Tag Archives: wealthy 1%

So You Want To Be ‘Exceptional’, Eh?

Posted on by under Economic issues, Environmental Issues, Global Issues, Political commentary, Social commentary

We’ve all heard the term ‘American Exceptionalism’, one which causes me to shake my head and roll my eyes.  It ties in with the ultra-discriminatory ‘America First’ ideology and other supremacy notions and has no place in this world.  But, it turns out there is one area in which we are ‘exceptional’ … we, particularly the wealthy in this nation, contribute more per capita to the destruction of the environment than any other nation.  Not something to take pride in, is it?

Somini Sengupta is the international climate reporter for the New York Times, and what follows is her column/newsletter from February 28th.

The American Exception

When it comes to climate footprints, rich people in the United States are in a class of their own.

By Somini Sengupta

28 February 2023

Climate change may be a global problem. But we are not all the same. Far from it.

The wealthier we are, the more climate pollution we produce, because of how much electricity we consume, what we eat, and how much we drive. But it’s not just wealth. It matters a lot in which country we are wealthy.

Take a look below at this chart that my colleague Mira Rojanasakul prepared based on an International Energy Agency analysis of per capita carbon dioxide emissions by income.

You will see the wealthiest people in the United States have an astonishingly large climate footprint, far larger than rich people in wealthy, industrialized Europe and in fast-rising China.

Not only that: Nearly everyone in the United States, even those in the lowest income brackets, produces a lot of climate pollution relative to everyone else in the world. It’s the way our economy is built. We take for granted long commutes and frequent flights. Our electricity comes from sources that are relatively carbon-intensive. The rest of the world is different.

Americans are exceptional.

I know this intuitively. I’ve reported from more than 50 countries. But seeing the spread of per capita emissions from the world’s four largest economies — the United States, the European Union, China and India — still surprised me.

The richest 10 percent of Americans, or those who make an average of $233,600 a year, produces 56.5 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per person, per year on average, according to the I.E.A. analysis. That’s more than double the emissions of the richest 10 percent in Europe. It’s nearly double that of the richest 10 percent of Chinese.

Everyone else in the United States has a big footprint, too, relative to their counterparts in Europe, China and India. For instance, the poorest 10 percent of Americans, those making $2,500 a year on average, have a carbon footprint that’s almost as big as everyone in India, except India’s richest 10 percent.

Likewise, the poorest 10 percent of Americans have a climate footprint larger than the poorest 30 percent of Chinese.

This is about emissions per capita. Not about total emissions.

India and China are obviously much more populous than the United States and Europe. So their small footprints add up. I get that. I wrote about the population question not long ago. But for those at the bottom, and even middle, of their class ladders, they do not produce a lot of emissions.

Inequality within countries really matters.

In China, for instance, the richest 10 percent have a footprint 33 times the size of the poorest 10 percent.

In the United States, the richest 10 percent pollute 16 times as much as the poorest 10 percent. See where you fall on this graph:

In India, the climate pollution produced by the poorest 10 percent of the population is negligible. Many of them still cook with charcoal or cow dung. They may not have access to electricity around the clock. They most certainly don’t own a car. At best, a bicycle.

This could make climate action simpler (in theory).

A small number of relatively wealthy people can make a very big difference. Most of all, in the United States. “The richest individuals have many ways to reduce their emissions,” the International Energy Agency analysis pointed out. They include individual changes and policy changes.

(Note: replacing a massive petroleum-burning car for a giant electric truck isn’t quite a silver bullet.)

And bear in mind that the so-called yacht class, the richest 0.1 percent of the population, are super polluters of another order. Their emissions are 10 times as much as the whole world’s richest 10 percent combined.

I have learned something else from going over these numbers.

I have frequently used the term “we” in writing about climate change. Are we doomed? Can we limit temperature rise to relatively safe planetary boundaries? How quickly can we wean ourselves from fossil fuels to slow down warming?

But who is we, exactly? I’m going to think harder about when I use the term. Because when it comes to our role in this profound global problem, we are not the same.

