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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   32408 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 23, 2023

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They really dropped the hammer on him, he's not even a billionaire anymore after Adidas cancelled their relationship with him.

Then he never really was a billionaire. Theoretical future money you may or may not get from a business deal doesn't actually count.

Then he never really was a billionaire. Theoretical future money you may or may not get from a business deal doesn't actually count.

Well, then most billionaires aren't actual billionaires. The value of of Kanye's stake in Yeezy plummeted absent without his partnership with Adidas (and the fact that no one else would want to fill Adidas's role in the partnership given the stigma around him) . If equity in a company (Kanye's clothing company) doesn't count as wealth then what does? I'm not sure how you would measure wealth, but I that certainly isn't how wealth is normally measured. By your reasoning, there was probably a brief point where Elon Musk was both the richest person in the world and not a billionaire as you define it, given that he didn't, for a decent period of time, have a billion dollars in money outside his stakes in his personal companies.

It seems counterintuitive that a guy who was then richest person ever should yet, according to your unique definition, not be a billionaire. I mean more power to you, but you are using the word in a very strange way.

Note that I didn't say equity in his company. My issue is with the notion that one can be counted as a billionaire when they don't even have the assets yet. In this case, future earnings from his business deal with Adidas that weren't realized. If he isn't a billionaire after that goes up in smoke, then he never was actually a billionaire.

Also... yeah, people do overestimate wealth that is totally ephemeral. I'm not saying that you have to have your wealth all in cash, but I think that there is kind of a minimum threshold of stability here. If I have billions in a diverse variety of investments such that even if I lose one I won't lose them all, that's pretty good. If I have them invested in a single bucket which is pretty stable, that's not as good but still reasonable. If I have billions in an investment that is fairly risky, then I may not deserve to be called a billionaire. If I have billions in dogecoin, then I'm not remotely qualified to be called a billionaire.

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