...there is a legally binding penalty of a beeelion euros if, during the dismantling, somebody "oops" accidentally drops an important piece meaning the bridge can't be put back together...

Profits are privatized. Losses are paid for by taxes (paid by the poor, of course).

Who do you think will pay those beeelion euros in the end?

That boat is large enough to be classified as Titanic in the making . There are still some icebergs left in the ocean.

Not that I wish the crew anything bad, but having this monstrosity go down would give the envious part in me some satisfaction. I can imagine others may feel a similar urge, somewhere. If it were to happen, one could only hope that the insurance policy excluded icebergs. The very rich can afford a crash once in a while.

>>having this monstrosity go down would give the envious part in me some satisfaction

No satisfaction in blaming the inanimate object for the sins of its creator/financier. I would much prefer a Robert Maxwell scenario...

Old sail ships could remove them for maintenance - I've visited one of the towers in the old Copenhagen harbor used to remove and fit masts to ships. Remove the masts, tow the thing out of that harbor, and then fit them again elsewhere. Tell Bezos he as to pay for that, of course.

Those masts are his finger to the world... "I'm rich - YOU move!" :(

I don't normally yearn for fictional tech too much, but oh for a reel of mono / hyper / diamond filament..!

The towers are perfectly set up, you could nip a bit off the top or slice it into boat sushi...

Surely it's like a ship in a bottle and there's a piece of string you pull to collapse the masts...

They likely can - but - the cost of dismantling the bridge and rebuilding it is likely less.

This shipyard has mega yachts before - it built the black pearl back in 2010(ish) which has 70 mtr tall masts).

Likely in this case, it wont even have its masts on at this stage - the hull is to be moved and it sits on a barge. The total height of the hull (including draft) and the barge itsself is likely >40M (max height of the bridge)

The masts for Black Pearl, incidentally, were made in Portsmouth.

Black pearl made it past with something like 4M clearance - that is one deck or so difference....

There are 3 other super sailing yachts >100m in existence and more motor variety - many from this yard. Most of them are owned by Russian Olligarchs

Good for Bezo's, I hope he likes the boat.

It's not a boat, it's a target... boats tend to be black and go quietly under the surface...

or light grey, in case of a Boot.

Isn't it better that he's spending some (1/2 billion is quite a lot) of his money and not just sitting on it like the aforementioned Smaug? Trickle down economics and all that? Shouldn't we be encouraging MORE of this sort of thing. If he starts spending a few Billion here, a few Billion there (and the rest of them do too) then we all get better off?

Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the little pr1c4. I stopped using the shop several years ago.

@Steve Button

Yup

Trickle down economics [1]doesn't work .

Unless you're rich, in which case it works just fine.

[1] https://www.economicsonline.co.uk/definitions/trickle-down-economics-why-it-only-works-in-theory.html/

Interesting article. I have a radical idea, but YOU AREN'T GOING TO LIKE IT. The problem is that most people, when they get this rich don't pay ANY tax at all. They domicile themselves offshore. And it's almost impossible to stop that, and we've been trying for many years. How about taxing them at a very low rate, say 10% or 15% on anything over £250,000? You could tinker with the figures, but work out a number that the vast majority of rich bastards will ACTUALLY PAY. That way you *might* find that the tax revenues you receive actually go up, because it's not worth trying to dodge it. Also, this might be popular as people would actually expect them to pay this. Make it public and shame those who avoid it.

Of course this all depends on how you measure inequality. Does it matter if the poor get richer (even if the rich get even richer and richer again).

Once you've paid a certain amount into the system, it doesn't make sense to keep increasing the percentage that you put in as you earn more. At least not in my mind. But this might actually make us all better off. I did warn you that you weren't going to like it.

I absolutely agree with the concept, but I don't believe that the rate matters: the wealthy hire tax advisors to minimize their obligations, and as the figures get astronomical, so does the amount of potential savings that can be used to e.g. pay tax advisors.

I think a better approach is to revisit the concept of taxation on stock valuation. A key issue is the idea of taxing unrealized gains, which is currently not possible (for pretty obvious reasons). However, the UK's HMRC is perfectly happy to tax trusts based on their anticipated income in a "it'll all come out in the wash" philosophy, so I wonder if it could be possible to impose recoverable down-payments on people with huge wealth tied up in a single company's stock...?

As slave labor is frowned upon in the Netherlands the the workers who built Jeff's Yacht and those that made the stuff to go in it were paid for their labors. They then spent some of those wages providing a livelihood to shops and people in the businesses and farms suppling those goods. Income tax and VAT would also have been paid by a great many of those extended pool of workers some of which would be used to pay benefits to those at need. That's trickle down economics working.

I seriously doubt that the state could have done better by taking the money directly from Jeff and distributing it.

So long as he doesn't want to Return or Replace it.

Trickle down economics doesn't work.

