why pretend to have found a contradiction when a stronger reading of the comment is clearly that it meant to highlight the distinction between the creation of that value and its consolidation primarily into an individual's personal wealth?
Because it is paradoxical on its face. Many people like to argue that founders (or rich people, or billionaires, or whatever) don’t create real value, but simultaneously discount all the jobs they created and products they produced, because it is convenient to do so when it fits your narrative.
Yes, I’m all for co-op structures, but there is a big difference between “created no value” and “created lots of value but kept the majority of profits for themselves.”
If they’ve created 1000 jobs; is that value? Surely to those 1000 employed people, it is.
