Every Fortune Is Made By You

Why You Might Want To Read This: Perfect timing today, with the SpaceX IPO mania reaching its peak, to make a point that is probably obvious to many of my readers but still not spoken enough, explicitly, when we argue for higher income taxes and wealth taxes on the filthy rich—every single fortune in the history of humankind is made by US, not by an Elon Musk low-life. [by the way, if you are a regular reader, are you a paid subscriber yet so you can get archived subscriber-only posts for the bargain price of ONLY $50 a YEAR?]

Look, I love, as much as the next person, dunking on the truly despicable, very rich (“dunking” is an intentional hat-tip to the crazy NY Knicks win last night), who hoard massive amounts of wealth while millions can’t pay basic bills, go hungry, can’t afford a roof over their head and get sick and die because real health care is out of reach.

And, yes, the game is rigged: every corporate board is stocked with sycophants who shower CEOs and corporate owners with a king’s ransom of riches; a handful of venture capital monopolists reap the lion’s share of multi-billion dollar IPO market offerings; and the system is so riddled with corruption that the tax code is a gift to the army of accountants, lawyers and lobbyists who are the front-line enablers of the greatest transfer of wealth in human history.

And it’s getting much, much worse:

Fifteen years ago, the world’s billionaires collectively had $4.5 trillion.

By 2024, their wealth had more than tripled to $14.2 trillion.

Now, their combined wealth totals $20.1 trillion — an amount that is equivalent to nearly a fifth of the entire world’s total yearly output. [yours truly added the bold]

People are very aware of the chasm between the very rich and the rest of us. Over the past nine months or so, I’ve talked to hundreds of people in the streets and at many events about the need for a wealth tax. It’s one of the easiest pitches I’ve ever made in a lifetime of political outreach. Folks see the massive crisis today facing every state budget, and coming even harder down the road, in the layoffs of teachers or roads that are in shambles. It’s a 5-alarm emergency. I’m fairly certain wealth taxes would probably pass in every state with ballot initiative options (because, without ballot initiatives, state legislators, in both parties, will be easily bought off).

Which would save lots of folks jobs and fund a whole bunch of super important services—and, if this was 1789 France, the very rich would soon be trudging their way to the sharp edge of a guillotine.

BUT: Beyond the outrage of the obvious inequality, we need to harp on a much more basic, self-evident thought:

WE MADE THOSE FORTUNES.

EVERY SINGLE ONE.

Here’s what we did:

Every single fortune was built by the thousands, or tens of thousands, of workers who, each day make their way to a job, or, do so remotely. That goes for public sector workers, as well, who create broad societal fortunes that appear as great schools, public transit, beautiful parks and other day-to-day things most folks take for granted like garbage pick-up.

The taxes we paid, disproportionately higher than the super rich, underwrite the roads that workers use to get to the workplaces that turn out the value that make these m-fers rich, and provide things like Medicaid that is a lifeline to thousands of people who work for bottom-feeders like Wal-Mart who pay poverty wages.

A general strike, with no work and one paying taxes, would prove this simple point in about a week.

The bottom line: wealth taxes, and much higher income taxes, on the very rich are actually just a modest return to us on our collective investment.

I find the “we made every fortune” especially important in building the argument for excising the deeper rot: the belief in the “free market” and the ingrained bullshit that a single genius is the creator of wealth.

This ingrained bullshit knows no partisan boundaries. Whether you’ve got a Joe Biden who blesses the very rich (“God bless you all”) or a four-time bankrupt malignant narcissist who raids the U.S. Treasury for himself and others, and everything in between, there is a persistent narrative that forgives and encourages the amassing of criminal levels of wealth because hat’s the “free market working its magic”.

The audience for “we made those fortunes” is that same person who hates a (regressive) gas tax because it means a big hit on meager incomes but is, I can say with first-hand, in-the-street feedback, quite ready to embrace wealth taxes—especially if the pitch hugs/applauds/give ownership to the very “working class” person, who seems to be at the center of the daily obsession in elite political circles that tries all sorts of consultant-driven potions and magic to “sell” itself, for being the source of all created wealth.

It’s not complicated.