While Americans fixate on Trump, the super-rich are absconding with our wealth.
By Paul Buchheit: Last year it was eight men, then down to six, and now almost five.
By Paul Buchheit: Last year it was eight men, then down to six, and now almost five.
While Americans fixate on Trump, the
super-rich are absconding with our wealth, and the plague of inequality
continues to grow. An analysis
of 2016 data
found that the poorest five deciles of the world population own about $410
billion in total wealth. As of June 8, 2017,
the world's richest five men owned over $400 billion in wealth. Thus, on
average, each man owns nearly as much as 750 million people.
Why Do We Let a Few People Shift Great Portions of the World's Wealth to
Themselves?
Most of the super-super-rich are Americans. We the American people created the
internet, developed and funded artificial intelligence, and built a massive
transportation infrastructure, yet we let just a few individuals take almost
all the credit, along with hundreds of billions of dollars.
Defenders of the out-of-control wealth gap insist that all is OK, because after
all, America is a meritocracy in which the super-wealthy have earned all they
have. They heed the words of Warren
Buffett: "The genius of the American economy, our emphasis on a
meritocracy and a market system and a rule of law has enabled generation after
generation to live better than their parents did."
But it's not a meritocracy. Children are no longer
living better than their parents did. In the eight years since the
recession the Wilshire
Total Market valuation has more than tripled, rising from a little
over $8 trillion to nearly $25 trillion. The great majority of it has
gone to the very richest Americans. In 2016 alone, the richest 1% effectively
shifted nearly $4 trillion
in wealth away from the rest of the nation to themselves, with nearly half of
the wealth transfer ($1.94 trillion) coming from the nation's poorest 90% --
the middle and lower classes. That's over $17,000 in housing and savings per
lower-to-middle-class household
lost to the super-rich.
A meritocracy? Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos have done little that
wouldn't have happened anyway. All modern U.S. technology started with, and to
a great extent continues with, our tax dollars
and our research institutes and our subsidies to corporations.
Why Do We Let Unqualified Rich People Tell Us How To Live?
In 1975, at the age of 20, Bill Gates founded Microsoft with high school buddy
Paul Allen. At the time, Gary
Kildall's CP/M operating system was the industry standard. Even
Gates' company used it. But Kildall was an innovator, not a businessman, and
when IBM came calling for an OS for the new IBM PC, his delays drove the big
mainframe company to Gates. Even though the newly established Microsoft company
couldn't fill IBM's needs, Gates and Allen saw an opportunity, and so they
hurriedly bought the rights to another local company's OS -- which was based on
Kildall's CP/M system. Kildall wanted to sue, but intellectual property law for
software had not yet been established. Kildall was a maker who got taken.
So Bill Gates took from others to become the richest man in the world. And now,
because of his great wealth and the meritocracy myth, many people look to him
for solutions in vital areas of human need, such as education
and global food production.
Gates on Education: He has promoted galvanic skin response
monitors to measure the biological reactions of students, and the videotaping of teachers to
evaluate their performances. About schools he said,
"The best results have come in cities where the mayor is in charge of the
school system. So you have one executive, and the school board isn’t as
powerful."
Gates on Africa: With investments in or
deals with Monsanto,
Cargill and
Merck,
Gates has demonstrated his preference for corporate control over poor countries
deemed unable to help themselves. But no problem: according to Gates,
"By 2035, there will be almost no poor countries left in the world."
Warren Buffett: Demanding To Be Taxed at a Higher Rate (As Long As His Own
Company Doesn't Have To Pay)
Warren Buffett has advocated for higher taxes
on the rich and a reasonable
estate tax. But his company Berkshire Hathaway has used
"hypothetical amounts" to pay its taxes while actually deferring $77
billion in real taxes.
Jeff Bezos: $50 Billion in Less Than Two Years, and Fighting Taxes All the Way
Since the end of 2015 Jeff Bezos has accumulated
enough wealth to cover the entire $50 billion U.S. housing
budget, which serves five million
Americans. Bezos, who has profited greatly from the internet and the
infrastructure built up over many years by many people with many of our tax
dollars, has used tax havens
and high-priced lobbyists
to avoid the
taxes owed by his company.
Mark Zuckerberg (6th Richest in World, 4th Richest in America)
While Zuckerberg was developing his version of social networking at Harvard,
Columbia University students Adam Goldberg
and Wayne Ting
built a system called Campus Network, which was much more sophisticated than
the early versions of Facebook. But Zuckerberg had the Harvard name and better financial
support.
Now with his billions he has created a charitable foundation, which in reality
is a tax-exempt limited liability company, leaving him free
to make political donations or sell
his holdings, all without
paying taxes.
The False Promise of Philanthropy
Many super-rich individuals have pledged
the majority of their fortunes to philanthropic causes. That's very generous,
if they keep their promises. But that's not really the point.
American billionaires all made their money because of the research and
innovation and infrastructure that make up the foundation of our modern
technologies. They have taken credit, along with their massive fortunes, for
successes that derive from society rather than from a few individuals. It
should not be any one person's decision about the proper use of that wealth.
Instead a significant portion of annual national wealth gains should be
promised to education, housing, health research, and infrastructure. That is
what Americans and their parents and grandparents have earned after a half-century
of hard work and productivity.
Paul Buchheit is the author of "Disposable Americans" (2017). He is an advocate for social and economic justice.
His essays, videos, and poems can be found
at YouDeserveFacts.org.
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