Hacker News Reader

A capitalist and a laborer who both contribute nothing should expect nothing as a return.

A capitalist who contributes capital should expect investment returns, and a laborer who contributes labor should expect the agreed-upon compensation. Beyond that, the details of who should expect how much come down to supply and demand, of both labor and capital.

View on HN

A capitalist who invests indiscriminately (e.g. broadly) today, has a positive expected outcome of this, and that's not a given out of the fundamental theory.

The work a capitalist does, their contribution, isn't just writing checks, it's writing the right checks.

It just happens that a capitalist writing a large number of checks happen to write a couple of right ones. And often we need them to write some wrong ones too.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com