3.4 Times What Medicare Approves

Conservatives have figured out how to scare Americans with centrist or leftist leanings to their self-defeating, tax-savings-that-benefit-the-rich position: call anything you want to destroy “socialist.” Even if you misuse the word, those used to outsource their opinions to conservative proselytizers will look no further than that word to hate what is proposed. Forget that “socialism” really means government owns all the business/production and real estate values. That description would seem to better fit the one percenters. If you want a more detailed set of definitions, see my December 17th blog, Socialism, Communism and Social Programs.

Historically, the bugaboo over “socialism” was born in the growing American disdain for and the continuing threat from what became the “scourge of communism” that began in the first half of the twentieth century. Communism was, after all, a form of socialism, albeit imposition of socialism by brute force and annihilation of any opposition. For older Americans, the fear response is triggered by memories of “duck and cover,” the red “scare,” HUAC and the McCarthy hearings, the Korean War, the “domino theory” that hoisted us into the Vietnam war and the litany of “spy vs spy.”

For Americans born after 1991, “communism” is reflected in the skyscrapers towering over Beijing and Shanghai, rippling with economic power and a huge middle class, hardly the dingy gray uniform government-issued apartment buildings, drab clothing, food rationing and empty shelves in all forms of government-run retail that were associated with the Soviet Union and Maoist China. The word “communist” became such an anomaly in what sure looked like a capitalist China, that when challenged by this inconsistency, Jiang Zemin (PRC President from 1993-2003) was forced to say, “Communism is what we say it is.” Bottom line: to younger Americans, “socialism” just another word, to many a notion of egalitarian politics that actually seems appealing to many millennials and Z generation.

The only real fight against guaranteed universal healthcare in the United States, the only developed nation without such a program, is based on a notion that such a system represents “creeping socialism.” On average, compared with other developed countries, the per capita cost of medical care in the United States is double. Writing for the January 26th Los Angeles Times, David Lazarus, explains how absurd our healthcare system truly is: “Opponents of ‘Medicare for all’ and other single-payer insurance systems routinely decry what they call ‘socialized medicine,’ insisting that private companies can do a better job of providing affordable treatment than a government entity.

“If that were true, of course, Americans wouldn’t spend about twice per person what people in other developed countries spend for healthcare yet have less to show for it… Despite the $3.5 trillion we shell out annually on medical treatment, Americans have a shorter life expectancy and higher rates of infant mortality than our economic peers — two key measures of healthcare efficacy.

“But the real proof of the pudding can be found in the bills we receive from hospitals and insurers, which typically feature jaw-dropping charges and what patients are supposed to believe are significant savings thanks to the shrewd negotiating skills of their coverage providers… What they actually show are a system wildly out of touch with reality.” Funny how in Germany, that uniform, universal healthcare system, guaranteed by the government and absolutely loved by the German people, is actually administered through privately held German insurance companies. All prices are uniform, and all prescription drugs are approved and then priced by the government. There are no medical bankruptcies in Germany.

Lazarus drills down on one specific example, 82-year-old Tony Summers who had a successful, three-hour sinus surgery on an outpatient basis at San Diego’s Scripps Mercy Surgery Pavilion. Although his copay was slightly less than $1200, Summers was astounded at the breakdown of the invoiced services: about $5,000 for the surgeon and the anesthesiologist and $77,000 for “medical services” (“the facility, the surgical room, the equipment, the support staff”). Huh? Summers’ government retirement carrier approved, and Scripps “accepted the amount that Medicare or Medicaid allowed for this care,” which was $5,869.

Lazarus: “If Medicare has determined on behalf of its 68 million beneficiaries that a procedure should cost less than $6,000, how on Earth does a hospital cook up a bill approaching $80,000?... And if we assume that Medicare’s rate represents fair value — that is, the doctor or hospital isn’t losing money providing treatment for this amount — how is it even possible that a patient’s bill could be more than 1,200% higher?” Presumably what someone without medical insurance would be billed! While most hospitals generally do not top a multiple of ten times what Medicare will approve in their general invoicing – Scripps was particularly outrageous by any standard – the average mark-up is 3.4 times. All of these mark-ups are suspicious.