Bye-Bye Little Birdie

Posted on by under Global Issues, Personal, Political commentary, Social commentary

He paid $44 billion to buy a toy that he didn’t know how to play with.  Last night I closed my Twitter account, so I have one less ‘pinned tab’ taking up space at the top of my browser screens!  I’ve been considering such a move ever since Elon Musk started threatening to buy Twitter, almost did it when he officially took ownership and fired half the people working there.  But for me, the final straw came yesterday evening when Musk announced that the former guy’s access to Twitter has been restored.

On Friday evening, Musk put out a “poll” asking if people wanted Trump to return to Twitter or not.  I immediately voted with a resounding “No!!!”, but at the end of the 24-hour polling period, those voting to let Trump back on outnumbered those of us who voted against.  And so, I’m finished.  That, for me, proved that since Musk’s takeover, Twitter has turned into a veritable garbage dump, and I refuse to share space with the likes of Donald Trump.  Ah well … one less thing to stir my angst!

But what a waste of $44 billion!  I did a bit of research and calculating, and even with today’s food prices, that $44 billion could have fed nearly 16 million people for a year!  SIXTEEN MILLION!!!  And I can only imagine how many homes for the homeless, how many pair of glasses for children whose parents cannot afford them, how many months’ supply of insulin for diabetics who cannot afford it.  The list is endless … and yet Elon bought himself this social media network and begin breaking it the very first day!

There is a direct inverse correlation between the amount of money a person has and the size of his conscience.  Oh sure, I know there are exceptions like Bill & Melinda Gates, Warren Buffett, and others, but … even they are left with billions more than they could use in a lifetime.  Take Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, who has given away $2.1 billion to causes such as the environment, education, and homelessness.  $2.1 billion is a lot of money worthy of kudos, until you consider that he is left with $184.8 billion in his own coffers.  The amount he gave away comes to just over 1% of his net worth … most people of average/moderate incomes typically give a higher percentage of their income than that to worthy causes.  And … Bezos spent more than twice the amount of his ‘philanthropy’, some $5.5 billion, for a ridiculous and pointless trip to space last year.

In short, Elon Musk wasted an obscene amount of money that could have helped millions of people in one way or another, then turned his purchase into a trash heap.  If he completes the destruction of Twitter before the end of the year, he’ll have one heck of a tax write-off next year!

Open Your Wallet, Rich Dude!!!

Posted on by under History, Law and justice, Political commentary, Social commentary

It’s no secret that I have very little use or respect for the ultra-wealthy.  Many rose to the top by climbing on the backs of the rest of us, while others were born with the proverbial ‘silver spoon’ in their mouth.  For the most part, those who have millions or billions in their investment portfolio look down on the rest of us and laugh, unwilling to share their wealth, uncaring whether we live or die.  For his 2023 budget, President Biden has included a serious tax on the ultra-wealthy and while I applaud it, I say it should be more, should cover every person who has more than six figures of net worth.  But who am I?  I’m not wealthy, never wanted to be.  To cut to the chase here … Robert Reich has written his thoughts on the proposal to raise taxes on the rich and he is far more knowledgeable than I, so I shall turn the floor over to him.

Really? A billionaire tax? Now? Are you kidding me?

Why it’s still a real possibility

Robert Reich

29 March 2022

President Biden’s budget, which came out yesterday, proposes a new minimum tax of 20 percent on households worth more than $100 million — which the White House says will reduce federal budget deficits by $1 trillion over a decade. The tax would apply only to the top 0.01 percent — the richest 1 percent of the richest 1 percent. Half of the expected $1 trillion in revenue would come from 704 households worth $1 billion or more.

If enacted, it would effectively prevent the wealthiest sliver of America from paying lower rates than middle-class families, while helping to generate revenues to fuel Biden’s domestic ambitions and keep the deficit in check relative to the U.S. economy.

