August, 24 2021, 08:20am EDT
American Billionaires Got 62% Richer During Pandemic -- Almost All That Wealth Growth Will Go Income-Tax Free, Showing Need For Biden's Tax Reforms & Investment Plans
New Report Finds More Than One Billion Dollars In DAF Grants Went to Other Commercial DAFs in 2019
WASHINGTON
America's billionaires have grown $1.8 trillion richer during the pandemic, their collective fortune skyrocketing by nearly two-thirds (62%) from just short of $3 trillion at the start of the COVID crisis on March 18, 2020, to $4.8 trillion on Aug. 17 of this year, according to a report from Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) and the Institute for Policy Studies Program on Inequality (IPS). [A table of the top 15 billionaires is below and the full data set is here.]
America's billionaire bonanza demonstrates the flaws in our current economic and tax systems President Biden and Democrats in Congress are trying to remedy by advancing a $3.5 trillion budget package, which has already passed the U.S. Senate and is being considered in the U.S. House today. If it becomes law through the budget reconciliation process this fall, it will aid communities and working families by making healthcare, eldercare, childcare, housing and education more affordable, investing in clean energy, expanding the Child Tax Credit and providing 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave. It will be paid for by making the wealthy and corporations pay their fair share of taxes, and it will not raise taxes on anyone making under $400,000 a year.
Not only did the wealth of billionaires grow, but so did their numbers: in March of last year, there were 614 Americans with 10-figure bank accounts; this August, there are 708. Their $1.8 trillion of increased wealth alone over 17 months, which will not be taxed unless they sell their assets, would pay for more than half of Biden's 10-year $3.5 trillion investment package.
"The unconscionable growth in billionaire wealth through the misery of the pandemic is the clearest case I can imagine for the progressive tax reform working its way through Congress," said Frank Clemente, ATF's executive director. "We have a historic opportunity this year to begin unrigging the tax code and rebalancing the economy through fairer taxes on the wealthy and corporations, including taxing wealth more like work, raising the corporate tax rate, and curbing corporate offshore tax dodging. We can't let the high-powered lobbyists for wealthy special interests stall this long-overdue reform."
"Billionaires have reaped an unseemly windfall at a time when hundreds of thousands of people have lost their lives and livelihoods." said Chuck Collins, of the Institute for Policy Studies, author of The Wealth Hoarders. "We should use this moment of extreme wealth inequality to fix a tax system tilted in favor of the wealthy and large corporations."
Sources: March 18, 2020 data: Forbes, "Forbes Publishes 34th Annual List Of Global Billionaires" March 18, 2020
August 17, 2021 data: Forbes, "The World's Real-Time Billionaires, Today's Winners and Losers," accessed August 17, 2021
The great good fortune of these billionaires over the past 17 months is all the more appalling when contrasted with the devastating impact of coronavirus on working people. Over 86 million Americans have lost jobs, almost 38 million have been sickened by the virus, and over 625,000 have died from it.
President Biden's investment proposals contained in the Senate-passed budget resolution would significantly improve Americans health by making private insurance in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges more affordable; closing the Medicaid coverage gap in 12 states that refuse to expand coverage under the ACA; expanding Medicare to cover dental, vision and hearing benefits; increasing long-term care benefits to help people afford home and community-based services; and lowering the cost of prescription drugs by giving Medicare the authority to negotiate lower drug prices with drug corporations.
Biden's proposed investments would reduce health insurance premiums for 9 million people, according to the White House, saving an average 60-year-old making $55,000 a year hundreds of dollars a month on their ACA insurance policy premium, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The cost of extending these subsidies is $163 billion over 10 years, per the Treasury Department. That means the $1.8 trillion increase in American billionaire wealth over the last 17 months could pay the entire 10-year cost of making healthcare more affordable for 9 million people more than 10 times over.
While these investments in healthcare would benefit millions of Americans and save money in the long run, the ballooning wealth of billionaires benefits no one but the super-rich. That's because the current tax code is riddled with loopholes and special breaks that allow the super wealthy to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.