While the Biden administration is doing away with “surprise” medical bills – from doctors the patient did not choose who are assigned to a procedure but are outside the insurance carrier’s approved network – unless and until we can address the totality of our medical coverage to mandate uniform reasonableness, the billing horribles described in the blog will simply continue. When you get your vocabulary straight and look at the hard numbers, if we really want to spend vastly less as a nation on medical care today… yet improve the product… we better be marching towards a single payer universal healthcare model, one that has worked well in every other developed nation on earth. 

The United States watched US automakers shifting significant operations to Canada in the 1970s and beyond. The cost to manufacture a car was essentially the same, except for the $1500/$2000 per vehicle in US union-mandated healthcare coverage, coverage that was not required for Canadian workers who all had their government-provided medical services. Universal healthcare was good for business! For those who decry Canada’s system, where delays can happen (they happen here too in a private system), note that most Canadians would give up watching and playing ice hockey if that were the price to preserve their healthcare system.

I’m Peter Dekom, and for those who actually believe that the United States has the best healthcare system on earth, they must be thinking of the richest in the land who don’t care about costs… not average Americans who just get what they can.

Kostumes, the Klan & Ko-Konspirators

  According to the Smithsonian Magazine (1/13/16), “Klansmen wore gigantic animal horns, fake beards, coon-skin caps, or polka-dotted paper hats; they imitated French accents or barnyard animals; they played guitars to serenade victims. Some Klansmen wore pointed hats suggestive of wizards, dunces, or Pierrots; some wore everyday winter hoods, pillowcases, or flour sacks on their heads. Many early Klansman also wore blackface, simultaneously scapegoating and mocking their victims...

“During the Reconstruction era (1865-1877), this variety was what helped keep early versions of the Klan a secret. While testimonies from witnesses referenced the outlandish costumes, people in power denied that these attacks were evidence of efforts by a coordinated hate group. In 1890, with the ushering in of the Jim Crow laws, the Klan's first iteration mostly disbanded, as their prejudices had been successfully codified into law— meaning there was no need for lynch mobs to hide their faces and identities.” KKK policy was then embedded in local laws.

The second iteration of the Ku Klux Klan began with a sputter in 1915, when the traditional white robes and pointed hood became Klan standard, and exploded with the glorification of the Klan in David Wark Griffith’s Birth of a Nation released in that year. By the 1920s, the Klan grew into a massive body of White Supremacists. Supported by clearly racist presidents (Woodrow Wilson and Warren Harding), by 1925 the Klan was able to stage massive marches in Washington, D.C. with their faces exposed (see above picture). To say black Americans faced brutality, death, discrimination, forced racial separation with voting pretty much out of the question… well that is an understatement, at least in the deep South, until the civil rights movements of the 1960s.

For whatever reason, white supremacy seems enamored of fire symbols – torches like those above from the August 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia reminiscent of KKK cross burnings – and costumes. White Supremacists and other extremists are particularly fond of long guns, constantly referencing their purported Second Amendment rights to bear arms… everywhere, but particularly at political gatherings.

In April, in serious opposition to Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s COVID restrictions, dozens of protesters, some of whom were armed (pictured with flags and guns above), gathered at the state capitol. Later that year, “A federal grand jury has charged six men with conspiring to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in what investigators say was a plot by anti-government extremists who were angry over her coronavirus policies.” NBC News, December 17th. That last picture is of self-described QAnon leader, Jacob Chansley, one of those arrested in connection with the Capitol break-in on January 6th. Camouflage jackets and other military apparel (some reflecting actual military service) are also popular. 

These costumes and symbols, expressions of extremism, are nothing new. “Like the early Ku Klux Klan, the viral spread of the QAnon conspiracy theory has been driven through spectacle. Chansley admitted as much. He has commented that his costume gets people’s attention, which then gives him the opportunity to spread the tenets of the conspiracy theory: that the world’s governments and banks are run by secret rings of Satan-worshipping pedophiles that manage child sex-trafficking organizations.

“Other members of the movement are keenly aware of how their clothing can work to influence others… Doug Jensen, the man seen in a viral video at the head of a mob chasing a police officer through the Capitol building, said in an interview that he purposefully positioned himself leading the charge wearing a ‘Q’ shirt so that ‘Q’ could ‘get the credit.’” FastCompany.com, January 26th.

