I won't call you greedy, but you may not be cautious or wise. The 50 hungry guys might do more than simply look longingly at your delicious English muffins.
I doubt Bill Gates has much to fear from the muffin-hungry masses. After all, he chose to start this fund. No one forced him to, and if they tried I doubt they would have a very easy time.
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That's why i said that your problem is scaling -- assuming that having $1 Trillion is just like having a dollar, only better
It's not, and that's why i offered the muffin example.The law of diminishing returns applies to money, too. When you have $100k to play with, and you gave away half of it, you can no longer buy the car you want, for instance. When you have billions of dollars, that's no longer the case -- you can no more spend all your money than eat all the muffins before they spoil. Sure, you may not be able to afford as many islands or corporations, but that's like arguing that you may want to gorge yourself on the muffins & throw up at the vomitorium. Things don't scale well
If a woman making minimum wage gives 50% to charity, she and her child starve to death. If Bill gives half of his wealth to charity, only his accountant will know the difference. See?
While it's true that Gates could just decide to live a "normal" life, that's some high expectations for anyone. I'm sure that there was a drastic change when he got rid of half of his money, even if to us it seems like he would be incredibly happy either way. If I had billions of dollars I wouldn't want to give it away, at least while I was alive.
And also, I make almost minimum wage and I would still be able to live even if I cut my money in half. Even those who live paycheck to paycheck would still be fine, as even if they have one dollar saved up all they have to give is 50 cents. It's all about using your money wisely, and investing in the right things (bitcoins for example).
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As i said, i'm not an ideal to aspire to, though please understand that ... see the mother example above.
You can say that but it isn't much of an excuse. You can't criticize people for doing something that you yourself aren't willing to do. Although maybe you didn't criticize them, because we've gone back and forth for a while and I forgot the original post that was quoted.