Larry Ellison Buys His Own Hawaiian Island

First time accepted submitter nrozema writes "Oracle co-founder and billionaire Larry Ellison is buying the Hawaiian island of Lana'i, the sixth-largest island in the U.S. archipelago. Hawaii Gov. Neil Abercrombie confirmed in a written statement that the current landowner filed a transfer application with the state's Public Utilities commission Wednesday to sell its 98 percent share of the 141-square-mile island to Ellison."

Same island Bill Gates chose for wedding

[Anonymous Coward]

Old story here [nwsource.com]

Re:Uh-oh.

[h4rr4r]

Educate their women, which can only happen when they have enough to eat. Educated women on average have less children. They also wait until they have achieved other life goals to have children.

The food by itself only makes the situation worse. It bankrupts farmers and only serves to make more poor people. If the food was sourced as locally as possible and education was available and useful then the problem could be addressed.

Of course this is all based on the naive notion that the main purpose of food aid is to benefit those receiving the aid. That is merely a side effect, its real purpose is to consume market surpluses and enrich the producers of these commodities at the expense of future competition, the farmers that the aid puts out of work.

Humans unlike other animals stop breeding like rabbits once they have a comfortable living. For evidence look at the birth rates in first world nations.

Re:Uh-oh.

[h4rr4r]

We send rice directly to Haiti. All that did was destroy their rice farms. Meaning more poor people to go on food aid. We destroyed one of the larger parts of their economy with this aid.

Re:Real plan

[GIL_Dude]

With something like this, he owns the land, not the island. That may sound stupid, but the island itself is part of Hawaii. For example - if the governor or legislature decides to build a highway across the island, they simply declare eminent domain and seize the land they need (paying for it at some "going rate"). However if he really owned the island, the government couldn't legally do that. So he is like any other landowner. The only difference is that he owns 98% of the land. All of the normal laws about land use still apply. If they have zoning there, it still applies. If they have laws like California does about maintaining free access to certain parts of beaches and waterways, those still apply. That's a far cry from what most people think of when they say someone owns an island. They generally think of it as the person being basically the sovereign there. And that is not true in this case. Larry isn't the king.

Re:Uh-oh.

[asylumx]

not trying to be a smart*ss

Why the fuck did you censor your shit there? Slashdot's a free fucking speech zone, you can fucking say all the shit you fucking want to.

Re:Uh-oh.

[Dcnjoe60]

not trying to be a smart*ss

Why the fuck did you censor your shit there? Slashdot's a free fucking speech zone, you can fucking say all the shit you fucking want to.

But doesn't a free speech zone imply that I can censor myself, if I choose to?

Re:What's the point of your post

[Sir_Sri]

Apple Foxconn and Clinton are actually late to the party on this one. They didn't move in until more boring infrastructure companies (power, water) set up shop.

Even before Nixon went to china the US was selling the chinese power generators through US companies that had non US subsidiaries. There was I think, a reasonable belief that the wedge between Russia/Soviet Union and China could be taken advantage of by friendly sales of non military things even before full on recognition of (Communist) Peoples Republic of China as the government rather than the Republic of China.

But yes, you're right. The solution to poverty in africa comes from trade. What's happened is that pure aid, in the form of food or money, has devastated economies, since someone from france will give away food why would you pay a local guy to grow any? Since the government gets half of its revenue from aid why would you pay taxes etc. Those two have combined to wreck chaos on economies (they aren't complete 100% effects). Trade isn't really possible until those countries can have credible education and legal systems (so investors won't lose all their money), and there will probably need to be some infrastructure investment.

There's still a need for aid for the moment, locusts, droughts that sort of thing, aren't going to be solved overnight. But in the long run Africa needs development from trade.

Re:Uh-oh.

[Anonymous Coward]

For what its worth, Larry does plan on giving it all back, he's already donated hundreds of millions to medical research and education, and he's taken Warren Buffet and Bill Gates' 'Giving Pledge'. He'll be giving his billions away to charity. He's just no public about it like Buffet and Gates are. It's a shame, it makes him hated because all that ever gets ublished is the nice things he likes to buy himself. Gotta give him points though, for not trying to milk charity for PR purposes.