Recall that America’s 704 billionaires have increased their wealth by $1.7 trillion since the start of the pandemic in February 2020, while most Americans have struggled to make ends meet. That means the billionaires could theoretically pay for everything Joe Biden and House Democrats have proposed — from childcare to climate measures — and still be as wealthy as they were at the start of the pandemic. Elon Musk’s pandemic gains, for example, could cover the cost of tuition for 5.5 million community college students and feed 29 million low-income public-school kids, while still leaving Musk richer than he was before Covid.

The dirty little secret is the ultra-rich don’t live off their paychecks. They live off their stock portfolios. Jeff Bezos’s salary from Amazon was $81,840 in 2020 yet he rakes in some $149,353 every minute from the soaring value of his Amazon stocks, which is how he affords five mansions, including one in Washington DC with 25 bathrooms. (Why would anyone want 25 bathrooms?)

So if you want to tax billionaires, you have to go after their wealth.

But does Biden’s plan have a snowball’s chance of getting this enacted in the hell called Washington? The problem is the old political chicken-and-egg: A big reason why the super-wealthy have done so well is they’ve bankrolled politicians who alter laws (such as tax laws) to give them even more wealth. They’ve bought armies of lobbyists to keep their taxes minuscule and create tax loopholes large enough to drive their Lamborghinis through.

ProPublica’s bombshell report last June showing America’s super-wealthy paying little or nothing in taxes revealed not only their humongous wealth but also how they’ve parlayed that wealth into political power to shrink their taxes. Jeff Bezos, the richest man in America, reportedly paid no federal income taxes in 2007 and 2011. Elon Musk, the second richest, paid none in 2018. Warren Buffett, often ranking number 3, paid a tax rate of 0.1 percent between 2014 and 2018.

All previous efforts to tax America’s super-rich have failed amid major political head winds. Republican senators obviously won’t bite the billionaire hands that feed them, and so – yet again – Biden needs every Democratic senator’s vote. But why would any sane person who has followed politics over the last year suppose that Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema will go along? Haven’t we been here before?

Yes, except that for months now Manchin has been on the receiving end of unremitting horse dung — not just from progressives but from establishment Democrats who accuse him of torpedoing any chance Biden and the Democrats have of retaining control over Congress after the midterms. Manchin has also been criticized by the mainstream press for taking big money from coal interests and then voting down climate measures (see yesterday’s New York Times front page feature story, here). In other words, Manchin badly needs some cred.

Manchin has also expressed concern about the size of the federal budget deficit. And in December, he told the White House he would support some version of a tax targeting billionaire wealth.

What really convinces me Biden’s billionaire tax stands a chance is that I doubt the White House would risk another big public loss to Manchin. After getting all hell beat out of them for building public expectations of passing Build Back Better, only to have Manchin kill it, Biden and his staff would not propose another big initiative unless Manchin had already given it the green light.

What about Sinema? She’ll go along with whatever Manchin ultimately votes for.

So a billionaire tax is by no means a dead. Even in this disappointing year, I’m staying hopeful.

The Banana States of America — Part I

Posted on by under Global Issues, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Social commentary

dana milbankA recent OpEd piece in The Washington Post by journalist Dana Milbank, carried the same title as this post … yes, I ‘borrowed’ it from him.  The premise of the article was that this 115th Congress is the most authoritarian in the history of the United States.  An excerpt from Mr. Milbank’s column …

“Hillary Clinton warns of a “full-fledged crisis in our democracy.” Rex Tillerson, the former secretary of state fired by President Trump, now warns that “American citizens are on a pathway to relinquishing our freedom.” (Too bad he didn’t say so when he was on the job.)

They are both correct, in a sense, but right now the fear of the United States going totalitarian doesn’t feel quite right. This crowd is too clownish to be Stalinist. Rather, the United States is turning into a banana republic …”

That is precisely what our friend Roger has been saying all along.  And he (Milbank, not Roger) goes on to cite some specific examples, such as …

“The president of the United States orders the Justice Department to investigate his political opponents. The Justice Department complies.

