Tony Dokoupil did a recent segment on CBS this Morning to give an illustration on what Americans think the wealth gap in this country is, and what the actual wealth gap is. In addition to many people not understanding the difference between income (paychecks) and wealth (asset values vs debts), they were shocked to see how the super-rich get an overwhelming amount of the pie when it comes to wealth in our country, while most of us barely get anything.
It's rare and refreshing to see corporate media admit just how absurd the distribution of wealth is in this country, and that, along with Dokoupil's creative use of a pie, is why I've seen this clip passed around quite a bit in the last few days.
It's also remarkable to see Dokoupil interview private equity a-holes on the subject, who try to justify their BS jobs and their oligarch clients. You can tell that even the hedge funders know this system is absurd, likely because they're one of the few people who know just how rich these people are, and it's telling that all they can put up as a defense of the system is a straw man about "well, do you want a socialist economy where everyone's the same?"
No, hedge fund guy, we're not asking for everyone to have the same wealth. But what the typical American knows in their heart is that most of those guys (gender intentional) really aren't that special, outside of perhaps a proclivity toward being a soulless sociopath. But the rich get advantages and security and the ability to take risks because of their wealth that we can't, and that their desire to grab more and more wealth often translates into economic choices that limit the ability of the rest of us from moving up the ladder (or even getting out of debt).
While many people reference the "greed is good" speech from the 1987 movie Wall Street, it's this other speech from Michael Douglas that's my favorite in the film. It's not only telling that Charlie Sheen's character walks in on Gordon Gekko having a meeting with Asian businessmen (because the interest of big money doesn't care about borders or the specific needs of individual places), but that Gekko could give this speech today, and I don't think it would be very different other than the dollar amounts.
"“The richest 1% of this country owns half our country’s wealth. Five trillion dollars. One third comes from hard work, two thirds from inheritance, interest on interest accumulating to widows and idiot sons… and what I do: stock and real-estate speculation. It’s bullshit. You got 90% of the American public with little or no net worth. I create nothing. I own. We make the rules, pal. The news, war, peace, famine, upheaval, the price of a paperclip. We pick that rabbit out of the hat while everybody wonders how the hell we did it.
Now you’re not naive enough to think we’re living in a democracy, are you, Buddy? It’s the free market, and you’re part of it.”
- Gordon Gekko
By the way, Dokoupil is pretty good on this "news guy out in public" thing. I remember him hanging out at Brewers bar on Opening Day in April 2016 discussing that week's Wisconsin primary with fans, and he also did this one.
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