[tawan]

Lot of people in this thread are arguing that wealthy people can spend money on what ever they want. I think it’s important to distinguish whether the money they spend on personal joy rides has been taxed as private income or written off as business expense. Does anyone have information on whether Bezos‘ investments into Blue Origin has been taxed previously as personal income when he presumably liquidated Amazon stock?

[rcMgD2BwE72F]

>I think it’s important to distinguish whether the money they spend on personal joy rides has been taxed as private income or written off as business expense.

So if the mafia did it, it'd be fine because government didn't pay for it? I'm not saying that Bezos is a mafioso, but this is a false dichotomy. There are also good reasons to think that all "legal" businesses aren't legit and with litttle political oversight, maybe the profit of giant companies like Amazon shouldn't be deemed 100% deserved.

This comment is related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27893518

[tawan]

I think you misinterpreted my comment (probably my bad, Im not an English native). What I meant is: It is important to make sure that the profits of stocks sold need to be taxed properly, and only the after tax amount that’s left over can be spend on, some may say frivolous, space adventures. Especially when it is often reported that billionaires dont pay hardly any taxes, since their wealth grew „only in equity“. But then suddenly they find themselves on a pretty expensive space vacation.