The president, The Post reports, personally urged the postmaster general to double the rate it charges Amazon, apparently because he doesn’t like the coverage by The Washington Post, owned by Amazon founder Jeffrey P. Bezos.”

But rather than dwell on the article, which you can read from the link above, I wanted to find out what, exactly, constitutes a ‘banana republic’, so I did some research.  Technically, the term ‘banana republic’ refers to a country that is politically unstable with an economy dependent upon the exportation of a limited-resource product, e.g. bananas, minerals, etc. But in today’s conversations, it became an epithet for a country whose governing institutions are corrupt, arbitrary, and generally inadequate.  Clownish.

I came across a list of ten criteria that defines a banana republic in the modern day usage.  The United States, at this point under the leadership of Donald Trump, fits the bill for 8 of the 10, the only two missing being ‘torture’ and ‘high unemployment rates’.  I think we should take a look at these points.  As I researched, pondered, and wrote, this piece well exceeded my self-imposed outer limit of 1,200 words, even though I trimmed as much as I felt it appropriate to trim.  Thus, this became, over the course of a few days, a two-part series.  This is Part I, and Part II will follow this afternoon.  I also subtly changed the direction of my thoughts as I read, studied and learned more.   Where feasible, I have included links for those who may wish to learn more. Please forgive my wordiness, but I do hope you will give some thought to what I am about to say.

#1 – Rising income inequality and a shrinking middle class.  This isn’t a new complaint, for five years ago, in 2013, a well-researched report in the Journal of Economic Perspectives asserted that the U.S. now has the highest income inequality and lowest upward mobility of any country in the developed world. They found that while the picture grows increasingly bleak for American’s embattled middle-class, “the share of total annual income received by the top 1% has more than doubled from 9% in 1976 to 20% in 2011.” And earlier this year, a report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development OECD also found that the U.S. now leads the developed industrialized world in income inequality.

#2 – Unchecked Police Corruption and an Ever-Expanding Police State. Let me just throw out a few names for you, folks, starting with Trayvon Martin, Philando Castile, Samuel DuBose, Freddie Gray, Sandra Bland, Walter Scott, and the list goes on … and on.  Unarmed black men and women who were killed by police only for the crime of … being black.  And in every case except that of Walter Scott, the police who did the killing walked away scot free.  But more … add to that the way immigration raids by ICE are conducted, the way drug raids are conducted, enhancements to FISA, and you see a pattern of an authoritarian police force.

#3 – Highest Incarceration Rate in the World.  The U.S. has an incarceration rate of 737 per 100,000!  The next highest is Russia, with 615 per 100,000 people.  Does this mean that U.S. citizens are the most criminal in nature?  No, not at all.  Much of it is due to the ‘war on drugs’, which has emphasized draconian sentences for nonviolent offenses.  The prison industrial complex has become quite a racket. From prison labor to construction companies to companies specializing in surveillance technology, imprisoning people is big business in the United States—and the sizable prison lobby has a major stake in keeping draconian drug laws on the books.

#4 – Corrupt Alliance of Big Business and Big Government.  Need I say more than gun-makers, NRA and Republicans in Congress?  Consider Benito Mussolini’s definition of fascism: the merger of state and corporate power. Consider the previously unchecked power of the too-big-to-fail banks.  And now, with Trump rolling back the Dodd-Frank banking regulations, we are returning to that state.  Banks, oil & coal companies, the gun manufacturers and others are holding hands with the Trump administration and the 115th Congress as regulations to protect the environment and the people are demolished.

