As they accumulate more and more wealth, the very rich
have less need for society. At the same time, they've convinced
themselves that they made it on their own, and that contributing to
societal needs is unfair to them. There is ample evidence that this
small group of takers is giving up on the country that made it possible
for them to build huge fortunes.
1. They've Taken $25 Trillion of New Wealth While Paying Less TaxesThe 2013
Global Wealth Databook shows that U.S. wealth has increased from $47 trillion in 2008 to $72 trillion in mid-2013. But according to
U.S. Government Revenue figures, federal income taxes have gone DOWN from 2008 to 2012. Even worse, corporations
cut their tax rate in half.
American society has gained nothing from its massive wealth expansion. There's no
wealth tax, no
financial transaction tax, no way to ensure that infrastructure and public education are supported.
Just
how much have the super-rich taken over the past five years? Each of
the elite 5% -- the richest 12 million Americans -- gained, on average,
nearly a million dollars in financial wealth between 2008 and 2013.
2. For the First Time in History, They Believe They Don't Need the Rest of UsThe rich have always needed the middle class to work in their factories and buy their products. With globalization this is
no longer true. Their factories can be in China, producing goods for people in India or Europe or anywhere else in the world.
They
don't need our infrastructure for their
yachts and helicopters and
submarines. They pay for private schools for their kids, private security for their homes. They have
private emergency rooms to
avoid the health care hassle. All they need is an assortment of servants, who might be guest workers coming to America on
H2B visas, willing to work for less than a middle-class American can afford.
The sentiment is spreading from the super-rich to the merely rich. In 2005
Sandy Springs,
a wealthy suburb of Atlanta, stopped paying for most public services,
deciding instead to avoid subsidizing poorer residents of Fulton County
by hiring a "city outsourcer" called
CH2M to
manage everything except the police and fire departments. That includes
paving the roads, running the courts, issuing tickets, handling waste,
and various other public services. Several other towns followed suit.
Results
have been mixed, with some of CH2M's clients backing out or
renegotiating. But privatization keeps coming at us. Selective decisions
about public services threaten to worsen already destitute conditions
for many communities.
Detroit, of course, is at the forefront. According to an Urban Land Institute
report, "more municipalities may follow Detroit's example and abandon services in certain districts."
3. They Soaked the Middle Class, and Now Demand Cuts in the Middle-Class Retirement FundThe richest Americans take the greatest share of over
$2 trillion in Tax Expenditures, Tax Underpayments, Tax Haven holdings, and unpaid Corporate Taxes.
The
Social Security budget is
less than half of that. Yet much of Congress and many other wealthy
Americans think it should be cut. These are the same people who deprive
the American public of
$300 billion a year by not paying their full share of the payroll tax.
4. They Continue to Insist that They "Made It on Their Own"They didn't. Their fortunes derived in varying degrees - usually big degrees - from
public funding, which provided almost half of basic research funds into the 1980s, and even today supports about 60 percent of the
research performed at universities.
Businesses rely on
roads and seaports and airports to
ship their products, the FAA and TSA and Coast Guard and Department of
Transportation to safeguard them, a nationwide energy grid to power
their factories, communications towers and satellites to conduct online
business, the Department of Commerce to promote and safeguard
global markets, the U.S. Navy to monitor
shipping lanes, and FEMA to
clean up after them.
Apple, the
tax haven specialist, still does most of its product and
research development
in the United States, with US-educated engineers and computer
scientists. Google's business is based on the Internet, which started as
ARPANET, the Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency
computer network from the 1960s. The National Science Foundation funded
the
Digital Library Initiative research
at Stanford University that was adopted as the Google model. Microsoft
was started by our richest American, Bill Gates, whose success
derived at
least in part by taking the work of competitors and adapting it as his
own. Same with Steve Jobs, who admitted: "We have always been shameless
about stealing great ideas."
Companies like Pfizer and Merck have relied on basic research performed at the
National Institute of Health. A Congressional Budget Office
study reminds
us that The primary rationale for the government to play a role in
basic research is that private companies perform too little such
research themselves (relative to what is best for society).
5. As a Final Insult, Many of Them Desert the Country that Made Them RichMany
of the beneficiaries of American research and technology have abandoned
their country because of taxes. Like multinational companies that
rationalize the move by claiming to be citizens of the world, almost
2,000 Americans, and perhaps up to
8,000, have left their responsibilities behind for more favorable tax climates.
The most egregious example is
Eduardo Saverin,
who found safe refuge in the U.S. after his family was threatened in
Brazil, landed Mark Zuckerberg as a roommate at Harvard, benefited from
American technology to make
billions from his 4% share in Facebook, and then skipped out on his tax bill.
An Apt Summary?
Bernard Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot and member of the Forbes 400, had
this to say about any American who might object to all the greed: "Who gives a crap about some imbecile?"
Paul Buchheit is a college
teacher, a writer for progressive publications, and the founder and
developer of social justice and educational websites
(UsAgainstGreed.org, PayUpNow.org, RappingHistory.org).
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