MS is worth a lot and yes they have helped productivity. Did Gates do that or did he do it <i>with</i> the help of many people before him inventing all sorts and many workers adding software. Were the workers compensated sufficiently for the value they added? Did MS use a pseudo monopoly using the legal system to capture more value than they actually added?<p>Gates did a lot but he stood on the shoulders of giants, seemed to have some &quot;sharp&quot; business practices enabled by our monopoly loving nation states and a lot of employees did the heavy lifting.<p>I&#x27;m not criticising Gates, I don&#x27;t mean to pick on him. If we had cheaper land I think the balance would shift to workers being less over a barrel and more able to negotiate higher wages to capture a greater share of their added value.