Due to one of the code's biggest loopholes, increased wealth enjoyed by billionaires and other members of the richest 1%--for whom such wealth growth is the primary source of income--can go untaxed forever. The virtual tax-free status of billionaire wealth growth was highlighted recently by a report from ProPublica. It estimated that 25 top billionaires paid on average just 3.4% of their wealth-growth in federal income taxes and that several, including Jeff Bezos (worth $188 billion on Aug. 17) and Elon Musk (worth $175 billion), went multiple recent years paying zero federal income tax.
Even when taxed, the top tax rate on wealth-growth income is only about half that of wage income--20% vs. 37%. President Biden would end those special breaks on the wealth-growth income of millionaires and billionaires as part of his tax-reform package. Following are Biden's tax reforms that are expected to be a part of budget reconciliation legislation to be voted on in the fall, many of which will ensure billionaires start paying closer to their fair share of taxes:
- Tax wealth like work. People with more than $1 million a year in income will have to pay a top tax rate on the sale of stock and other assets that is the same as the top rate workers pay on wages. Biden also will close a loophole that often allows the wealthy to avoid paying taxes on investment gains for their entire lives. These reforms will raise $325 billion.
- Restore the top individual tax rate to 39.6% and stop avoidance of taxes by wealthy business owners that are used to fund healthcare. These two reforms will together raise $370 billion.
- Crack down on tax evasion by the wealthy, which will raise $700 billion.
- Raise the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%, leaving it still far below the 35% rate in 2017. Corporate taxes are largely paid by the owners of corporations, which means the stockholders. Billionaires are among the wealthiest 1% that own over half of all corporate stock. This reform will raise nearly $900 billion.
- Curb offshore corporate tax dodging by eliminating incentives to outsource jobs and shift profits to tax havens. This reform will raise more than $1 trillion.
A more direct way to tax billionaire wealth is to tax the wealth itself instead of just its growth. If the wealth tax proposed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren had been in effect in 2020, the nation's billionaires alone would have paid $114 billion for that year--and would pay an estimated combined total of $1.4 trillion over 10 years.
Poll after poll shows that Americans of all political persuasions and by large majorities believe that the wealthy and big corporations need to start paying their fair share of taxes. A June poll by ALG Research and Hart Research shows 62% of voters support Biden's proposed $4 trillion (at the time) investments in healthcare, childcare, education, clean energy and more--paid for by higher taxes on the rich and corporations.
March 18, 2020 is used as the unofficial beginning of the coronavirus crisis because by then mostfederaland state economic restrictions responding to the virus were in place. March 18 was also the date that Forbes picked to measure billionaire wealth for the 2020 edition of its annual billionaires' report, which provided a baseline that ATF and HCAN compare periodically with real-time data from the Forbes website. PolitiFact has favorably reviewed this methodology.
Institute for Policy Studies turns Ideas into Action for Peace, Justice and the Environment. We strengthen social movements with independent research, visionary thinking, and links to the grassroots, scholars and elected officials. I.F. Stone once called IPS "the think tank for the rest of us." Since 1963, we have empowered people to build healthy and democratic societies in communities, the US, and the world. Click here to learn more, or read the latest below.
LATEST NEWS
Israel Bombs Refugee Camps After Inking $5.2 Billion Deal for US F-15 Fighter Jets
"Despite overwhelming evidence that the Democratic Party's most devoted constituents wanted to end sales of weapons to Israel, the Biden administration kept sending them."
Nov 07, 2024
The Israeli military on Thursday bombarded refugee camps in northern and central Gaza hours after inking a $5.2 billion deal with the United States to acquire more than two dozen F-15 fighter jets made by the American aerospace giant Boeing.
The agreement, part of a broader military aid package approved by the Biden administration and the U.S. Congress earlier this year, was finalized hours after Vice President Kamala Harris lost the 2024 election to Republican nominee Donald Trump following a campaign in which she resisted calls to support an arms embargo against Israel.
Though Trump at times tried to posture as a pro-peace candidate during the race, he publicly and privately signaled support for Israel's war on Gaza and Lebanon, telling far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a recent call, "Do what you have to do."
