I hear this a lot, that 12 people control half the wealth of the world, but it seems like just another bit of trivia to most people. The list says a lot to me.
Topping it is makeup and handbags. Getting rich off keeping women second class. Then the guy who says hate speech is free speech. Then control of the marketplace. Some computer guys, lots of media, including social media. They are all beyond regulation.
Yes, interestingly there are more chemists employed in the cosmetics industry than in the coatings industry.
I happened to hear a Robert Reich lecture this morning, where he said, “it’s not about the rich people being bad.” I think some are, but it’s more about the system being rigged in a way that harms a lot of people. This happened over generations, not some secret group in a room somewhere.
The richness is about wealth. If one of them decided to start giving it away, it would harm their stock price, people would lose jobs, and a few would get helped, but many would suffer. That’s the problem, even if they wanted to be good with their riches, they couldn’t stay rich if they were too good.
That’s a broad brush, it depends on my definition of “good”, but I hope you get the idea.
I would like not to depend on whether billionaires are good. I’d be happy if they (and corporations) were just taxed more fairly.
There’s one for you, nineteen for me
That’s George singing about the 95% tax bracket he was in. I think life was pretty good back then.