Playboy: What does the money actually mean to you?
Jobs: I still don't understand it. It's a large responsibility to have more than you can spend in your lifetime — and I feel I have to spend it. If you die, you certainly don't want to leave a large amount to your children. It will just ruin their lives. And if you die without kids, it will all go to the Government. Almost everyone would think that he could invest the money back into humanity in a much more astute way than the Government could. The challenges are to figure out how to live with it and to reinvest it back into the world, which means either giving it away or using it to express your concerns or values.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Steve Jobs On Leaving Money to the Government After You Die
This seals it. Steve Jobs, as I suspected, knew what the government was about. From a 1985, Playboy interview (My emphasis):
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Really, Robert???? Next, you'll be arguing Al Gore is anti-government and a libertarian.
ReplyDeleteNice find. I just saw another (albeit tiny) piece of evidence that he was anti-state:
ReplyDeleteSteve Jobs protests against government intrusion of private property by parking in a federally mandated handicap space at One Infinite Loop
...Either that or he was in a rush. Ha!
So far as we know he gave very little of it away. you are attaching to a few phrases of a relatively young man and trying to make him into you libertarian hero. He seemed to avoid graft with the government, intensive political lobying and crony capitalism (as did Gates until the antitrust suit against him). I suspect these Calif business types viewed Washington as very distant.
ReplyDeleteLater Larry Ellison and a couple other silicon valley types supported Clinton in exchange for cutting Microsoft down (via an antitrust suit).
They learned how profitable influencing government has become. More than building products ans services.
Perhaps it is confirmation bias..or the thing about businessmen is they can be bottom-up libertarians with domain inconsistencies with issues not affecting them directly..but they won't be shy to use the State's patent system, monopoly grants etc. to make money.
ReplyDeleteWhen Jobs says "more astute", is he making an "efficiency" argument or a moral argument?
ReplyDeleteBeing an entrepreneur is probably the most libertarian act an individual can make. Plus add to the wealth, jobs, and technological advancements made by Apple with very little assistance from the government. Whether he was a philosophical libertarian is irrelevant, I would take a million Steve Jobs over 1 million of the most principled libertarians who were not entrepreneurs. We would live like the Jetsons.
ReplyDeleteThe Libs been saying Steve Jobs is one of them because he donated to Democrats and supported Obama and Gore. That maybe true, but Steve Job is a model capitalist that every capitalist support. Steve Job live his life growing his business thus benefiting society
ReplyDeleteDidn't Jobs support John Kerry in 2004? I had a fairly strong sense that he was pro-Democrat.
ReplyDelete@738PM, nobody claimed he was a libertarian hero. Based on his comments in his lifetime, he is known to have no tolerance for lousy work, let alone work that is merely "good enough." Even if he was okay with the idea of government, he seems to have an ongoing disdain for government in reality.
ReplyDeleteLook at Steve's statements vs. Bill Gates, who comes from a very different background and pushes quite a bit of the hard left agenda in his charitable activities and statements about the same.
These people bought government terrorists to destroy their competition. Steve Jobs was no different...He destroyed his competition using bogus government patent laws. Now that he is dead we will see more competition in the computer gadget market.
ReplyDeleteAre these donations of his accurate? Pelosi? Sick.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.newsmeat.com/billionaire_political_donations/Steve_Jobs.php
@Stella
ReplyDeleteJobs was buying protection from the political terrorists. The terrorists threaten to murder you if you don't give them protection money...See Microsoft.
Bill M. said...(October 11, 2011 12:14 AM )
ReplyDelete"We would live like the Jetsons."
Yes, i'm sure living like the Jetsons says a lot about personal freedom.
You may not have anything of value to decide about your own life, but at least you'll be able to send in your taxes simply by snapping your fingers.
Talk about irrelevant. Enjoy your iPad.