Israel's Ministry of Defense called the F-15 deal "a landmark transaction" for fighter jets "equipped with cutting-edge weapons systems." The ministry said deliveries of the aircraft will begin in 2031.
"While focusing on immediate needs for advanced weaponry and ammunition at unprecedented levels, we're simultaneously investing in long-term strategic capabilities," the ministry said. "This F-15 squadron, alongside the third F-35 squadron procured earlier this year, represents a historic enhancement of our air power and strategic reach—capabilities that proved crucial during the current war."
Shortly following the announcement, Israeli forces killed at least 22 people in attacks on the Jabalia refugee camp and Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza—where Israel is engaged in an active campaign of ethnic cleansing—and on the Nuseirat refugee camp in the center of the Palestinian territory.
Norwegian Refugee Council secretary-general Jan Egeland, who traveled to areas of northern and central Gaza this week, said in a statement Thursday that the "complete destruction" he witnessed there was "worse than anything I could imagine as a long-time aid worker."
"What I saw and heard in the north of Gaza was a population pushed beyond breaking point," said Egeland. "Families torn apart, men and boys detained and separated from their loved ones, and families unable to even bury their dead. Some have gone days without food, drinking water is nowhere to be found. It is scene after scene of absolute despair."
"This is in no way a lawful response, a targeted operation of 'self-defense' to dismantle armed groups, or warfare consistent with humanitarian law," he added. "What Israel is doing here, with Western-supplied arms, is rendering a densely populated area uninhabitable for almost two million civilians."
As early as October 2023, NRC warned Israel, UK, US, Germany, & others, that Israeli "relocation orders" for civilian communities were forcible transfers, which under international law constitute an atrocity crime.
Since then there have been more than 60 "relocation orders"
1/2 pic.twitter.com/bsDvWKOqhY
— Jan Egeland (@NRC_Egeland) November 7, 2024
People here have been herded from unsafe location to unsafe location across the Gaza Strip.
They have lost everything, some having been forced to move more than 10 times.
Families I have spoken to here are enduring suffering almost unparalleled anywhere in recent history.
— Jan Egeland (@NRC_Egeland) November 7, 2024
Israel's latest deadly attacks on Gaza came after the conclusion of a U.S. election in which Gaza featured prominently, with Palestinian rights advocates warning that continued American support for Israel's assault would be politically damaging for Democrats—on top of being morally reprehensible and unlawful, given Israel's obstruction of humanitarian aid and repeated targeting of civilians.
New York Times writer Peter Beinart argued in a column Thursday that the election's outcome appeared to show that such concerns were justified.
"Despite overwhelming evidence that the Democratic Party's most devoted constituents wanted to end sales of weapons to Israel, the Biden administration kept sending them, even after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel expanded the war into Lebanon," Beinart wrote. "And not only did Ms. Harris not break with Mr. Biden's policy, she went out of her way to make voters who care about Palestinian rights feel unwelcome."
"There is only one path forward," Beinart continued. "Although it will require a fierce intraparty brawl, Democrats—who claim to respect human equality and international law—must begin to align their policies on Israel and Palestine with these broader principles. In this new era, in which supporting Palestinian freedom has become central to what it means to be progressive, the Palestinian exception is not just immoral. It's politically disastrous."
Layla Elabed and Abbas Alawieh, co-founders of the Uncommitted National Movement, said in a statement Wednesday that "while there are many factors at play" in Harris' loss, "one undeniable truth remains: Neglecting the voices of those impacted by war has consequences."
"Today, our message is clear: This moment requires more than resilience; it demands decisive action," said Elabed and Alawieh. "The Biden-Harris administration must put an end to the flow of weapons that fuel this cycle of violence. If they do not, the Democratic Party risks saddling our coalition of voters with the ever-increasing weight of a legacy intertwined with endless war and suffering."
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Sanders Slams 'Big Money Interests' and Consultants That Control Democratic Party After Loss to Trump
"While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change," said the Vermont Independent. "And they're right."