Many of those who entered the Capitol on January 6th, despite the violence and the damage, cannot believe that they can be convicted of any crime because the Capitol is “our house” and they were clearly invited to the Capitol by the President of the United States. Reactions such as these are typical: “A retired firefighter from Long Island, New York, texted a video of himself in the Capitol rotunda to his girlfriend’s brother, saying he was ‘at the tip of the spear,’ officials said. The brother happened to be a federal agent with the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service, who turned the video over to the FBI. A lawyer for the man, Thomas Fee, said that he ‘was not part of any attempt to take over the U.S. Capitol’ and that ‘the allegation is that he merely walked through an open door into the Capitol — nothing more.’

“Another man who was inside the Capitol was willing to rat out another rioter who stole House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s lectern and emailed the video to an FBI agent, even signing his own name to it. ‘Hello Nice FBI Lady,’ he wrote, ‘Here are the links to the videos. Looks like Podium Guy is in one of them, less the podium. Let me know if you need anything else.’…

“[Does bode badly for Donald Trump’s upcoming Senate trial?] Unlike criminal cases, impeachment trials do not have specific evidence rules so anything said and done that day can be used. And several of the people charged have said in interviews with reporters or federal agents that they were simply listening to the president when they marched to the Capitol.” Associated Press, January 26th. Still, Republican opposition to convicting Trump is very strong.

Whether they are armed militia groups with helmets and flak jackets, rifle-toting marchers wearing Hawaiian shirts or horned crazies yelling nasty slogans, it seems pretty clear these white supremacists intend to intimidate and force their will on the rest of us. So much for democracy. That so many American believe that the November election was fraudulent, to the point of supporting and encouraging what would have been a violent overthrow of the US government, is shocking…  but those feelings will dictate whether there is a remote chance of bipartisan unity… or the same-old/same-old pattern of congressional blockage, delay and gridlock.

I’m Peter Dekom, and this right wing, white supremacist (American “nativist”) movement is not going anywhere for a long time.

Science vs Tyranny

If there is indeed a correlation between higher education and more liberal views, that’s a pretty strong basis for letting our public primary and secondary educational systems, and our support for public higher education, erode… if you are a conservative hell-bent on retaining power. If that were true. For those who are antagonized by the notion of panty-waisted academics and isolated ivory tower professors, who slide into the highest reaches of government bureaucracies and who seem to be running roughshod over the rights and prosperity of ordinary Americans, there is a strong belief in the evil disconnect with those “elites.” Too many Americans with a high school education or less, or those blue-collar workers in now obsolescent industries, often conflate knowledge with out-of-touch elitism. When pressed, they seem unwilling to avoid medical professionals (doctors are elites under the classic definition of “elite”) when it comes to addressing a health problem, pointing out a most basic problem with their approach. 

We are still falling, by international standards, in measurement of reading comprehension, mathematics and science… the basic elements of the international educational ranking by the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the current primary global standard tracking 79 countries. Looking at average 15-year-olds, the last measurement was in 2018, where the United States was 38th in math, 14th in reading, and 19th in science. China was first in all three categories. We used to be. Makes you feel all rosy and fuzzy inside? But maybe, just maybe, we trust nerdy scientists more than we think. After all, Dr. Anthony Fauci, as nerdy as it gets, is now a national hero.

We have lived through four years of science denial, noting that science is actually very mathematically driven. Top governmental leadership has implemented an official program denial and anti-science practices. Educational budgets, state and federal, have been cut under a notion of prudent fiscal policies (but tax cuts for the rich were vastly increased). These US anti-science, anti-educational governmental trends have resulted in a developed nation, the only one without national healthcare, that accounts for a mere 4% of the global population, generating 25% of the planet’s COVID-19 infections, 20% of COVID-19 deaths, creating the worst decimation of the American economy since the Great Depression.

As we have withdrawn government support from education, we still live in a world where the “ordinary” for a good job now requires some post-high school education (preferably a degree). With almost 60% of college age younger Americans getting at least some advanced education, we have pulled the economic rug out from under their feet by increasing tuition at a multiple of the cost, reduced need-based grants and shoved the bulk of these costs into interest bearing loans. X-ers and boomers did not remotely face the student debt loads shoved on to the younger generations. We are actually killing ourselves. The devaluation of education, particularly science and math, has changed the political landscape from a meritocracy to a populist free-for-all.

