'Global Oligarchy' Reigns as Top 1% Controls More Wealth Than Bottom 95% of Humanity
'Global Oligarchy' Reigns as Top 1% Controls More Wealth Than Bottom 95% of Humanity | Common Dreams
FYI (and I expect to be downvoted because y'all don't want to hear this), but when an article talks about the "global 1%" it's probably talking about YOU.
Yes, you. And me. And probably most of the people reading this, who live in the US or another Western country and consider themselves "middle class." WE are the global 1%.
From https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/9/15/23874111/charity-philanthropy-americans-global-rich :
If you earn $60,000 a year after tax and you don’t have kids, you’re in the richest 1 percent of the world’s population.
Also, if you prefer to measure by wealth instead of income, that's lower than you think, too. I'm having trouble finding a more recent figure, but as of 2018, the threshold to be considered global 1% in terms of net worth was only $871,320. No, didn't typo: it really is only hundreds of thousands, not millions or billions.
(The billionaires are more like the 0.01%.)
This is some wild reverse temporarily embarrassed millionaire bullshit right here.
No matter how many times you repeat this responsability shifting nonsense, it won't ever make the people earning 60k responsible for what billionaires are doing.
Maybe visualising the scale of the numbers being discussed will help you see what a joke your comment is.
(E: fixed link)
But what's your point? Are people making $60k/year causing world hunger through artificial scarcity or is it the greed and mental illness of the capitalist class?
Only $800k net worth? Who the hell in middle class America has that? If they did, then homeownership would be less of an issue.
Only $800k net worth? Who the hell in middle class America has that?
Homeowners near retirement age, basically. Much of that net worth would be their home value, and the rest would be in their 401k/IRA.
(Keep in mind that in order to achieve a "modest but comfortable" $40k/year middle-class retirement, you need $1M assets (not including your residence) to achieve a 4% safe withdrawal rate. Basically, you have to be a millionaire by retirement just to avoid poverty.)
1% of 8 billion is only 80 million. I wouldn't say most Americans are in the 1% when the 80 million is spread around the world.
I don't know how this keeps getting trotted out and up voted. I swear it gets dunked on every time.
Not just Americans. First world nations in general. That's about 20% of the population in there, so the top 5% of US, Europe, Japan, Australia, etc. We're talking the upper middle class. $100K pre-tax gets you there easily, and thanks to rising prices of housing, I doubt most of them feel very rich at all.
The billionaires are holding big numbers as well, and there's a few of those dotted around the world, but I'd imagine they're mostly concentrated in first world countries. If you can live anywhere, why would you live in a craphole?
I don't feel like an oligarch.
Yeah, where's my yacht?
Yes, you. And me. And probably most of the people reading this, who live in the US or another Western country
Not quite. 1% of global population is ~80 million people. There are about a billion people in the highly developed nations (US, Canada, Western Europe, Japan, South Korea, and some minor others). So the top 8% of the golden billion, if we assume all in the US, the top ~25% of the country.
That "study" is a charity trying to guilt people into giving money. When you adjust for PPP it becomes quite a different story. The media loves it because it drives clicks but it's literally just a calculator to guilt you and a list of approved charities.
This is what Oxfam has to say, from the actual article.
The immense concentration of wealth, driven significantly by increased monopolistic corporate power, has allowed large corporations and the ultrarich who exercise control over them to use their vast resources to shape global rules in their favor, often at the expense of everyone else.
The immense concentration of wealth, driven significantly by increased monopolistic corporate power, has allowed large corporations and the ultrarich who exercise control over them to use their vast resources to shape global rules in their favor, often at the expense of everyone else.
This is literally everything.
Aside from the bullshit religion is responsible for, the vast majority of the issues with the whole world is down to this. Government of the corporation, by the corporation, for the corporation.
Most Americans won't have that much wealth even in retirement.
Middle class people worth 800 grand these days, and earn over 60 grand where you live? Damn.
Upper middle class maybe, sure, but middle class mostly doesn't exist any more, mostly it's people scraping by on a mortgage trying to act like they're still middle class :-(
wheres my superyacht
OK so I'm a millennial worth $-35,600, that's a negative net worth thanks to student loans and the fact that owning anything is outside of my shirt on my back is basically been priced out.
So a net worth of close to $900,000 is feeling a lot like a whole fuck ton of money to me. And probably a lot of other people nowhere fucking near that.
Just cause we live in "western" countries does not make it immediately that we are anywhere near the 1% either. It's 1% for a reason. Just more of that 1% live in western worlds cause that's where they want to live. Don't think of it as some slam dunk.
I'd say it's also relative to an area's COL. Not technically, but practically. Sure I'm living great compared to many. The kleptocrats are the ones killing us all, including the habitat they need to survive. But hey, as long as they live longest with the most money, it's all cake.
Oh thank God I'm still not the 1%. Average wage in the US is 45k and I'm not even making that
Average wage in the US is a lot more than 45k. Sorry to hear about your financial situation, we don't even try to make the economy work for most people.
"The national average salary in the U.S. in Q4 of 2023 was $59,384"
In addition to the problems with this that others have stated, this also ignores the wealth distribution among that 1%. Like how much does that 95% go down if we limit it to the top 0.1%? 0.01%?
Yes but what about the 1% if that 1%
Then tax the first world?
FYI (and I expect to be downvoted because y’all don’t want to hear this), but when an article talks about the “global 1%” it’s probably talking about YOU.
Came here to mention this, but I learned I'm only in the top 1% of income and not wealth so I feel a little better about myself.
'Global Oligarchy' Reigns as Top 1% Controls More Wealth Than Bottom 95% of Humanity
Excellent wording.
The swine have gorged their fill
Three thousand masters,
all demanding their till
They'll call us savages
Cause we eat what we kill
Very nice. Is that a quote from something, or you come up with it yerself? (Yes I Googled it, but that doesn't turn up shit these days.)
I mashed it together from some Fit For An Autopsy songs. Every lyric they write just slaps with the times.
Sounds like an easy problem to solve: seize their assets and enact Pinochet-style methods to make them shut up if they complain too much.
Your target is three rungs above you on the corporate ladder. If you have more than 3 rungs below you, there is a guillotine with your name on it.
Although more and more are cutting middle managers. All the more profit for them before they jump out with their golden parachute.
Let's invite them all to a wedding of a fake international pop star and start playing the rains of castemere.
I hear billionaire pot pie tastes great. The ketamine cooks right out.
Pretty soon that devine right of kings and thing is going to look laughable by comparison.
Kings were nowhere near this rich, or powerful.
Huh. I feel like I recall that “95” as a “70” in the disconcertingly recent past.
Wheeeeeee hypercapitalism 😑
COVID did wonders for the wealth concentration of billionaires... Mom and pops close down, billionaires can ride it out and if anything made profit.