I am a Self Made Millionaire #7
I am certain you’ve heard the expression "Self Made Millionaire".
It seems like it is a real thing, that some people REALLY became "millionaires" all by themselves, all by their own will and effort.
But when you look closely you will see this is utter bullshit… No "Millionaire" is "Self-Made".
But before I continue to explain why, let me make it absolutely clear that I have absolutely nothing against millionaires… Or to be more specific, I have nothing against people having a good and comfortable life, with options, with freedom, and everything good that comes with having a lot of money.
My problem is NOT with people having a lot of money.
My problem is with people having NO MONEY AT ALL!
My problem is that fact that we are in a world of immense wealth, immense knowledge, immense skills and abilities to ensure everyone has a great and comfortable life -- and yet there are billions of people "living" on 5$/day… That is NOT living.
That is my problem…
Well, it is not just "MY problem" -- that is THE PROBLEM!
Let me also state that I am one of the lucky ones. I have a good and comfortable life. I am far from being a millionaire - but I have a "million dollar life”. If everyone on this earth had a life similar to mine, this world would be a paradise.
Now that I made this clear, let's get back to the point of this blog…
There is no such thing as a "self-made millionaire"
And it is important for those that are millionaires and billionaires - and even those that don't have that kind of wealth but do have a "millionaire life" of comfort and security - to REALISE that they are the ONLY ONES that can actually make a difference in this world.
We are the ones who hold the power to give others the life we have.
Not even democracy can do this -- because democracy is "the-mockery" as the belief the "demos" is ruling. The “people” is not ruling, the system has been rigged to benefit only a handful…
If you are a "millionaire", then you are one of the beneficiaries of the system.
And your millionaire status is not of your making, no matter how much you'd like to believe you have earned it, that you made it all yourself - that is a lie!
And if you really believe that, here is a challenge: go to the desert, isolated from everything and everyone, and then make your "millionaire lifestyle" there.
You see, it is impossible.
A person can ONLY be a millionaire because they can occupy a place in the system that grants that luxury.
It is thanks to everyone else in the world today -- and the ones that have come before and died long ago -- that a person can be a millionaire today and have a luxurious lifestyle.
Have a look: you can do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in this world and be a millionaire - but you cannot go to the desert alone and create a "millionaire lifestyle", no matter how hard you sweat and bleed… If you are lucky, you will barely survive.
You can be "blessed" by being born to very wealthy parents and not have to lift one finger in your life and have the most luxurious and extravagant life. You can do NOTHING - zero work, zero contribution to society - and live a millionaire lifestyle. But you cannot isolate yourself from the society and have a millionaire lifestyle, even if you are the most intelligent and the most skilled human.
Isn’t this obvious?
There is no "self-made millionaire".
There is only "Society-Made Millionaires"
A person that becomes a "millionaire" is only so because he/she benefits from the whole society structure.
Lets take the example of Bill Gates. Why is he a billionaire? How is it possible he amassed such wealth?
Lets see: first he was born in a wealthy family, in the USA. That is already a huge advantage. He was born into a privileged position right from the start.
Then, he was "lucky" to go to a school where he had access to this new technology at the time called "computers".
If there were no computers, would there be a "Bill Gates"?
How many people were involved in creating the computer? How many things had to happen before such an invention was possible and became a reality?
Let's go back in time and see:
One of the essential parts of the computer is the transistor. Without transistors there would be no computers - at least not "personal computers" (which is how Bill Gates made his fortune) because before the transistor we used vacuum tubes to amplify electric signals - and this were HUGE machines, you certainly could not have one in your home…
And before the transistor being invented, we have the Second World War playing an important role in the development of computers.
Would Bill Gates be the Bill Gates of today without the Second World War?
He would not… Without the Second World War, history would play out differently. Who knows how long before we would develop the technology to create personal computers.
Have a look at just a fraction of things that had to happen before “Bill Gates” could become BILL GATES, THE Billionaire:
The invention of the transistor by William Shockley, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain in 1947. It replaced the vacuum tube as the primary electronic component in computers and other electronic devices.
The development of the integrated circuit by Jack Kilby in 1958. It significantly reduced the size and cost of computers and made them more widely available.
The invention of the magnetic core memory by An Wang and Jay Forrester in the 1950s. Magnetic core memory was the primary form of computer memory until it was replaced by semiconductor memory in the 1970s.
