Millions of people are being forced deeper into poverty as the ultra-rich increase their wealth. People in the US and around the world struggle to pay the high costs of food, gas, and other necessities, yet over the past two years, the richest 1% have secured nearly twice as much wealth as the rest of the world combined. How is this possible?
Most people believe billionaires are there to help the economy, this is a total NO in most cases. Their very billions are earned because of cheap labor, and cheap labor is available because of poverty. More poverty creates more billionaires. They are rich because they utilze the opportunities coming from developing and poor nations.
In short, billionaires are bad for the economy. How bad? Check out these top four ways:
Ultimately in a capitalist based society there will always be some people at the super rich end of the spectrum, however it does feel like wealth has gotten more out of whack in the last couple centuries. It's hard to find a balance though, because you need strong laws that push back on wealth at the expense of society and those laws need to be carefully crafted to prevent the endless assault of accountants who minimize profits on paper but cash out vast amounts to the owners. Globalization has also made it extremely hard to make sure the richest are paying their fair share, because they can often threaten (or do already in reality) to move their money elsewhere and reduce the already pitiful tax amounts they pay.