[walletdrainer]

This feels like Reddit leaking over a little bit.

Let me remind you that this is a forum operated by a VC fund looking for people to give lots of money to so they can build billion dollar businesses. Those who succeed are routinely celebrated here, but actually discussing that money being spent rapidly becomes judgmental.

Hard to reconcile it being super cool to build an unicorn (a cute term we’ve come up with to describe billion dollar startups which have made their founders tremendously wealthy), but somewhat disgusting to actually have or spend that money.

News.ycombinator.com seems like the wrong place to complain about capitalism.

FWIW I don’t even get a Silicon Valley salary, am not in any way extraordinary, but have spent 10+ years building 100+ small online businesses out of which none have been particularly successful (but in total the little streams add up)

[botanrice]

Sorry for jumping on this off-topic but I'm a junior engineer hoping to build out some of those small online businesses but I've been a bit unsure of how to go about it. When you say small online businesses do you mean like micro-SaaS kind of things? Or like tangible items? Sorry, just curious :)

[walletdrainer]

Micro-SaaS and digital products. Just figure out a good stack to work with for billing and try to crank out one little thing a week that will be useful to someone.

One of my best projects just sells some pdf files you can submit to the government to achieve a thing you would usually unnecessarily hire a lawyer for.

Another in a similar vein simply offers an easy-to-fill PDF version of a government form that does not exist online, and a nice HTML interface that will help you mostly automatically fill it.

Most of these took less than a day to build and take next to no maintenance. Both of the above earn more than $100k annually.

Just make sure your customers can get in touch with you very easily so you don’t end up with broken websites running on autopilot charging customers for broken stuff, I made that mistake once and ended up having to call a bunch of people to apologise when I discovered what had been happening.

[ok_dad]

It's not reddit leaking, it's normal people leaking into your weird millionaire world. I say weird because 99.9% of people in the world would consider it on a range of weird all the way to unethical that you spend tens of thousands on pants. I'm not going to sit here and preach and make you bored, but consider what good you could do with that money, if only your ass and thighs were slightly more uncomfortable than they are today. Especially now when people around the world are dealing with 2x the food costs of a year or a few ago.

Also, HN is a fine place to complain about capitalism, maybe a few of you capitalists will have it click in your brains that other people are struggling and you can do something about it other than sitting on a cloud.

[walletdrainer]

I donate approximately 47.5% of everything I earn to the French government, is that not enough? (And yes, taxes are a voluntary donation in my case. I could move less than a mile across the border to Monaco and incorporate elsewhere if I wanted to pay ~0%)

Of course, when I spend 10000 euros in the Loro Piana boutique or anywhere really, 20% of that goes to the government too.

Could I afford give more? Sure! To whom? How much? Figuring that out seems like another full time job, and the track record of the effective altruism folks doesn’t seem all that great.

[derektank]

>the track record of the effective altruism folks doesn’t seem all that great.

I've been donating 5-10% of my income to GiveWell[1] and their top charities like GiveDirectly[2] and the Against Malaria Foundation[3] for nearly a decade at this point and I think their track record has been fantastic. Effect altruism only gets shady when longtermists get involved and start speculating on the moral worth of lives in some distant future. If you focus on human beings alive today, effective altruists (and development economists) have done a great job identifying how to make your charitable donations go the farthest in reducing suffering.

[1] https://www.givewell.org/

[2] https://www.givedirectly.org/

[3] https://www.againstmalaria.com/

[astrange]

> I donate approximately 47.5% of everything I earn to the French government, is that not enough?

It's better to think of pretax money as just not existing. The effect of /everyone/ paying taxes is different from the effect of only you paying taxes, since your buying power is somewhat determined by how much you have relative to everyone else.

[walletdrainer]

Well not really, I do my grocery shopping a few minutes away in Monaco where nobody pays taxes. I could move less than a kilometre and save loads of money, despite the outrageous real estate costs.

I just kind of like where I am now so don’t care enough to do that, and at least try to assume that the government does a relatively good job of directing my donation to good causes.

[robocat]

Everybody seems to have an opinion on what someone more wealthy than they are should spend their money on.

Unfortunately we don't get to look at what the commenter earns or spend...

A normal car weekly payment in the US is ridiculously wasteful. If you live in the US its almost a given that you are ridiculously wealthy in comparison to many in the world.

A normal overseas trip is ridiculously wasteful.

It's hard to consider what an average person in the world would think is wasteful, because with our common developed country expenses we don't feel like millionaires.

We couldn't even ask a person with an average world income to comment, since do they even have the free time to waste? (edits)

[ok_dad]

Whataboutism isn’t going to solve the problem of inequality. Compare me to many others and you can say the same things as I said to GP, however there’s a clear difference that isn’t very subtle between me buying a compact car and GP buying a few pairs of those pants for the same cost.

There’s this argument that people make that goes something like, “the wealthy give their fair share why sour they pay more than a lot income person and get called out for not giving more?” I don’t believe that’s their fair share, is why I ask them to give way more. Do you think a person who starts 100 businesses is working harder than a single mom with a few kids? Why did they deserve the lions share of the profits over their employees? These are some of the questions I have they could be relevant.