If we actually cherish science and facts, perhaps we could become increasingly globally competitive (we have definitely slipped here!), and perhaps our political systems would not be so incredibly fact averse… and thus damaging to the entire nation. Leroy Hood, a professor and co-founder of the Institute for Systems Biology and senior vice president and chief science officer of the Providence St. Joseph Health system and Matthew D. LaPlante, a professor of journalism at Utah State University and the host of “UnDisciplined” on Utah Public Radio wrote an op-ed for the January 24th Los Angeles Times. Here is some of what they said:

“The insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 confirmed this for many people, but in truth it was clear all along — and should have been clear to every one of us by Feb. 27, 2020. That was the day that Donald Trump promised not just a speedy resolution to the COVID-19 crisis, but a magical one. ‘One day, it’s like a miracle,’ he said. ‘It will disappear.’

Trump’s earlier statements can charitably be said to have been made in the fog of uncertainty about the virus, its trajectory and its danger to human lives. But there is absolutely no question that, by the time Trump promised a ‘miracle’ was forthcoming, scientists had been warning him that the virus was in this country, it was spreading, and it was deadly. Yet in the weeks to come he continued to promise that ‘it’ll go away’ (it didn’t), that ‘anybody who needs a test gets a test’ (they couldn’t) and that ‘I really get it’ (he most certainly did not).

“Trump has claimed he was simply trying to prevent panic. Behind the scenes, he has implied, he was taking the threat seriously all along. His actions prove otherwise. Both in policy and personal practice, he ignored and even mocked the scientific recommendations for controlling the pandemic — including masks, distancing, tracking the infected and frequent testing…

Truth decay is marked by an inability of opposing sides to agree on common facts. Left unchecked, it forms the environment needed for demagogues to metamorphose into authoritarians. This is the darkness in which democracies actually die.

“Our republic has stood up to this test — thus far, at least. But the fact that the United States has managed to elude the worst consequences of truth decay does not mean we haven’t been on the slippery slope, many times over — and it does not prevent us from landing there again… What might save us? Some might say ‘civics.’ We, however, would say ‘science.’

“Only about a third of Americans say they trust elected officials. Just around half say they trust business insiders, the news media and religious leaders. On the ‘trustiest’ side of spectrum, however, it is well known that the military enjoys great support among Americans; as of 2019, about 82% of adults in the U.S. said they had confidence that members of the nation’s armed forces act in the best interests of the public, according to the Pew Research Center… Less known is the group that scores highest when pollsters seek to measure trust: That would be scientists, at 86%, according to Pew’s surveys.

“There are partisan divides. Democrats are far more likely to say they have a ‘great deal’ of trust in science than Republicans. But 82% of Republicans attest to at least ‘a fair amount’ of trust in science. That is almost the same percentage of GOP members who said they believed Trump was trustworthy — 83% just prior to the 2020 election, according to Gallup.

“That’s right: Republicans trust scientists as much as they trust a man who, throughout the COVID-19 crisis, presided over an executive branch that silenced and disregarded government epidemiologists while openly flouting basic public health measures. If that was Trump’s only offense, it would be enough, but he also trafficked in climate skepticism, vaccine denialism and carbon apologetics. His administration rolled back laws limiting pollution and eliminated regulations protecting people from exposure to dangerous chemicals.

“Some might see this as a perplexing duality among Republicans. In fact, it can be an opportunity. Even in a deeply polarized country where ‘alternative facts’ have infected a lot of political discourse, most people have retained an innate sense that they can rely on scientists, who have dedicated their lives to observation, logic, facts and transparency. These are the qualities it takes to combat truth decay.” Is that a good place to start? 

In 1957, the Soviet Union was the first country on earth to launch an orbital satellite – Sputnik. That slammed innovative America in the teeth. US governments, state and federal, then poured money into education and research. My public education was a direct beneficiary of that spending. By 1969, we were the first nation to land a man on the moon. Because we cared. Because we prioritized. And because we could.

Hood and LaPlante continue: “Even in a deeply polarized country where ‘alternative facts’ have infected a lot of political discourse, most people have retained an innate sense that they can rely on scientists, who have dedicated their lives to observation, logic, facts and transparency. These are the qualities it takes to combat truth decay.

“The questions of scientific inquiry — what do we know? how do we know it? how can we prove it? — when applied to the words of a demagogue can be an inoculation against authoritarianism.

