I’m willing to make a simple bet. If Jeff Bezos’ and Elon Musks’ wealth were reduced to $100 million dollars from triple-digit billions, we’d still have same-day shipping and Teslas.

A nice use for that money might be paying for national healthcare that actually heals people without bringing medical bankruptcy into play. About that - did you know that medical bills are the number one cited cause of American bankruptcies? Fun stuff.

This edition’s crop of short videos are about the un-checked explosion of privately hoarded wealth and how little of it makes it back into public coffers. Somehow, it’s all considered “legal”.

And check it out. 22nd United States Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich, is a fan.

Making Billions. Avoiding Taxes.

Video Transcript

This just in: no one has more wealth and avoids more taxes than American billionaires. Elon included. Here's a Pro-Publica study about that. The wealth of the 25 richest Americans went up $401 billion from 2014 to 2018. They paid $13.6 billion in federal income taxes for those five years. That means a true tax rate of 3.4% and sometimes lower. Here's the wall of shame. The median American household earned about $70,000 and paid 14% in federal taxes. 3.4% for billionaires 14% for the middle class. Maybe you're thinking of that $11 billion tax bill that Elon Musk *might* pay. If he did, that would be under 4% of his net worth. So it's the same old story. Billionaires have all the power they make the rules for themselves and they keep us fighting so that they can get away with it.

10 people. Trillions in wealth.

Video Transcript:

Robert Reich @RBReich

During the first two years of Covid, the world’s ten richest men doubled their fortunes. These 10 men now hold $1,500,000,000,000 in wealth. Meanwhile, the incomes of 99% of humanity fell. 160 million people were forced into poverty. Inequality is tearing our world apart.

11:34 PM ∙ Jan 19, 2022

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Hello America. And let me introduce the simple concept of reducing the wealth of these 10 men from levels that are obscene to levels that are merely outrageous. We could do this through an act of working-class solidarity, where everybody who works for a living and has to do that comes together and decides that $100 million is enough for a single person, and even that is outrageous. We could then decide to use the balance of the funds to pay for shit that would make us truly great, like health care that doesn't kill you. That's it.

Runaway Wealth Explodes During Pandemic

Video Transcript:

Public Citizen @Public_Citizen

Elon Musk got $243,500,000,000 richer during the pandemic. Jeff Bezos got $75,000,000,000 richer during the pandemic. Mark Zuckerberg got $62,800,000,000 richer during the pandemic. Meanwhile, over 160 million more people were forced into poverty.

8:15 PM ∙ Jan 23, 2022

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Are we okay with this? It's too much, right? Like this is... this is too much. It puts us all in the same boat. It's so much that all of us are in the same boat. If you have a crazy opinion that I disagree with, we agree that this is not correct. They couldn't have made this much money without us. The money and value we create, it's all being funneled to the people who captured the system and wrote the rules, so they got all the money, right? We agree. But if enough working-class people, people who have to work for a living, demanded that this stop and change and we actually kept that money like we used to that would... we can do that, right? We can agree? I'm asking for me.

But fear not friends, the power is ours when we choose to take it. If enough people who have to work for a living stand together and make demands, many things become possible.

JR