Nov 06, 2024
Shortly before Vice President Kamala Harris delivered her concession speech on Wednesday, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders forcefully called out Democratic Party leadership for losing the White House and at least one chamber of Congress to Republicans.
"It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working-class people would find that the working class has abandoned them," Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a statement. "First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well."
"While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change," said the senator, who decisively won reelection on Tuesday as Republicans reclaimed the upper chamber. "And they're right."
After seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020, Sanders spent this cycle campaigning for Harris, warning of Republican President-elect Donald Trump's return, blasting billionaire involvement in U.S. politics, and urging Democrats to better serve working people.
"Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? ...Probably not."
In Sanders' new statement, he highlighted U.S. income and wealth inequality, worker concerns about artificial intelligence, and the federal government's failure to provide paid leave and universal healthcare while pouring billions of dollars into Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
"Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful oligarchy which has so much economic and political power?" he asked. "Probably not."
"In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions," Sanders concluded. "Stay tuned."
Progressives—who have responded to Trump's Electoral College and popular vote win by criticizing billionaires who backed him and promising "unprecedented resistance" during his second term—echoed Sanders' remarks.
Sharing Sanders' statement on X—the social media platform owned by billionaire Trump backer Elon Musk—United Auto Workers (UAW) communications director Jonah Furman said: "The task has been clear for a decade. The question is only whether and when we will rise to the task."
Separately, the union's president, Shawn Fain, said in a Wednesday statement that "UAW members around the country clocked in today under the same threat they faced yesterday: unchecked corporate greed destroying our lives, our families, and our communities."
"We've said all along that no matter who is in the White House, our fight remains the same," Fain continued, pointing to the battle against "broken trade laws" like the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement and fights for good union jobs, a secure retirement for everyone, a living wage, affordable healthcare, and time for families.
"It's time for Washington, D.C. to put up or shut up, no matter the party, no matter the candidate," added Fain, whose union endorsed Harris. "Will our government stand with the working class, or keep doing the bidding of the billionaires? That's the question we face today. And that's the question we'll face tomorrow. The answer lies with us. No matter who's in office."
"Will our government stand with the working class, or keep doing the bidding of the billionaires?"
In a post-election column, Chuck Idelson, former communications senior strategist for National Nurses United, made the case that "amid the postmortems and reckoning that will now follow the wreckage of Donald Trump's return to 'absolute' power, as authorized by the Supreme Court, there are... two notes in particular that deserve a deeper dive."
"In Missouri, a state Trump won by 58%, voters also acted to increase the state's minimum wage to $15 an hour and to require employers to provide paid sick leave to workers," he pointed out. "In Nebraska, another red state won by Trump, voters also passed a paid sick leave measure, Initiative 436, by 75%."
In addition to the ballot measures, Idelson highlighted that "in the multitude of exit poll results, one particularly stands out—94% of registered Republicans voted for Trump, the exact same percentage he received in 2020. The heavy campaign focus on pulling away Republican voters from Trump turned out to be a pipe dream. The old cliché 'it's the economy stupid,' triumphed again."
Harris' campaign, he argued, "reflected the direction the Democratic Party establishment has taken, away from working-class issues since the advent of neoliberal policies in the 1970s and carried out by most Democratic Party presidents since."
Historian Harvey J. Kaye, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, took aim at the Democratic Party on social media Wednesday, noting failures to stand up to billionaires, raise the minimum wage, and pass the Richard L. Trumka Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act.
Morris Pearl, chair of the Patriotic Millionaires and a former managing director at BlackRock, said in a Wednesday statement that "a self-avowed authoritarian successfully wielded the economic frustrations of millions to win the most consequential election of our nation's history. The Democratic establishment has only itself to blame."
"Voters demanded a fundamental overhaul of a rigged economic system. When neoliberal Democrats dithered, Donald Trump offered to clear the board, and voters chose the dark unknown rather than the status quo," Pearl added. "The only question remaining is, why are Democrats surprised? This is the entirely predictable result of a multidecade strategy to appease the rich that met no serious resistance."
