The article implies that Jeff Bezos, the most massive wealth in the
world, should spend his fortune to help people who are in need instead of focus
on his space travel project called Blue Origin.
Bezos has a deep interest in space and has been studying it since he was
a 5-year-old boy." He rationalizes his spending on space by noting that he
does not have many alternatives to spend his fortune. He underlines to save
earth for our grandchildren; he plans to have millions even trillion people in
space with lower access costs.
On the other side, hundreds of millions of vulnerable children live
without access to primary health care or education. Every year, about 5.6
million children under the age of five dies. Millions of children have no
access to sufficient public schools with qualified teachers, electricity,
books, and hygiene facilities, leading them to leave school without basic
skills required for the 21st century.
Therefore, according to the article, there are several reasons why Bezos
needs to prioritize first and foremost spending his money on hundreds of
millions of children who lack access to basic health care and schooling.
Firstly, the effect of the digital age led to the condition where
winner-take-all markets. Those who
work on technologies such as Mack Zuckerberg and Bezos earn their fortune by
harvesting our data. They then are given patents that create 20-year artificial
monopolies on technologies that are supposed to be in the public domain.
Moreover, much of the super-rich's wealth comes from the redistribution of
income from low-skilled workers, whose jobs and earnings are being lost to
robots and artificial intelligence. Based on Forbes magazine, in these past
dozen years, the number of billionaires and their net worth have both roughly
tripled, from 793 billionaires with $2.6 trillion in net worth in 2006 to
around 2,200 billionaires with $9.1 trillion as of March in 2018.
Secondly, the billionaires optimize media power to influence our
representative to represent them instead of people at large. They aim to promote a fiscal race to the bottom,
government deregulation of the business environment, or reduce tax rates to
attract or retain economic activity in their jurisdictions. The outcome, such
as massive deficits and debt, might be left for us in the future.
Thirdly, the wealth for those one percent is increasing rapidly. In 2010, Gates made a vow to give away at least
half of his fortune and called for other affluent people to do the same. He was
worth 53 billion dollars at that moment. His net worth is $94.8 billion tin
2018. Moreover, over the past eight years, fewer than 10% (200) of the
billionaires have joined the Giving Pledge, committed to giving the majority of
their wealth to address some of society's most pressing problems. Even worse,
their actual giving has no reporting or transparency.
Their small percentage of wealth could dramatically improve the lives of
hundreds of millions of people. UNESCO estimates a global financing gap for
education is $39 billion per year; WHO professionals estimate a global
financing gap for health is $20-$54 billion. Whereas, a mere 1% of the net
worth of billionaires per year will amount to approximately $91 billion, a sum
that could guarantee access to health care and education for the world's most
impoverished children.
Therefore, it is wiser for those at the top richest to contribute more
to solving pressing problems in the earth. If they are not willing to do it
voluntarily, Governments should enforce a mega-wealthy tax.
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