Part of it is work, yes. But consider. How much is your take home as a fund manager with 100M AUM? How much is your take home with 10B AUM? The work is the same, yet if the take home is different, you've proven that your income is not in fact earned through work in a moral sense.
Yes, the same is absolutely true for many other professions. And artists are probably more aware than most, at least on average, how much luck plays a role.
But note that I have been very careful not to call the fund managers individually immoral.
Of course that is a feature, but at this point I have to suspect that you're willfully ignoring the point.
The moral problems begin when writing that book gives you extraordinary power beyond what is healthy for society (which is extremely rare for authors, of course; the discussion isn't really about authors, you just invoked them in an attempt to conjure a moral shield for the people who are the real problem).
And again, even that in itself is still not a moral failing of the individual. It's primarily a failure of the system in which the individual operates.
It does become a moral failing of the individual if the individual uses that power to perpetuate the system.
Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. [1]
I was talking specifically about the moral implications of books that can be read without any additional work from the author. This statement is about books, not authors.
> but it's certainly not "work" the same way that digging a ditch
I don't think so. Value comes from utility, not from toil.
What do you mean “extracted”? The wealth is sitting there in his 401(k) being risked through (highly) fractional ownership of various publicly traded business ventures.
Some Nvidia employees are making graphics cards, that cost $1000, and use $300 of materials, and being paid $200. $500 is being extracted from the value chain at that point and some of that is going to you because you own Nvidia stock.
Work implies the creation of value: physical artifacts, services, or more generally, stuff that adds to the world. Capital gails isn't work, you're getting money without adding anything to the world.
>Are those excess returns not work? What are they?
Normally you'd get a low percentage fee instead of getting all of the returns unless you got that capital for free (inheritance?), so yes, you are a worker compared to the person controlling the capital.
Say I dig a hole and then fill it back in and dig a hole and fill it back in and make a mud pie then throw it on the ground and then a stranger gives me $100. Is that work?