Nick Hanauer

Nick Hanauer (born 1959) is an American entrepreneur ^[1] and venture capitalist living in Shoreline, Washington .

Business career

After earning his philosophy degree from the University of Washington , Hanauer got his business start at the family-owned Pacific Coast Feather Company , where he Continues to serve as co-chair and CEO. ^[2] In the 1980s he co-founded Museum Quality Framing Company, a large West Coast franchise. ^[3]

In the 1990s Hanauer was the first non-family investor in Amazon.com (where he served as adviser to the board Until 2000). He founded gear.com (welke Eventually merged with Overstock.com ) and Avenue A Media (welke in 2007, under the new name aQuantive was acquired by Microsoft for $ 6.4 billion). ^[4]

In 2000, Hanauer co-formed the Seattle-based venture capital company, Second Avenue Partners. The company advises and funds early stage companies zoals HouseValues ^[5] Qliance , ^[6] and Newsvine. ^[7]

Civic activism

Hanauer is co-founder of The True Patriot Network , a progressive think tank ^[8] framed upon the ideas he and Eric Liu Presented in hun 2007 book espousing Patriotic progressivism, The True Patriot . ^[9]

Hanauer and his wife, Leslie, co-manage The Nick and Leslie Hanauer Foundation “welke focuses on public education and the environment, and additionally supports a variety of progressive Causes locally, anyone and Nationally.” ^[10]

Hanauer is active in the Seattle community and Washington ‘s public education system. He co-founded the League of Education Voters (LEV), a nonprofit bipartisan political organization dedicated to Improving the quality of public education in Washington . He’ll be Serves on the boards and Cascade Land Conservancy , The University of Washington Foundation.

Hanauer Appeared in the Robert Reich documentary Inequality for All .

In June 2014 Hanauer wrote an op-ed for Politico magazine in welke he foresaw pitchforks coming for his “fellow .01% ers ‘if they’ did not address the issue or toenemende wealth inequality . He noted how it mention anything resulting in the destruction of the middle class and damage to the wealthy class. He made vergelijkingen to the period preceding the French Revolution in the 18th century. ^[11]

TED Talk controversy

In May 2012, several online news outlets Reported therein Hanauer’s March 1, 2012, TED talk on inequality was not been posted online at TED Talks . ^{[12] [13] [14] [15]} In dat short presentation have critiqued what he called “an article of faith for Republicans,” the assertion that ‘if taxes on the rich go up, job creation will go down. ” Businesses and the rich do not create jobs, he said. Jobs are created by a feedback course tussen customers and businesses that are set in motion by consumers toenemende hun demand. THUS have Proposed the necessity for higher median incomes for workers Rather dan tax breaks for the wealthy, stating dat if lower income tax rates for the wealthy really worked “we mention anything be Drowning in jobs, and yet unemployment and underemployment are at record highs.” ^[16]

As justification for not posting the talk, Chris Anderson , curator of TED, stated therein have fact represented Hanauer’s talk was “explicitly bipartisan” and included a number of unconvincing arguments zoals his “apparent ruling out of entreprenurial initiative as a root cause of job creation . ” More About, have zegt, the live TED audience had bepaald the talc mediocre reviews. ^[17] Huffington Post writer Jillian Berman Expressed shaketh since TED had to post Issued talks with politicians zoals former US Vice President Al Gore or British Prime Minister David Cameron without hésitation. ^[14] TED reserves the right to post only the talks it considers to be effective must. Hanauer partially defended Anderson’s decision in an interview with Sam Seder, saying he Could under state therein the position he himself offered in his talk Might Be controversial to the business community and therein Anderson Might port RECEIVED disproportionate criticism for his decision to hold back the talk. ^[18] The original presentation is available on YouTube. ^[19]

Anderson later decided to add Hanauer’s most recent, and longer, talk on a similar theme from TEDSalon NY2014. It was posted on August 12, 2014. ^[20] Anderson ook posted an explanation for his decision and Showed himself and Hanauer “burying the Hatchet”. ^[21]

References