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Saturday, October 15, 2011

Does Capitalism Work for the Many?

Should one human have a billion dollars at their disposal? It would seem an indictment of capitalism that such things can occur. But they do and now we have lots of billionaires. That kind of concentration of wealth into the hands of the few is unsustainable. Should an Oprah have billions and billions of dollars?Should a Bill Gates? Some would say the good provided is worth the payout,but in our wired world of five billion people and three and a half billion jobs, it just doesn't make sense.

Behind the OWS movement is a basic proposition: capitalism favors the few at the expense of the many. The few are people who game the system and make the billions. And why shouldn't they? They are smart enough to do that. But we are all on the same planet and just because one person can have the intelligence or luck to make a billion dollars should society permit that kind of inequity?

The problem is people don't share. Even if the President proposed a tax on billionaires it would never pass the congress because the billionaires can buy the congressmen. Even this rarefied world of billionaires could cry class warfare and say people are taking from them unjustly. We would like think that a sort of mega philanthropy would kick in for people at this leve,l but money has a nasty habit of staying in the same circles.

Capitalism allows anyone to become a billionaire in theory. But becoming a billionaire is largely a fluke in a system that allows one individual to prosper at the expense of the many. It would seem the many are starting to wake up.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/

Books by William Hazelgrove