“When we teach science, technology, engineering and mathematics to young students — and embrace innovative approaches to teaching these subjects — we are investing in the long-term well-being of our economy, national security and health. But more than that, sci-ence education is a bulwark against the sort of rank populism that sets people against one another. It unites us with a common strategy for identifying facts and a common basis for communicating about perceived problems and potential solutions. This does not mean we will not disagree — scientific debate can be a brutal thing — but it makes meaningful debate possible.

“This does not just prevent demagogues and authoritarians; it suffocates them, leaving them unable to find a foothold when citizens demand facts over fanaticism and esteem knowledge over power.” Education opens more doors to more opportunities than any other social phenomenon known. And no, contrary to what some believe, public education is not creeping socialism. Science just might be the path to saving our nation… from itself.

I’m Peter Dekom, and we need to be more fearful of those who reject science than we do of those who embrace it.

300,000 a Day

The interconnectivity of events, natural forces and the survivability of large segments of humanity are both fascinating and horrifying. For example, when climate change rendered vast portions of eastern Syria and southwestern Iraq perpetually drought-ridden and no longer able to support the agriculture that had defined that countryside for centuries, well over a million farmers, mostly Sunnis, were displaced. Farms turned fallow. Families lost their livelihoods, now forced to leave their homes. 

Pleas to the Alawite (Shiite) Assad regime in Damascus and to the Shiite-led (Nouri al-Maliki) government in Baghdad fell on deaf ears. Shiites were not about to aid Sunnis. That’s when al Qaeda and ISIS, Sunnis extremists, stepped into that void. You know the rest, from migrating farmers rejected by many of the lands they sought, to horrific conflict with vicious terrorists leading the fray. Brutal counterattacks from Shiites to just about any Sunni configuration marred a horrible situation into unfathomable.

Regional conflicts roiled the earth. Rohingya Muslims being systematically slaughtered in Myanmar. Boko Haram kidnappings and murders in Nigeria. Civil War, literally a surrogate war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, tore apart Yemen. Hamas and Israel constantly exchange mortal blows. Conflicts in Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia decimated entire communities, destroyed farms and escalated both homelessness and starvation. As if that were not enough, enter the pandemic, often in nations too poor to contemplate mass vaccinations at any level. The horrors just continue unabated.

The United Nations’ World Food Program (WFP) won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2020. What all of the above have in common is starvation. That’s what the WFP was designed to counter. People who are seriously ill, in the middle of a combat zone with bombs and bullets flying or no longer able to work fallow land face starvation. And when the nations that used to support massive contributions of food and medical support are now deeply financially impaired with their own internal struggles with COVID-19, the net impact is simply that more people, particularly children, will starve to death. And while the United States is watching its economy being decimated by this disease, mass starvation is not our reality. Yet the WFP is facing new levels of mass starvation they have not witnessed in recent memory.

The head of the WFP, David Beasley, has told world leaders that without billions of dollars of additional funding, “we are going to have famines of biblical proportions in 2021.” “Now, Beasley said, COVID-19 is surging again, economies are continuing to deteriorate particularly in low- and middle-income countries, and there is another wave of lockdowns and shutdowns.

“But he said the money that was available in 2020 isn’t going to be available in 2021, so he has been using the Nobel to meet leaders virtually and in person, talk to parliaments, and give speeches to sensitize those with power to ‘this tragedy that we are facing -- crises that really are going to be extraordinary over the next, who knows, 12 to 18 months.’

“‘Everybody now wants to meet with the Nobel Peace Prize winner,’ he said, explaining he now gets 45 minutes instead of 15 minutes with leaders and is able to go into depth and explain how bad things are going to be next year and how leaders are going to have to prioritize programs, Beasley said. ‘And the response has really been good...I’m telling them you’re not going to have enough money to fund all the projects you historically fund,’ he said.” EuroNews.com, November 14th. But what is really at stake? 

Back in April, before the prize was announced, Beasley warned: “that in addition to the threat posed by COVID-19, the world faces ‘multiple famines of biblical proportions’ that could result in 300,000 deaths per day — a ‘hunger pandemic.’ COVID-19 will almost double people in acute hunger by end of 2020… New WFP figures indicate additional 129 million lives and livelihoods will be at risk…

“Speaking at an online briefing broadcast by the UN on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, Beasley highlighted the fact that there are currently 821 million food-insecure people in the world. ‘If we don't prepare and act now, to secure access, avoid funding shortfalls and disruptions to trade,’ he said, the result could be a ‘humanitarian catastrophe … in a short few months.’… Beasley added: ‘Millions of civilians living in conflict-scarred nations, including many women and children, face being pushed to the brink of starvation, with the spectre of famine a very real and dangerous possibility.’” WFP.org, April 20th. 

