Earthbucks, billionaires, and orbital value (was Economic diversity

> how [would] a billionaire from Tau Ceti [...] benefit his
> new community on Earth differently from a regular paycheck
> astronaut from Alpha Centuari?

A typical self-made wealthier-than-average person -- erstwhile,
otherwhile, or otherwise -- is valuable partly in that he is more-
productive than the average person. See The g Factor, IQ and the
Wealth of Nations, and:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_Global_Inequality

> What good are billionaires in a settlement

With their plentiful Earthbucks, they help make markets for:

1. Importation services.
2. Local products and services.
3. Communication services (Earth-end and otherwise).
4. Special Intellectual-Property uniquely valuable to orbital
settlement. (Codes and platforms for remote product-manufacture, etc.)

> when their billions are locked into assets on Earth

Not everyone with whom they do business on an orbital-settlement
necessarily:

1. Physically exists on the settlement.
2. Plans on staying on the settlement forever.
3. Values predominantly things with low value-mass ratios.
4. Believes that importation-costs will never drop. (The spector of
dropping import costs could be a factor in delayment of purchase of
items of low value-mass ratio.)
5. Charges exactly as little in orbit as he would charge on Earth.
6. Is low-income.

As to Item 1, stockholders in an orbital-settlement-corporation
indirectly receive Earthbucks when an Earthbucks-holding settler pays
rent. A stockholder can potentially exist any given where, at any
given time.

As to Item 2, a local-producer might be in orbit to earn Earthbucks
and, at some point, then permanently return to Earth. Others might
travel back and forth, spending a lot of their Earthbuck while on
Earth.

As to Item 3, the market for massless and/or remote products-and-
services continuously grows. Even if IP were the only export product,
IP could also be the predominant -- or even the only (in a closed-loop
habitat) -- import-product.

As to Item 4, a consumer could save up his Earthbucks to buy at a
later, predicted-cheaper, date. In such a case, he would still be
personally-valuing Earthbucks.

As to Item 5, the extra-high prices of products and services in orbit
would not necessarily outweigh the savings derived from a lack of
income-taxation.

As to Item 6, if the Earthbucks-GDP-per-capita is relatively higher,
the cost of importation is relatively lower. One reason for attracting
the productive to settle in a habitat-enterprise (and for encouraging
their productivity through income-tax relief) is that their high
Earthbucks-incomes make the cost of mass-importation relatively
negligible. The high-income are known for being high-consumers of high
value-mass-ratio products. If toothpaste cost a lot, why would these
people care? The low-productive would probably care, but if they
highly-valued low-value/mass products, what would they be doing in
orbit in the first place?

A waterjet-operator making $100/hr, and working 80 hours per week,
would be making $400,000/year, tax-free. Would this person likely-care
that toothpaste costs a lot? Maybe he has a taste for expensive
toothpaste. On Earth, Sensodyne costs about $5 for a 6-ounce tube. At
$100/lb, the shipping-cost to orbit would be $37.50. At one
tube/month, that would be $450. That might seem like a lot, for
toothpaste, but this person has a huge disposable income -- and as
long as his disposable income is high, and the shipping cost/mass is
high, he might as well buy the best of everything.

For what he gives-up in toothpaste-cost, he might make-up in the
relatively large amount of IP he can afford. If he likes Blu-Ray
movies, he might buy 300 per year at $20/each. That would be
$6,000/year. He might want the tele-services of an Earth-pychiatrist.
That might cost $1,000/week, or $50,000/year. He might want the
services of other Earth-doctors, and he might send samples of his
blood, etc., down to Earth to have them analyzed. That might cost
another $25,000/year. He might buy $100,000 worth of Earth-made
consumer-electronics every year. If they together weigh 500 pounds, he
spends another $50,000 on shipping.

He still has not spent all of his money. Maybe he likes gourmet food.
It costs the same-per-mass to ship cheap food as it does gourmet food,
so why not buy the gourmet? Maybe he likes jewelry. Maybe he likes
nice clothes. Maybe he is an audiophile, or a wine connoisseur. Maybe
he is an aesthetic philanthropist and gives all of his money to his
church or other charity. Maybe he is saving all of his money to pay
for a cancer operation, or for an education.

Certain kinds of people will be more-attracted to living in orbit.
These kinds of people might specially-value the opportunities and
incentives to productivity. They might specially-value the access to
alternate-accelerations. They might specially-disvalue low-value/mass
commodities. They might plan on being temporarily ascetic. Whatever
their reasons are, they differentiate themselves from the rest of
humanity by having decided to live -- at least for a time -- in orbit.
That makes them part of a self-selected group, and that is the reason
that economic comparisons that might be fairly valid for typical
places on Earth, might not be very valid for orbit, and especially
productivity-incentivized (e.g. income-tax free) orbit.