The development of computer languages such as FORTRAN, LISP, and COBOL in the 1950s and 1960s made it possible to write instructions that computers could execute.
The invention of the microprocessor by Intel's Ted Hoff in 1971. It significantly reduced the size and cost of computers and made them more widely available.
The development of the internet in the 1960s and 1970s made it possible to share information and resources between computers over long distances.
The invention of the computer mouse by Douglas Engelbart in the 1960s.
The invention of the graphical user interface by Xerox PARC in the 1970s allowed for the interaction with a computer using icons, windows, and a pointing device, like a mouse.
The invention of the hard disk drive: Invented by IBM in the 1950s, the hard disk drive (HDD) is a storage device that uses rapidly rotating disks to store and retrieve data.
The invention of the CD-ROM in the 1980s.
The invention of the flash drive in the 1990s
The invention of the keyboard: The keyboard is an input device that allows users to enter text and other data into a computer.
And as you can imagine, before these inventions were possible, many other inventions and discoveries had to take place.
In an alternate reality where we did not have that war, the “Bill Gates” of that reality would be called something else, born in a different year, and probably in a different country...
So - Bill Gates can very well thank Hitler for his life… Crazy, right?
You see? Bill Gates is Bill Gates because of the place he occupies in society and history.
Just consider how many people and how much knowledge was necessary to get to a point where the computer became an invention.
Look at the amount of knowledge, skills, and technologies necessary to build a computer: you need to extract metals from the earth, you need to know how to make fire and separate the metals, you need to know how to work the metals, you need to extract oil from the ground, you need to know where to find the oil, you need to know how to transform that oil into a variety of plastics, you need to know how to make glass, you need to know the chemistry on how to make glass, you need to know the principles and physics of electricity, you need to know how to produce electricity, you need to know some pretty advanced mathematics - how are you going to learn it all by yourself when it took some of the most brilliant minds in human history THOUHSANDS of years to arrive at a point where it became advanced enough to be a fundamental part of a computer system…
Do you understand?
Isn't this so obvious?
Bill Gates wealth is the product of society and history! There are the millions - if not billions - of people that lived on this planet which played a role in the development of the computer, directly and indirectly.
For example, algorithms are essential to computers, and one of the mathematicians that first formalized it was Euclid in ancient Greece, 300 BC
Very little is known about Euclid's life, but according to ancient sources he was the head of the Library of Alexandria, and he taught mathematics at the school associated with the Library. Just this fact alone tells you Euclid himself was already standing on the shoulders of giants!
It is obvious Euclid occupied a high position in society. He dedicated his life to mathematics and teaching, so he was likely supported by a patron. He did not work the fields, he was not involved in the production of food, which means other people were responsible for ensuring he was alive and well. There were farmers producing the grain and shepherds producing the meat and milk he consumed. If Euclid had to focus all his time and effort in simply feeding himself, he would not have the time to develop his mathematics. Suppose Euclid had kids, if he was responsible for taking care of them all the time, he would not have time for his mathematics. Other people were taking care of his kids, probably the mother or maybe some nannies… who knows.
Do you see the interconnectedness?
So, to recap: Bill Gates’ wealth is thanks to a Greek genius and a crazy Austrian… Got it!
And I am saying Bill Gates but I could say Elon Musk, or Warren Buffet, or Gary V, or the Rockafeller's, or The East India Company and their beneficiaries (i.e, Rothschilds)
Consider this later example:
Who made the ships? Who cut the wood for the ships? Where was the knowledge of ship building coming from? Who made the ropes? Where was the hemp planted and who planted it to build the ropes? Who were the sailors? What sailing knowledge did the captains have? Where did that knowledge come from? Who built the instruments for navigation?
The East India Company's business was based on trade, mainly in spices, tea, silk, and other luxury goods. Who planted the spices, tea, and silk? Who harvested it? Who processed it? Who made the porcelain, textiles, and jewelry that they traded?
And then you have the market: the number of people buying the products. The size of the market will also be a great determining factor of the wealth that is created. And for a specific market to exist, other factors must also be pre-existent.
For example:
For personal computers to sell in the millions, you need an educated population. Reading, writing, and basic math is a pre-requisite for a person to make any significant use of a personal computer. Who are the ones contributing for an educated population? Virtually everyone, through taxation, and more directly the teachers.