Just what the world needs is hundreds of millions of people with little or nothing to lose. Instability provokes further unwanted mass migration and armed conflict. Human life dwindles in value. Children are left without life-sustaining support. Death rules. While the United States cannot fix these shortfalls remotely on its own, and while private charitable contributions, however magnificent they may be, cannot fill the void, perhaps a planet just might unite even a little bit more to address this cruelty that surrounds us.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I am thinking about the billions of dollars that we waste on fomenting political polarization that could be deployed actually to do some good on this earth.

America, Land of Opportunists

America, Land of Opportunists 

Milking Honey During the Pandemic

There are so many ways to profit during a seemingly never-ending natural disaster, one that keeps folks glued to their residences and out of factories, offices and retail spaces. There are two most basic strategies as to how to make money with an existing company: One: “increase revenues, decrease costs.” Two: “buy low, sell high.” Add a global pandemic to the mix with savvy business leaders, and those who can do. Not so easy if you own movie theaters or concert/sports venues. Easier if you cater to those for whom a massive movement of people into a semipermanent or long-term basis back home represents an opportunity… or if you are a vulture capitalist.

If your factories are down, but you still have reams of cash left over from that huge corporate 2017 tax reduction or simply have managed cash flow well, and if you’ve been wondering how to install new automation and get rid of the people that automation is designed to replace… Cut staffs and workers… permanently. Done! Those costs are gone, the automated capital equipment (much of now powered with artificial intelligence) will be depreciated, and if revenues continue or can be grown, so much more sticks to the bottom line. And if you have had underperforming divisions or subsidiaries, what a good time simply to shut them down. For those few businesses where unions still have a stronghold on the private sector (under 7%), the pandemic can still enable layoffs. Hmmm, no wonder the stock market soared.

With office workers, those not replaced with more sophisticated computer systems and interactive analytics, as they learn to operate from home, you need less office space, your salaried employees have more time to work (no commute!), and health and safety risks plunge.

And if you increase automation, particularly in warehouses, even if you hire more people to effect elements like final mile delivery (smile if you believe in the gig economy), think of how online shopping might just appeal to people unable to leave their homes. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos knows.

For bored rich people, not tethered to 9 to 5 jobs, the range of upscale shopping moves from luxury goods, from chichi electric cars and new homes to add to the stable, to picking up distressed assets when their values hit bottom. 

Oxfam (a non-governmental organization) investigated these wealth-driving anomalies in a report entitled The Inequality Virus, reported on the January 25th BBC.com: “The combined wealth of 10 men [noted in the above chart] increased during the coronavirus pandemic by $540bn (£400bn), Oxfam has found…This amount would be enough to prevent everyone in the world from falling into poverty because of the virus, and pay for a vaccine for all, the NGO said… Its report found the total wealth of billionaires was equivalent to the entire spending by all G20 governments on recovering from the virus…

“Unprecedented support from governments for their economies saw the stock market boom, driving up billionaire wealth while the real economy faces the deepest recession in a century, it says… Worldwide, billionaires' wealth increased by $3.9tn (trillion) between 18 March and 31 December 2020 and now stands at $11.95tn - which is equivalent to what G20 governments have spent in response to the pandemic, the report adds.” 

Most of the names gathered above by the Oxfam/BBC are Americans, seven to be exact. The other above listed billionaires are, respectively, Russian, Chinese and Indian. Some buy and sell companies, but most of the others have built homegrown entrepreneurial dreams into corporate behemoths. These are the richest individuals on earth. Combined these 10 richest people saw their fortunes rise by $540 billion since March 2020. While we cannot forget that between March and June, these exceptionally wealthy individuals have committed a total over $7 billion to fight this horrific virus, their wealth exploded by a vast multiple of that number.

