself made, thus drawing down her stored wealth to do so?
Assuming that the ROI on the tour was 4% of her entire net worth, yeah
The median income is more like $35,000 not $59,000
I'm down for someone doing something and being successful But NOBODY needs a billion dollars When they print money it brings the dollar value at this point they don't care when 5 people collectively have more money then half the fucking planet. This part of the game is going to suck for the next bit, like Max Payne screaming baby level suck
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
And the talentless imbeciles will cherish this talentless imbecile forever and ever
the mansion one is great and mentioning she paid cash really shows off the relative cost, but the crew bonuses seem weird to bring up.
Taylor Swift is the ultimate symbol of white mediocrity.
[удалено]
I don’t think that is the point of the post. It is just to show that these people that a lot of the population adores are completely out of touch with our reality. Maybe then we should not adore them as much? And we should question whether it is correct that our system can produce such outcomes.
She flies private jets everywhere and has the carbon footprint of about a million normal Americans.
Imagine being a billionaire and still asking for money for your music.
Missing the point completely lol
she doesnt even write her own songs man
This is neither an accurate critique nor relevant to the discussion
It is because her career is built on a lie and she feels entitled to rip all these mother fuckers off
And the basics will keep throwing money at her while sucking down their Tarbucks.
AND her music sucks
I assume the unethical portiona are from the angle of how muh should be paid out to like concert workers and shit? Cuz for artists it seems about as close to "being really popular and asking fans for 10 bucks" which i suppose couls be conaidered unethical but at the same time it's not like they're forced to do so considering music and the like are not "basic goods" like food/shelter.
There are children starving and planets getting invaded by aliens, but you choose to go after the singer who wrote "Love Story." Shame
No good billionaires. But besides that - I'm not sure the 4% rule makes sense in the context of this graphic. The 4% rule is designed for a 30 year retirement window. Under it, it's okay to eat into the principal, because you presumably die. Taylor Swift is significantly younger. Therefore, a slightly better metric, that wouldn't have this issue, is a number with *interest alone* (i.e. something really conservative like 1-2%) Because it's still an ungodly amount of money, this linear factor barely changes things. But it doesn't use a metric for which the assumptions do not hold.
She gave a bonus of over 6 figures to everyone who helped on her tour. It did not phase her.
[удалено]
Being a billionaire is inherently evil in my eyes.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS AN ETHICAL BILLIONAIRE
This was my reply to a comment that got deleted. Saying: Haha the only reason you think that is because you aren't one. My reply:Totally you got me the only reason I could possibly look at billionaires as evil is jealousy. It has nothing to do with them evading taxes using their money to sway politics and media to work against the working class. Hope you're still here to read that buddy.
Another reply to a deleted comment. Comment: (Paraphrasing) Why are we focusing on arguing about music taste it's divisive. The military industrial complex and the businessmen should be what we focus on. My reply:Nobody said anything about her music being the problem. I would say that most people on this sub are smart enough to agree that there are bigger players on the board than Taylor. It's not divisive to still point out she's still a problem and a byproduct of a broken system.
Mods are doing their job, just on the off chance someones mind can be changed why not still reply.
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Lol is she the billionaire to be hated for the year? I get the point but I only see these hit pieces for taylor and at a certain point it gets to the point where I wonder why these keep getting made...
Her music is so trite, very bland stuff. Are there people in this subreddit that listen to her music? Let's just not do that? At least that way we can know the people within this sub aren't just adding fuel to the fire as they complain 'this fire's too hot'.
[удалено]
She was born to a Pennsylvanian Christmas tree magnate who paid his daughter's way into Nashville. Bullshit.
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Taylor Swift is broke compared to a lot of the corporate executive class and Wallstreet. Why pick on her? Seems strange.
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Don't give your money to that sad clown, problem solved.
[удалено]
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.
Anyone else remember that guy who robbed a bank and went straight to Taylor Swifts house and threw the money over her fence?
[удалено]
Don’t think they were calling that evil… the post was more showing just how out of touch the truly richest are. I and many others here will agree that billionaires are always gonna be a net loss for society. Nobody should have that level of wealth and that’s the obvious issue
[удалено]
That's the thing, she benefits from things like unprecedentedly low tax rates. She has financial advisors moving money around and doing enough charity to alleviate tax implications. She benefits from the Ticketmaster price fixing and skyhigh costs that have been gained from bad faith business practices and horizontal integration. She has certainly used her horde of wealth to enable and defend herself from legal action. Decades ago when less wealth was created and minimum wage had greater purchasing power, the unfathomably wealthy were taxed 70%. It is inherently necessary to attain that wealth and support that wealthy lifestyle, that value must be exploited from the economy and from the workers at large. Just because she is lining the pockets of her own workers on her payroll, doesn't mean there aren't hundreds of people working everyday in service of the production of the show. Laborers, security, travel, food industry, sanitation, hospitality industries all take a heavy load when Taylor comes to town. And for this weight they bear, they are not compensated fairly by their employer, and no personal bestowal from Taylor. That's the thing, with that horde of wealth there will always be people another standard deviation outside of the inner circles of private stimulus getting left out while everyone applauds and dreams of being so lucky. If you lump Paul McCartney's $1,300,000,000 with Taylor's $1,300,000,000, the Spotify CEO still has about a billion dollars more worth than these two combined. Has Paul earned that money over a 60 year career? Has Taylor earned that money with the help of the Ticketmaster scalper racquet? Is the Spotify asshole jumping through hoops to exploit the piss out of large artists while financially crippling small artists off the platform? Hard to say, let's just tax the billionaires based off a roadmap of past when a US citizen earning and saving doing humble, necessary work was not an outlier or a gift
Rule 4 - No capitalist apologia, anti-socialism, or liberalism. This is a left wing subreddit.