The whole system is connected, everyone is playing some key role in society, everyone occupies a "place in the system".
The problem is that the vast majority occupies a place which has been decided to be of "low value" and thus they get very little for the work they do in the system (barely enough to live) - while a very small percentage occupies a position in the system that is "priviledged" and they are disproportionally valued for it -- because they could not have the wealth they have if it weren't for everyone else that is "bellow them" in the system.
Again, let me reiterate that I am not against people having a good life. The problem is that not everyone has a good life!
So, if you are blessed to be born with inteligence, and you manage to develop knowledge and skills that become more valuable to society, and you invent something or you create a business that brings value to society -- yes, by all means, have a great life! You should be well compensated for that, no doubt!
But there is a difference between being well compensated for your work and effort - and being dispoportionally compensated for your work and effort.
That is the problem.
Because we live in a finite reality, in a finite world, with finite resources.
And one of the resources that is finite is money - which should be the representation of human labour, ingenuity and creativity. All the materials are already here on earth, the sun shines, it rains, the plans grow, the animals grow… The human is not creating anything our of nothing, we are just using what is already here, and we do it through our effort, our time, our labour. Therefore, money ought to represent that. It takes "X" amount of human effort to dig 1kg of gold out of the ground. Therefore, 1kg of gold should equal "X". And the same principle should be applied to "price" everything else.
Therefore, money is finite because human labour is finite.
The problem is the money is divided SO unequally that some people, despite their labour, barelly make a living in a world of immense wealth, skills and technology.
If it were 1000 years ago, or even 500 years ago, the poverty which many people experienced was justifiable…
But with the Industrial Revolution everything changed. Not long after it became inexcusable for people to still live in poor striken conditions - at least in the European countries to which it first spread.
And the reson why is very simple.
Because before the Industrial Revolution, all labour was dependent on the effort of man and animals. (and the odd windmill or rivermill)
But when the Revolution took place man was able to tap into seemingly unlimited amouts of energy…
How?
The Industrial Revolution allowed man to extract the chemical energy stored in coal and transform it into mechanical energy. That's what a steam engine does: you burn coal, you heat up water, the water turns to steam, the steam creates pressure which moves some mechanical parts and voilá! The energy goes from chemical to mechanical.
In other words, coal gave life to machines!
The huge amounts of energy stored in coal were used to not only make bigger machines, but also move those bigger machines.
If you really want to understand how significant this was, just look at some numbers…
1kg of coal can be converted into 8000 watts of energy.
A man pedalling on a static bicycle to generate electricity would output about 100 watts / hour.
Therefore, it would take a man 10 days pedalling for 8 hours everyday to produce the same energy as 1kg of coal.
It would take that same man, pedalling the same 8 hours per day, non stop, 125 days (4 months!) to fully charge a 100kWh Tesla battery.
But it would only take 12,5kg of coal to fully charge the same battery (assuming 100% efficiency)
Obviously it is not as straight forward as this, I am really simplifying here, but I am sure you understand the significance of this…
How do you think we have the world we have today? It was not through human brute force that we created this world we live in!
The cars, the roads, the houses, the skyscrapers, the planes… all of this was only possible through accessing gazillions of watts of energy that are stored in coal, oil, and gas.
And it is for this reason that there is absolutely no justification for one single person to experience poverty.
ZERO!
Why is there poverty?
Because huge amounts of energy are used to provide not only comfort but extravagant luxurious lives for some - while a vast amount of people depend on their physical effort to survive.
To claim there isn't enough for everyone is a LIE! There is more than enough for everyone to have a great life!
The problem is some motherfuckers want to live as if they are gods and have others as slaves…
And these motherfuckers have all the power, and they never look in the eye of their slaves - for they are always far away…
You see, there can only be gods if there are slaves.
There are no "Self Made Millionaires" … there's only "Slave made millionaires".
If there are no slaves, there are no gods, everyone is Equal.
"EQUALITY? That is blasfemy!"
Hey, are you going to nail another Jesus to the cross? Didn't you get the message the first time? You tried to kill Equality 2000 years ago; you nailed "equality" to the cross as a way of saying:
"If you speak of equality, this is what we will do to you, so don't you fucking dare to love your neighbour as thyself!"
I got bad news for you if you think this way…
