The Digital Dispatch

From NOEBIE.net

Inequality

The Rigged Game: New Report on Inequality

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The Economic Policy Institute has published a new report on income inequality in the United States. Here’s a quick summary of the findings.

Income inequality has risen in every state since the 1970s and in many states is up in the post–Great Recession era. In 24 states, the top 1 percent captured at least half of all income growth between 2009 and 2013, and in 15 of those states, the top 1 percent captured all income growth. In another 10 states, top 1 percent incomes grew in the double digits, while bottom 99 percent incomes fell. For the United States overall, the top 1 percent captured 85.1 percent of total income growth between 2009 and 2013. In 2013 the top 1 percent of families nationally made 25.3 times as much as the bottom 99 percent.

It’s important to understand that none of this is happening by accident, nor by the hand of God, nor even because of the effects of an impartial marketplace. The ruling class decides who will win and who will lose. So it’s no wonder who wins and who loses.

Read the full report: Income inequality in the U.S. by state, metropolitan area, and county | Economic Policy Institute

From Posh to Poverty in SoMa

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Sylvia takes a walk South of Market in San Francisco.

“Under the freeway was a line of shopping carts ballooning with black plastic garbage bags. And on a dirt embankment across the street I saw shapes of people hanging out, talking and smoking in what seemed like a convivial atmosphere, much like a street fair. A few blocks north, the scene completely changed as new million-dollar condos popped up, and their denizens and designer pets strolled the glittery streets.”

Read the full essay: Berkeley Blog: Air-to-Earth Bnb: From Posh to Poverty in SF’s SoMa.

Understanding the Latest Wave of Immigration

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Justin Akers Chacón offers some context with regard to the latest wave of immigration from the South.

The children and youth coming to the U.S., chiefly from Central America in the current wave, are victims of faceless economic, political and military policies engineered and implemented by the U.S. government, either unilaterally, or working through ruling elites in the region.

These young migrants are journeying north to be reunited with their families or in a desperate search for work and security. It is a further indictment of the U.S. government’s inhuman immigration policy that these innocent victims are treated as criminals and undesirables.

Please read the full article: Children forced on a dangerous journey | SocialistWorker.org.

David Cay Johnston on Inequality’s Looming Disaster

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From an interview with economics journalist David Cay Johnston:

We will either, through peaceful, rational means, go back to a system that does not take from the many to give to the few in all these subtle ways, or we will end up like 18th century France. And if we end up in that awful condition, it will be the bloodiest thing the world has even seen. So I think it’s really important to get a handle on this inequality.

Read the full interview. “Bloodiest thing the world has seen”: David Cay Johnston on inequality’s looming disaster – Salon.com.

Capitalism Threatens Democracy – NYT Op Ed

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From Thomas Edsall:

Thomas Piketty’s new book, “Capital in the Twenty-First Century,” described by one French newspaper as a “a political and theoretical bulldozer,” defies left and right orthodoxy by arguing that worsening inequality is an inevitable outcome of free market capitalism. Piketty, a professor at the Paris School of Economics, does not stop there. He contends that capitalism’s inherent dynamic propels powerful forces that threaten democratic societies.

Read More: Capitalism vs. Democracy – NYTimes.com.

The Super-Rich Have $32 Trillion in Offshore Tax Shelters

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The super-rich of The Earth had at least twenty-one trillion dollars hidden away in secret tax shelters at the end of 2010, according to a report just released by the Tax Justice Network. The number may be as high as $32 trillion – nearly half of the entire Gross World Product.

At least $21 trillion of unreported private financial wealth was owned by wealthy individuals via tax havens at the end of 2010. This sum is equivalent to the size of the United States and Japanese economies combined.

There may be as much as $32 trillion of hidden financial assets held offshore by high net worth individuals (HNWIs). according to our report The Price of Offshore Revisited, which is thought to be the most detailed and rigorous study ever made of financial assets held in offshore financial centres and secrecy structures.

We consider these numbers to be conservative. This is only financial wealth and excludes a welter of real estate, yachts and other non-fianncial assets owned via offshore structures.

This $32 trillion amounts to more than $4500 for every man, woman and child on the planet that has been squirreled away and not subject to taxation.

Less than 100,000 individuals accounted for nearly $10 trillion of the offshore wealth.

The report shows that when hidden wealth is taken into account, many so-called “debtor nations” are actually wealthy – but their wealth is being imprisoned offshore by the elites and bankers.

The Tax Justice Network is an independent organization launched in the British Houses of Parliament in March of 2003. It is dedicated to high-level research, analysis and advocacy in the field of tax and regulation.