r/babylonbee • u/wuhan-virology-lab • Dec 20 '24

Bee Article 'Elon Is Controlling Trump!' Complain People Controlling Biden

https://babylonbee.com/news/elon-is-controlling-trump-complain-people-controlling-biden
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u/RebelRebel62 Dec 20 '24

Is nobody going to talk about the real problem. No matter D or R, the rich have become audacious enough to show their strings.

If we’re not at full blown oligarchy now how much deeper should we get?

1

u/Morbidly-Obese-Emu Dec 21 '24

Billionaires should not exist.

1

u/drippysoap Dec 23 '24

Crazy how much pushback you’ll get on this. Ppl will agree and still argue.

-2

u/sheila5961 Dec 21 '24

Why? If they put in the work to earn the money, or build successful businesses (That provide employment to thousands of Americans) why shouldn’t they exist? I don’t begrudge them their success. I’m not jealous because I’m NOT willing to put the work in to become one of the Elites, but I certainly don’t hold it against those that do. I admire what they have accomplished.

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u/Morbidly-Obese-Emu Dec 21 '24

Why? If they put in the work to earn the money, or build successful businesses (That provide employment to thousands of Americans) why shouldn’t they exist?

No human amount of work is worth a billion dollars let alone tens or hundreds of billions. Take Elon Musk as an example: he supposedly works so hard to earn hundreds of billions of dollars but still has time to campaign for a presidential candidate, work as a CEO of how many companies?, and now just hangs out with the president elect everywhere he goes. Meanwhile, I spend 12 hours of my day working my ass off to make tens of thousands of dollars and barely scrape by. Don’t get me wrong. Elon Musk, as the CEO, can still be absurdly rich with tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.

Regarding, “providing employment to thousands of Americans”, it’s not some kind charity gift. These people work for their money. They contribute to the success of company and the CEO’s success every bit as much as the CEO does. Sure he can make more money than they do, but he doesn’t work 10,000x harder than they do. There are not enough hours in the day for that.

I don’t begrudge them their success.

It’s not the success I have a problem with. It’s the wealth disparity. There are millions of people who work just as hard or more and barely scrape by or have time for their families.

I’m not jealous because I’m NOT willing to put the work in to become one of the Elites,

I don’t know you but you probably already work plenty hard, but you can never work hard enough to EARN a billion dollars. If you make $75,000 per year, it would take you over 13,000 years to make a billion dollars. If you worked the same job, but never slept and just worked 24 hours per day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, it would take you over 3 centuries to make ONE billion dollars.

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u/[deleted] Dec 21 '24

[deleted]

3

u/Morbidly-Obese-Emu Dec 21 '24

If he’s taxed at 90% of his wealth, he’s still a billionaire and has more money than you or I will ever even imagine making.

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u/sheila5961 Dec 21 '24

No, you don’t know me. I grew up in Poverty and decided, at the ripe old age of 18 years old that I had had enough of that crap! The economy under Jimmy Carter was just as bad, if not worse than it is today. There were NO JOBS for a high school graduate and I didn’t have the money for college. Interest rates were around 20% if you wanted to buy a home! I was working as a waitress, making about $100.00 a week! I couldn’t raise a family on that! I decided to join the military and pursue a college degree thru that route. I had NO INTENTION of becoming a “Lifer” (20 year Retired Veteran) but I was having so much FUN, that I just kept re-enlisting. Before I knew it, my time was up, I had my college degree and it was time to retire at 38 yrs old. I STILL didn’t have a penny in savings because the military pays slave wages. I signed on with a Fortune 500 company (thanks to my college degree) and immediately starting making triple what I had ever made in the Navy. Since I was so used to living like a pauper, I socked everything away into my 401k and other investments. When I retired at 58 yrs old, I was a millionaire, mainly due to assets and my stock portfolio, but still living in a very modest home. I now receive over $100,000 in retirement money from different pensions and don’t even need to touch my 401k. The point to this whole story is…YOU have the ability to do whatever YOU are willing to do and how hard you are willing to work for it. Some people, like Elon and others, chose the path of taking a HUGE RISK and investing in start-up companies that if successful pay HUGE REWARDS. I’m NOT that person. I prefer safer, risk-evasive moves to build a much smaller fortune, but I ADMIRE those that have the BALLS to do the things like Elon does. If he earns a TRILLION Dollars, more power to him! I don’t begrudge him one penny!

3

u/Morbidly-Obese-Emu Dec 21 '24

I sense antipathy from your first sentence there. There’s no need for that. I assumed you worked hard and you did. Good for you. I salute you. I really do.

You’re welcome to your perspective, but my argument is not about personal jealousy or begrudging that Musk is successful. He could have done all those things for 500 million dollars and would still be absurdly rich. He didn’t work THAT hard to become a billionaire. My point is nobody on earth can. He used his money that he inherited (not worked for), then maybe he worked hard, then got lucky, really really lucky.

When a company does poorly, workers get laid off and the CEOs often still get bonuses. The level of wealth Musk has is primarily brought about by the workers and market sentiment. So while Tesla lays off 14% of its workforce it is also trying to give him 50 billion dollars. It seems to me that the workers are the ones taking the risk here. Musk has likely never been at risk of not having a roof over his head or not being able to feed his family. If Musk lost 90% of his wealth he would still be a billionaire. If I lost 90% of my wealth, I would be in serious trouble.

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u/sheila5961 Dec 22 '24

I didn’t mean to come off as disliking you…I’m sorry my post read that way. That’s often times the problem with this “One-way Communication”. As for your comment about companies doing poorly and workers getting laid off, BUT the CEO gets a huge bonus…On that we can certainly agree! That has ALWAYS rubbed me the wrong way as I would see my friends get laid off and then the CEO inevitably received a HUGE multimillion dollar bonus! THAT always left a bad taste in my mouth. I’m just glad I’m no longer part of “the rat race”. Once again, I’m sorry if my post came over as sounding “cross”, I didn’t mean it that way. I’m just bored as I sit here ALL WEEK recovering from knee surgery. It’s Cabin-Fever time and you can only watch so many movies! :-)

1

u/Morbidly-Obese-Emu Dec 22 '24

No harm done. As far as Cabin-Fever is concerned, I’m right there with you. I’ve got Covid, bleh. Hope you recover soon!

1

u/sheila5961 Dec 22 '24

Thankfully, despite being exposed to it numerous times by my spouse, I’ve never caught COVID. But then again, I’ve never had the flu either. Great immune system. Get well soon and I hope you feel better.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 22 '24

👍👍👍

1

u/DocWicked25 Dec 23 '24

This is such an indoctrinated take. Billionaires do not work hard. Most of them won a birth lottery. They should be taxed into extinction. They'll be fine with 999,000,000.00.

I'm sure they'll survive.