April 20, 2015

Walmart Heir Does Not Deserve Assets It Would Take a Worker a Million Years to Earn

Walmart Heir Does Not Deserve Assets It Would Take a Worker a Million Years to Earn

"So try and wrap your head around the two statistics cited above: 1) Six people (Walmart heirs) have passive net worth - the money is inherited through stock; they don't need to do anything to earn it - equal to more than the bottom 40% of the people in the US; and 2) It would take a Walmart employee working a 12-hour day a million years to earn just one Walmart heir's financial assets.

Think of these two figures as the 2016 political campaign unfolds and you hear many politicians call for an increase in "economic opportunity." It is a disingenuous term because it implies that the problem with the economy is not that money has been massively redistributed upward in the last few decades, but rather that we need a more "pro-business" environment. This is a canard, because loosening regulations and lowering taxes on the wealthy over many years has led to a giant economic chasm between the haves and have-nots, not narrowed it.

Income inequality is going to be talked about a lot less, by Republicans and most Democrats. Income inequality, when fully exposed, explodes the myth of trickle down economics in which wealth, in reality, is redistributed to the rich from the pockets of the working class and poor."