Jeff Bezos’ contribution was listed at $125 million as of June, a handsome sum, but… “The report said that Mr Bezos had earned so much by September 2020 that he could have given all 876,000 Amazon employees a $105,000 bonus and still been as wealthy as he was before the pandemic… This compares with the world's poorest, for whom recovery could take more than a decade. Oxfam estimates that between 200 million and 500 million more people were living in poverty in 2020, reversing the decline in global poverty seen over the last two decades.” BBC.com. Bezo’s ex-wife donated $4.5 billion. 

This ability to accumulate wealth at this level begins to be questionable. It is morally impossible to justify. We are increasingly finding ourselves relying on the charitable largesse of the mega-wealthy to do what governments used to do in the past. Look at the scenario: governments move to stimulate job growth by reducing taxes (“supply side” or “trickle down” economics) under a misplaced assumption that those receiving the massive tax benefits will simply hire more people. Just because they got more money? Never happens. Never! You hire more workers when there is a believable business plan that will make more money. Not because of a windfall. The 2017 tax cut is a classic example. Lots of mergers and acquisitions. Dividends. Stock buybacks. Very few new jobs. And a huge multi-trillion dollar increase to the federal deficit.

But having reduced its tax revenues, the relevant governmental body that gave rich folks that tax cut now has less money to implement safety nets, emergency relief, social programs and other rather relevant uniquely governmental functions and disbursements. Fiscal conservatives call for governments to cut taxes and reduce social programs. The mega-rich, supported in the United States by Supreme Court rulings like Citizens United vs Federal Election Commission, also continue to be able to exert massive pressure on governmental policies to insure they continue to get favorable treatment, with an occasional “give” to make the optics look better.

So, when a huge disaster strikes, society is forced to rely on the voluntary generosity (read: whim) of a highly concentrated few, some of whom are generous… and some of whom are not. The result is egregious wealth, often above the entire GPD of nations, accelerated income inequality and truly unnecessary suffering by hundreds of millions, if not billions of people mired in inescapable poverty. If there has ever been an argument for massive increases in wealth and estate taxes, the net economic impact of 2019-20 and the coronavirus pandemic would seem to be incontrovertible proof in support of that premise.

I’m Peter Dekom, and if the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer, there seems to be a rather obvious boost in why so many believe in populist alternatives… the system no longer cares about most of us.

Is a Big Political Mouth a CEO De-Pillowtary

In the world of corporate marketing, the mantra for CEO survival had been: keep your big mouth shut, because just about any political opinion is going to alienate some segment of the consumer base. Michael Hiltzik, writing for the January 21st Los Angeles Times, puts the evolving “best practices” CEO communications practices this way: “The traditional rule for CEOs has been that it’s best to let your products speak for themselves and keep your big mouth shut about anything other than narrow business principles. In recent years, the rule has become more often honored in the breach. That’s because social conditions have led to a broadening of the principle of corporate social responsibility.

“The redefinition has been driven by major institutional investors such as BlackRock, whose CEO, Larry Fink, has called on companies ‘to wade into sensitive social and political issues’ in part because governments have ceased to address them.

“Major corporations and their CEOs still take care when wading into political waters. They have been more willing to take a stand on questions with an economic coloration, such as the minimum wage and climate change, than polarizing topics such as LGBTQ rights, gun control and abortion, according to a 2018 study by Aaron K. Chatterji of Duke University and Michael W. Toffel of Harvard University.

“Social conditions sometimes can change a precarious topic into one seen as appropriate, even mandatory, for corporations to take a stand on — the Black Lives Matter movement and the George Floyd killing, for instance, have placed support for racial justice squarely on corporate agendas.” Some folks have products so unique, so compelling, that even the twisted words of their CEO cannot change that. Weed-smoking rightist Elon Musk, railing against safe-distancing rules in his California plants and lambasting higher state taxes that drove him to move to Texas, is now the richest man in the world. Tesla sales are skyrocketing.

On the liberal side, openly gay Apple CEO, does not seem to have impaired his company’s sales. Apple is still a wild success. But when a CEO speaks specifically against an identified demographic segments, the risks magnify. Hiltzik: “[O]ccasionally CEOs take it upon themselves to speak out. That can be a bad choice. Same-store sales at the pizza chain Papa John’s cratered after its founder and chairman, John Schnatter, blamed the take-a-knee protests by NFL players for a decline in the league’s TV ratings and consequently his company’s sales… Schnatter ceded his post as CEO and, following a later report that he had used the N-word on a conference call, left the company’s board and sold all his stock.