Like I said, I don’t want to bore anyone, it’s not like the wealthy have ever been in touch with the common man, for millennia. I’m certainly not going to convince anyone, I’m no good at arguing and my arguments tend to be rough and full of holes, but at least I’m not a millionaire claiming I couldn’t or shouldn’t do more because I’m a special hard worker who deserves every penny.

[walletdrainer]

I’m definitely not working particularly hard, but for what it’s worth my work has saved and will continue to save vast amounts of time for ordinary people. I’m not sure that how hard a person works is the right metric to use.

> it’s not like the wealthy have ever been in touch with the common man, for millennia

A few years ago I used to live in hostels, sometimes hoping that my (then few) websites would get one or two payments to cover my expenses for the next day so I wouldn’t have to go without food. I’d like to think that I’m not suddenly particularly out of touch.

[frmersdog]

>my work has saved and will continue to save vast amounts of time for ordinary people.

I have my doubts.

>A few years ago I used to live in hostels, sometimes hoping that my (then few) websites would get one or two payments to cover my expenses for the next day so I wouldn’t have to go without food. I’d like to think that I’m not suddenly particularly out of touch.

Consider that living in hostels and going hungry while maintaining multiple web services is maybe outside of the common man's experience. The priorities of someone stuck in the former situation, and the resources generally available to someone in the latter, usually don't overlap. Grocery shopping in Monaco and calling your taxes "donations" doesn't help matters.

I say this as someone who is, by many measures, out-of-touch himself: weird know weird. A measure of self-consciousness is healthy.

Finally, for efficiency's sake:

>Hard to reconcile it being super cool to build an unicorn (a cute term we’ve come up with to describe billion dollar startups which have made their founders tremendously wealthy), but somewhat disgusting to actually have or spend that money.

You probably misunderstand my perspective on the matter.

>Could I afford give more? Sure! To whom? How much?

Oh, the possibilities are endless (even if the ability to vet is not; so, don't).

Talk to people, find out their pain points, make their day.

OR

Your employees (or the people who automation has saved from being your employee).

OR

Invest in that neighborhood people tell you not to go to.

Just starter suggestions. Note that they're not merely aimed at making you feel good for being a good little philanthropist; in the long run, they make it safer to run your mouth off however you like.

[robocat]

You've gone off on some other tangents.

Most people react poorly to the word hypocrite so ChatGPT found[1] some other choice phrases for people that are well off that complain about the better off.

> Why did they deserve the lions share of the profits over their employees?

You appear to live in the US. Ask yourself why those in the US deserve the lions share of world wealth? You seem to be complaining about others while not looking at yourself.

[1] https://chatgpt.com/s/t_69141a5497948191a2d349e803d343c8

Disclosure: I'm well off for a New Zealander but I'm earning less than the median wage my cohort receives in NYC. Taxes total around 45% of my income.

Edit: 1/3 of US households earn over $150k. https://economistwritingeveryday.com/2025/09/17/one-third-of... - It isn't that uncommon in the US but that amount is rather uncommon in most of the rest of the world. I've just been to New Orleans so I saw one poorer part of the US recently so I have some point of comparison.

[basisword]

Do something about it then. Start by learning to make arguments that aren't so poor you yourself think they're rough and full of holes. Get involved in politics, activism, or campaigning. Vote. Convince others to vote in the same manner you do.

[jazzyjackson]

Money is not distributed to whomsoever works the hardest, weird axiom.

[ok_dad]

A good start might be taking 9500 euros a next time you need pants and donate to a local food bank, then buy 500 euro pants instead!

Maybe you could even retire and open a food bank or a childcare facility locally, which might not be possible for you but who knows.

If I were wealthy i would open a childcare facility that was free for anyone who lives in my town for emergency care 24/7.

[mapontosevenths]

This is such a broken take. Jealousy is so ugly. It's like you expect those doing better than you to Harrison Bergeron themselves for your sake.

I'm sorry you're unhappy with your lot in life. Maybe work hard and do better, rather than expecting others to pretend like they're not doing well to appease your feelings.

[ok_dad]

I’m doing fine, others aren’t doing as well, I guess you see it as jealousy and in fact I’m just disgusted by my fellow man that they can hoard while others starve.

[mapontosevenths]

> I’m just disgusted by my fellow man that they can hoard while others starve.

Despite popular belief the economy is not a zero sum game where every dollar someone makes comes at anothers expense. In reality, every dollar a wealthy person spends becomes some other person's livelihood.

It is only unproductive idle capital that should be considered "hoarding", and that IS a bit of a sin in my book. As is wealth invested in rent seeking rather than productive activity.

[marknutter]

I'm sitting here trying to figure out why you haven't sent 90% of your income to the poor people in Sudan.

[ok_dad]

I will when I can afford pants that cost ten grand, for now I just try to do what I can in my local community.

[marknutter]

Sure you will, bud. I believe you.

[bchasknga]

> I say weird because 99.9% of people in the world would consider it on a range of weird all the way to unethical that you spend tens of thousands on pants.

TIL it's unethical to spend a lot of money on clothes. It's not like the sub-thread's OP was spending $10k on a pair of <Insert crazy designer brand name> pants that actually have more form than function. It's a $500 pair of pants. God forbid people spend money on their own preference for their own comfort.

Pragmatically, capitalism brought in more good than bad. Are we arguing that we would've been better off if the world had gone the way of the soviet/pre-80s China way of life?