To be continued …

Sold Downriver …

Posted on by under Political commentary

Once again, my friends, we are the lowest on the food chain when it comes to politics in the U.S. and once again, we have been played for a fool.  The tax bill that the two chambers of Congress quite quickly, in the grand scheme of things, given the complexity of the U.S. Tax Code, and given the fact that it is already proven to add trillions of dollars to the national debt, reconciled, has apparently the support of every damn republican in Congress.  Why?  Because it is giving We The People tax relief?  Nope.  Because their donors have told them to pass the bill or else, and because Trump is adamant, like a petulant child, that he must win at something, anything, before the end of the year.  Enter Senator Bob Corker.

corker

Senator Bob Corker, Traitor to the People of the United States of America

Tennessee Senator Bob Corker, a republican, announced his retirement from the Senate on Tuesday, 26 September, 2017, stating that he would not seek re-election next year.  Corker was one of the more ‘moderate’ republicans, not uber-right wing, but what they refer to these days as an ‘establishment republican’, whatever that is supposed to mean.  I was rather sad about his announcement in one way, for his kind, the kind that believe in bi-partisanship, in doing the right thing for the nation, are a dying breed, being squeezed out by the likes of Steve Bannon and his chosen few.  But, in another sense I was glad for two reasons: 1) it would open a seat in the 2018 mid-terms for a democrat to win, as there would be no incumbent advantage; 2) Corker now had nothing to lose … he didn’t need donor money next year and he no longer needed to pander to Trump in order to receive his endorsement.  He would be free to vote his conscience, and it appeared that perhaps he had a bit of one, after all.

I was buoyed when I heard him say, “I also believe the most important public service I have to offer our country could well occur over the next 15 months, and I want to be able to do that as thoughtfully and independently as I did the first 10 years and nine months of my Senate career.” It seemed to confirm that he would use his unique position to stand up to Trump and the “Freedom Caucus”.

And so, when the tax ‘reform’ bills of the House and Senate were said to be reconciled, I expected no less of Corker than the stance he took in late November/early December, saying he would not support any bill that would add to the federal deficit.

“At the end of the day, I am not able to cast aside my fiscal concerns and vote for legislation that I believe, based on the information I currently have, could deepen the debt burden on future generations.”

Fools that we are, we actually believed him.  And then on Friday, he went into a meeting with his “Nay” hat on, and came out with his “Yea” hat on.  What happened, my friend?  Moolah, dough, dinero, cash … that’s what happened.  There is virtually no change in the bill’s devastating effect on the federal budget deficit, yet Mr. Corker’s conscience flew out the window of that meeting room.

The conference report (reconciliation of the House and Senate versions of the bill) released last week does nothing to address Corker’s deficit concerns. But there was one small change to the bill, the incorporation of a clause that benefits owners of pass-through businesses with few employees but significant depreciable assets—such as, for example, owners of real estate LLCs. Well, now, isn’t that handy for one Donald Trump, real estate “mogul”?  But wait … it is also quite handy for soon-to-be ordinary citizen/businessman Bob Corker who is ranked the 4th wealthiest Senator in Congress.  His net worth?  $69,450,025.  Yes, my friends, $69 million and change.  Close your eyes and try to imagine seeing that on your bank statement or investment portfolio.

Under the new “tax reform” bill, I am willing to bet that Mr. Corker will pay a smaller percentage in taxes of his net income than you or I in 2018.  So, all of a sudden, it does not matter all that much after all if the federal deficit, and thus the national debt spiral out of control. Mr. Bob Corker will be sitting in his mansion, eating his steak and lobster, and saying, “So what?  I got mine.” And meanwhile, we have once again been sucker-punched, played for fools, and shown just how much conscience any of our elected officials have.

2018 is the year that we need to do some serious housecleaning, get every damn one of those cobwebs out of the dark corners, along with the abominable creatures who made them (my apologies to all the spiders in the world, for spiders are really quite benevolent as compared with the lot in Congress).

We The People need to take stock in what drives our voting habits, need to make sure that our friends on both sides of the aisle understand that at the present time, every republican member of Congress, and quite possibly many of the democrats as well, have been bought and paid for, lock, stock and barrel, by Trump’s friends, the wealthy 1%.  We all need to heed this wakeup call and understand in no uncertain terms that the United States of America is no longer a democratic republic, of the people, by the people and for the people, but rather a plutocracy: government of the rich, by the rich, and for the rich, gained by stepping on the broken backs of the poor.

We The People have been sold downriver, and we have little left to lose.  Let Us Rebel!!!