“Sometimes a top executive’s comments don’t have a direct impact on sales but damage a company’s reputation nonetheless. That happened to the family-owned fast-food chain Chik-fil-A in 2012, when its president, Dan Cathy, spoke out against gay marriage in interviews with a Baptist publication and a devotional radio program. The company was also found to have contributed to organizations opposing LGBTQ rights.

“Boycotts ensued, along with expressions of support by evangelist politicians such as Mike Huckabee. The company reported a 12% gain in sales for 2012. But the controversy plainly hurt. Chik-fil-A stopped contributing to anti-LGBTQ organizations and announced it would henceforth ‘leave the policy debate over same-sex marriage to the government and political arena.’

“By 2014, Cathy was expressing regret for ‘making the company a symbol in the marriage debate.’ He told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that aligning the company with ‘anti-gay groups’ resulted in its ‘alienating market segments.’… ‘Consumers want to do business with brands that they can interface with, that they can relate with,’ Cathy said. ‘And it’s probably very wise from our standpoint to make sure that we present our brand in a compelling way that the consumer can relate to.’” Perhaps the most toxic brand association of all, particularly after the January 6th debacle, is with former President Donald Trump. 

MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell (pictured above) was photographed carrying documents suggesting the invocation of martial law as he visited Trump in the latter’s waning days in the White House. Lindell has been a seriously outspoken supporter and campaign contributor to the ex-President. “Mike Lindell is discovering the downside of becoming known as a right-wing crank… Or so the My Pillow chief executive claims. He says that in recent days, Bed Bath & Beyond, Kohl’s and Wayfair have dropped his product.

“Lindell is convinced their decisions are related to his continued support for Donald Trump’s claims of a rigged election, telling Yahoo Finance that the retailers were pressured by ‘left-wing groups that attack with bots and trolls.’

“Bed Bath & Beyond said it’s dropping My Pillow because it isn’t selling well; the retailer called it one of a “number of underperforming items and brands” being excised from inventory, though it’s possible that reflects consumer distaste for Lindell’s position… Kohl’s, citing ‘decreased customer demand,’ said it would sell off remaining inventory and not order any more. Wayfair hasn’t commented publicly…

“It can be hard to distinguish whether extremist CEOs have a negative impact on their companies because of their views or their distraction by noncorporate matters. After building Overstock.com into an innovative online retailer, Patrick M. Byrne veered into a conspiracy-infected fever . He announced that he had been serving as an informant against the Russian foreign agent Maria Butina, and plunged into the cryptocurrency world.

“Overstock’s profit and market capitalization plunged. In mid-2019, Byrne announced he had sold all his stock, blaming his decision on attacks on him by ‘organs of the Deep State,’ including the SEC. Under a new CEO and with a tail wind provided by a pandemic-related surge in online commerce, Overstock.com’s revenues and stock price have recovered… The old mandate to keep corporate executives out of the political limelight has obviously faded…

“For all that, some business executives will find it hard to stay out of the limelight, to their own disadvantage. The best example may be a prominent businessman who has lately been losing corporate sponsorships and public credibility because of his extreme public positions while reportedly facing growing deficits and mounting debt at his businesses. His fortunes may end up defining the limits of CEO cults of personality. His name is Donald Trump.” Hiltzik.

But as the government had stepped away from addressing some difficult core policy issues, the notion of “corporate responsibility” has become an increasing reality. Issues like climate change as well as racial and gender inequality seem to have moved into mainstream corporate citizenship. “[Corporations] have been more willing to take a stand on questions with an economic coloration, such as the minimum wage and climate change, than polarizing topics such as LGBTQ rights, gun control and abortion, according to a 2018 study by Aaron K. Chatterji of Duke University and Michael W. Toffel of Harvard University.

“Social conditions sometimes can change a precarious topic into one seen as appropriate, even mandatory, for corporations to take a stand on — the Black Lives Matter movement and the George Floyd killing, for instance, have placed support for racial justice squarely on corporate agendas.” Hiltzik. In some ways, inclusion is a good way to expand a customer base. Conspiracy theorist beware… if you are deeply associated with a company that depends on reputation and customer goodwill. That appears to be the one arena of consistent business quicksand.

I’m Peter Dekom, and while the First Amendment guarantees free speech, it goes not preclude consumer blowback for the words so freely spoken.