If You Were A Billionaire What Would You Do With Your Money?

[jpiniero]

With the infrastructure Sears had at one point a forward-looking CEO could have turned them into Amazon in one quarter of the time.

Don't think Sears would have had the mentality of wringing every last ounce of productivity out of people.

 

[Captante]

Don't think Sears would have had the mentality of wringing every last ounce of productivity out of people.

My point exactly .... THIS was the issue. (They proved incapable of wringing that last drop out of anything)

Sears was a household name for 50 years + with physical locations everywhere, several popular national (and quality) brands like Craftsman, Diehard etc and massive supply chains.

 

[dank69]

$1B isn't really enough. Not even enough to build a drone army for my self-sustaining compound. Hell, you could blow a few billion just on a satellite network.

 

[Ajay]

$1B isn't really enough. Not even enough to build a drone army for my self-sustaining compound. Hell, you could blow a few billion just on a satellite.

FIFY.

 

[skyking]

I'm pretty much retired. if suddenly a billion fell into my lap, I know what I would do.
Vaccines are wonderful, freshwater for everybody is wonderful, these are lovely ideals. The truth is we have plenty of people on the planet and that's not going to change.
I can't ease their suffering or provide for all or even a tiny portion of their needs, and they just keep coming.
I wouldn't do a damn thing along those lines.
instead I would pick little niche ecosystems that were threatened, and buy up the real estate before it got developed or otherwise fucked over forever.
I'd be the little nature conservancy guy.

 

[BoomerD]

A billion $$$? Buy anandtech just so I could ban the OP and other idiots just like him.

 

[IronWing]

A billion $$$? Buy anandtech just so I could ban the OP and other idiots just like him.

At this point, I think Future would sell you the forum for about $3.50.

 

[BoomerD]

At this point, I think Future would sell you the forum for about $3.50.

 

[snoopy7548]

I would buy a huge apartment complex and fill it with people who died in 1994.

But really, I have no idea. Probably try to help people in some way.

 

[MrSquished]

I would buy @IronWing 's home and raze it and put up a triplex.

I'd open up a chain of foot massage parlors called Salty Foots Spa and Massage

 

[Exterous]

I'd mess with people. If someone parked like an asshole I'd buy 4 cars and box in their car and just leave mine.

Someone being a dick? Hire a front end loader and dump truck and empty a few tons of snow at the end of their driveway in the winter or dirt in the summer. Or buy some billboard space and put their picture with a warning about them on it.

Or really just buy some billboards and put dumb things on them to entertain people. Maybe put some ads online for the same reason

I'd also do some random acts of kindness. Good server? Here is your $500 tip. Or hell grab a soda from McDonald's, hand them a $100 and tell them to keep the change. Tell a pizza place to bill me for every other order on a Friday night.

 

[Kaido]

I remember watching the food documentary "Forks over Knives" & being totally blown away that we currently produce enough food for 10 billion people & only have 7.9 billion people on that earth, and we're only using 40% of our land for agriculture, not to mention climate-independent systems like Farm.One & Freight Farms.

I was originally going to visit Farm One back in April 2020, but then the lockdown happened & they got hit hard with the drop in restaurant business. They've since moved to Brooklyn (Bergen street). I was in the area the other day & went on a really neat tour of the facility. They do 4 main types of indoor vertical hydroponics:

1. Luxury salad greens
2. Specialty herbs
3. Edible flowers
4. Microgreens

I currently have two compact countertop hydroponic systems at home & am building a third larger custom one with growlights & maybe an Arduino watering system once I figure out what I want to do with it. Their space at Farm One is very compact (they use rolling archival-style racks for efficient operation) & bill themselves as a "neighborhood farm", which is a concept I absolutely LOVE, especially given the prevalence of food deserts in America.

I've really gotten into fermentation lately as well. Things like fermented carrot sticks & cauliflower & even hot sauce are SUPER good. Mostly I've been doing a lot with sourdough starter & sourdough discard along with my 5-minutes-a-day no-knead bread approach. I think it's so cool how you can easily grow food at home these days with modern tools like full-spectrum UV LED grow lights & automated watering systems (even for people like me, who can kill a cactus!), as well as easily make food at home using things like homemade sourdough starter, no-knead recipes for things like breads, bagels, baguettes, etc. & so on.

I was pretty happy on a diet of McDonalds & Domino's pizza & Snickers candy bars growing up, but having gone through a decade of being unable to eat things like gluten, dairy, and corn, I really got a perspective on health, energy, nutrition, and food in general that I wouldn't have appreciated otherwise! I really enjoy seeing the marrying of technology & food production techniques come together to solve problems like how to get hyper-local, ultra-clean food inside of densely-populated cities...we live in AMAZING times!!

 

[pete6032]

I would also like to buy a huge apartment complex and fill it with people born in 1994 (my birth year).

Ah yes, housing discrimination...

 

[IronWing]

I would buy the world's most expensive mirror. I would look at myself every day and laugh and laugh and laugh. I would name it y or z or something like that.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

Some niceties for myself, probably find a way to leverage it to combat climate change in whatever way I could. 1B really isn't that much, so maybe just hire people to kill off some really bad offenders.

Maybe open an animal shelter. Really big one with cat trees.

Yup, still applicable.

 

[KMFJD]

build/provide renewable energy for poor communities

 

[amdhunter]

Happiness.

 

[IronWing]

Happiness.

So two hookers and blow at the same time?

 

[Kaido]

Happiness.

Yeah 40k posts is amazing man

 

[skyking]

Don't think Sears would have had the mentality of wringing every last ounce of productivity out of people.

I worked for them briefly in the 80's. They had perfected the method of offering health insurance for anyone working more than 32 hours a week, while paying bonuses to managers who made sure that never happened.
The Sears I knew was plenty ruthless.

 

[Ajay]

Amongst other things. Build a bunch of low cost housing in the city. I'd be able to pay a premium for the land, build the apartment's and set up a non-profit trust to keep rental costs down + a maintenance fund so they don't wither and die like some public housing.

 

[Brainonska511]

Amongst other things. Build a bunch of low cost housing in the city. I'd be able to pay a premium for the land, build the apartment's and set up a non-profit trust to keep rental costs down + a maintenance fund so they don't wither and die like some public housing.

You'd spend it all trying to fight NIMBYs and getting the variances needed to actually build anything of any scale, since we've severely limited where and what type of multifamily homes can be built by right.

 

[Ajay]

You'd spend it all trying to fight NIMBYs and getting the variances needed to actually build anything of any scale, since we've severely limited where and what type of multifamily homes can be built by right.

Less of a problem in my small city (100k pop). Would probably expand to the next two largest cities in NH after the first one. It’s not like I’d try this in Boston, $1B isn’t enough for the 'favors' to grease the wheels and land prices are very high.

 

[nOOky]

I'd buy land, build a nice house on it, somewhere with 4 seasons. I'd travel a lot. I'd probably spend a lot helping animals and children, especially disadvantaged ones. I'd travel a lot, we already do as much as we can afford. I'd probably try to donate to local things that need help, the food shelf, humane society, parks and outside areas that need money and attention. I'd probaly spend a day or a week in Brazil renting exotic hookers and getting professional BJ's while the wife is out shopping

 

[BoomerD]

I'd spend a lot on dogs...shelters/rescues/spay-neuter clinics.