The Sunrise Movement—a youth-led climate group that worked to reach millions of young voters in swing states to defeat Trump—similarly stressed on social media Wednesday that "last night's results were a call for change. Millions of people are fed up after living through decades of a rigged economy and corrupt political system. They are looking for someone to blame. It's critical the Dem Party takes that seriously."
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"We can stop him, and we must," Sunrise said of Trump. "But it's going to take many thousands of people taking to the streets and preparing to strike. And it's going to take mass movements putting out a better vision for our country than Trumpism and proving that we can make it happen."
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Peace Advocates Fear Trump May Hand Israel 'Full Control of Gaza and the West Bank'
"We in the anti-war movement must redouble our efforts to end the genocide and wars in the Middle East," said one campaigner.
Nov 06, 2024
While many critics of U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris opposed the Democratic presidential nominee due to the Biden-Harris administration's nearly unconditional support for Israel's annihilation of Gaza, peace advocates on Wednesday warned that Republican President-elect Donald Trump could lift the few guardrails the Democrats had placed on Israel and unleash the key ally to seize all of Palestine.
"A Harris victory would not have stopped Israel's genocide in Gaza or drive to war across the Middle East, but Trump's racism, Islamophobia, and bigotry, and his close relationship with [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, could well enable Israel to pursue its desire for full control of Gaza and the West Bank," Lindsey German of the London-based Stop the War Coalition said in a statement.
"We face an extremely dangerous situation worldwide."
Israel has gradually and systematically seized more and more Palestinian lands since illegally occupying the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in 1967. The goal of Israel's far right is expansion of Israeli territory to include what proponents call "Greater Israel," which is based on biblical boundaries that stretched from Africa to Turkey to Mesopotamia. Netanyahu has repeatedly displayed maps showing the Middle East without Palestine, all of whose territory is shown as part of Israel.
On Wednesday, far-right Israelis including senior government officials like National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich celebrated Trump's win. They are openly plotting ways to steal more land, including by ethnically cleansing Palestinians during the current war on Gaza, through home demolitions and forced expulsions in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and by expanding Jewish-only apartheid settlements that are illegal under international law.
David Friedman, who served as U.S. ambassador to Israel during Trump's first term, recently released a book advocating Israel's annexation of all of Palestine, a policy "based first and foremost on biblical prophecies and values," according to the author. Friedman envisions a situation in Palestine akin to the U.S. conquest and rule of Puerto Rico, in which Palestinians don't have voting rights but are granted limited autonomy so long as they act in accordance with Israeli law.
Powerful Trump backers also support annexation. Republican megadonor Miriam Adelson's wish list for the president-elect's second term includes Israeli annexation of the West Bank and U.S. recognition of the move.
During Trump's first term, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo ended a 30-year State Department policy under which Israeli settler colonies in the occupied West Bank were viewed as inconsistent with international law. Pompeo later explained that as an evangelical Christian, his position was based on the biblical belief that Israel is God's "promised land" for his "chosen people," the Jews.
In February, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reversed the so-called Pompeo Doctrine, declaring Israeli settlements to be "inconsistent with international law"—even as he provided diplomatic cover for the war on Gaza for which Israel is on trial at the International Court of Justice for alleged genocide.
According to Israeli media reports, Trump has pushed Netanyahu to wrap up the Gaza war before he takes office next January. Many observers fear that could mean Israeli forces ramp up already devastating attacks that have killed more than 43,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, while wounding more than 102,000 others and displacing, starving, and sickening most of Gaza's population.
United Nations human rights officials said last week that Israeli forces are creating an "apocalyptic" situation in northern Gaza, where the invaders are being accused of carrying out the so-called General's Plan to starve and then ethnically cleanse Palestinians from parts of the coastal enclave in order to make way for Israeli recolonization.
"We face an extremely dangerous situation worldwide, with a growing arms race," warned German. "We in the anti-war movement must redouble our efforts to end the genocide and wars in the Middle East. We also need peace in Ukraine, for the West to stop arming Ukraine, and for an end to the escalation of militarism and conflict aimed at China in the Pacific."
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