US Billionaires Have Increased Their Riches By $1 Trillion During the Pandemic
A trillion dollars could maintain wages at pre-crisis levels for all workers in America, enabling people to stay home and stop the spread of the virus, for four months. Instead, it’s gone into the personal piggy banks of a handful of billionaire owners and investors.
Jeff Bezos has increased his wealth by $70 billion since the start of the pandemic. (Dan Farber / Flickr)
The economic crisis brought on by COVID-19 could have been averted. The Right thinks it could have been done by denying the reality of the virus altogether, reopening everything with no precautions, and sending the death toll skyrocketing. That’s inhumane and indefensible. But the economic crisis could have been averted another way: by using public money to pay people to stay home and to prevent layoffs.
This splendidly wealthy nation could have afforded to take that route. What is a nation’s wealth good for if not to rescue society from catastrophe? Instead, the federal government abandoned Americans without adequate economic relief while state and local governments carried out half-hearted lockdowns that were simultaneously economically punishing and unsuccessful in stopping the spread of the virus.
Thus we got the worst of both worlds: widespread economic hardship and unabated contagion.
This article is for subscribers only. Please login or subscribe to access our full archives and beautiful print and digital magazine starting at just $3 a month.