The article you link to says something very specific. It looks at trickle-down economics from the angle of cutting taxes to "the rich" (that includes companies, etc.). It says that trickle-down economics assumes that the savings will be invested in the economy one way or another and, well, trickle-down will occur. It then says that oftentimes the savings are not put back into economy, so the aforementioned assumption of trickle-down economics is, in general , unfounded.

All that is fine. In this case though, Mr. Bezos whom many love to hate has actually spent almost half a billion bucks. Some of it will , in fact, be paid as taxes, some will get transferred to various vendors up the shipbuilders' supply chain, salaries and bonuses will be paid, employees (and owners, and their families) will spend their income, shops and restaurants and pubs and service providers and employees thereof will get their share, etc.

So in this specific case the basic assumption of trickle-down economics is factually correct and Steve Button's comment was exactly on point. IMHO.

@phuzz

"Trickle down economics doesn't work."

So where did his money go for the boat and for work on the bridge? Does nobody get it? And the people paid by that money do they not spend it?

The link isnt quite correct. This is a curve created by Arthur Laffer, who showed the way that tax cuts create a powerful multiplication effect Arthur Laffer didnt create it although he did make it famous.

Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is concerning since this trickle-down policy seems to exacerbate the income inequality spurred by Reaganomics Trump inherited Obama's 'new normal' sluggish economy propped up by government subsidy. Trumps tax cuts increased employment across the board and a white hot economy. The wet pants cry about income inequality is worthless, improved living standards matter and it delivers.

If you do want to live where inequality is small you should try socialist countries where most everyone is equally poor.

As an ocean-going vessel that is also capable of carrying a boat (lifeboats), it technically will classify as a ship , although it will be called a "yacht" (as in 'private residential ship').

..... that the bridge has to come down cos Jeff wanted to sail it out himself and his big fat head won't fit underneath!!!

JB if they didn't take the bridge down ------------->

+1 for creative icon usage

This could be Rotterdam for everyone.

the shipyard would have just handed him the boat and said "Here's your new yacht Mr Bezos, exactly as you specified".

But they obviously want to get the contract in 18 months time when he's got bored with it and decides he wants one twice as big. However, as they've demonstrated that they were too stupid to realise this would happen, I think that ship might have, as they say, already sailed.

His second yacht is already under construction. The masts on the first one prevent landing a helicopter so he needs another one with a helipad. A bit silly really as [1]Jacklyn should be big enough for a really big luxury super-helicopter.

[1] https://maritime-executive.com/article/jeff-bezos-names-rocket-landing-ship-in-honor-of-his-mother

Helicopters are so much last millennium. When you have your very own vertically landing rocket - why not flaunt it?

Guess that would limit how far from land you could sail without getting wet ... unless he can borrow one from Uncle Elon. Perhaps not.

And didn't pause for a second to ask themselves how it would get to sea ?

Maybe they should have thought about that before taking the contract.

They knew - its been done before elsewhere. The city has grown round the shipyard.

Perhaps they could just fill it up with mercury or gold or osmium or something and float it a little lower in the water.

Or get a really really big lorry and ship it by road?

Well it's really Oceanco's fault for building their shipyard the wrong side of the bridge. Bezos has offered to stump up for the work, which, if it hadn't been agreed to, would mean his yacht being built elsewhere and Rotterdam losing his business. Can't really see how this is Bezos fault, to be honest.

Now he's had that treatment, everyone will want it. That bridge will be up and down like a ... um ...

... pair of electric Time-Trousers?

RIP, Jo Kendall.

"..you or I popping to the corner shop for a Freddo.."

"..for none other than real-life Smaug.."

Genuinely got references confused and thought you meant a Frodo.

And my thought was "The brits can buy real chocolate frogs?!?!" Can they jump out of train windows?

Only once

Here's a pic of the moving part of the bridge lifted out by sheerlegs for the most recent restoration.

https://www.telegraaf.nl/nieuws/1607046888/rotterdamse-brug-de-hef-een-dag-uit-elkaar-voor-megajacht-jeff-bezos

Also includes a pic of the yacht in the yard, on SPMTs to take it for a spin.

It's a monumentally dull looking yacht. Quite apt, I suppose, for an equally dull owner.

I wonder if he bought it from an Amazon seller called "Bezo's Floaters" who pays fees to Amazon.ie via Amazon.es, Amazon.uk and Amazon.nl? Of course, as there's a bridge to move as part of the bill, the bridge cost will be ten times what it needs to be and tax deductable as the ship bill is for a floating office ... and there'll probably be a tax rebate for restoring an historic monument ... I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't make a profit on buying this ship.

More like capitalism’s very own Frankenstein’s monster. No doubt he’ll be looking to save a few euro’s on unnecessary staffing for this bridge deconstruction project... the first time civil engineers in such a project were required to wear a comfort break tracker.

Surely he can afford to Fitzcarraldo it across the city instead....