There’s a far bigger problem going on than a Target getting robbed.
Article by Lauren Martinchek is a writer and leftist analyst
After the murder of George Floyd at the hand of Officer Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis, Minnesota, protests and uprisings have begun to surface across the nation. As is so often the case when people of color and even white allies are raising their voices and demonstrating against the continued abuse and brutality at the hands of white supremacy and the state, opposition is quick to dismiss their efforts and message by any means necessary. Not for the first time opponents to the demonstrations have chastised the activists, arguing that the looting and rioting destroys their credibility and achieves nothing.
Since I have already addressed the opposition to the rioting, lets talk about the real looting taking place here in the United States.
On April 15, 2020, The Guardian published a piece entitled: Millionaires to reap 80% of benefit from tax change in US coronavirus stimulus.
Amanda Holpuch writes:
“Millionaires and billionaires are set to reap more than 80% of the benefits from a change to the tax law Republicans put in the coronavirus economic relief package, according to a non-partisan congressional committee.
The change — which alters what certain business owners are allowed to deduct from their taxes — will allow some of the nation’s wealthiest to avoid nearly $82bn of tax liability in 2020. Nearly 82% of the benefits from the tax law change will go to people making $1m or more annually in 2020, according to an analysis by the joint committee on taxation (JCT). Overall, 95% of individuals who benefit from the change make $200,000 or more.
Taxpayers will lose nearly $90bn from the change, which suspends a restriction introduced in the 2017 tax bill. The change allows owners of businesses known as pass-through entities to lower their taxes by deducting as much as they want against income unrelated to the business…”
At a time when over forty million people are unemployed, losing health insurance not just for themselves but for their families, and many unable to put food on the table let alone pay their rent or mortgage, the wealthiest people on the nation are going to be avoiding $82 billion dollars of tax liability.
At a time when over forty million people are unemployed, losing health insurance not just for themselves but for their families, and many unable to put food on the table let alone pay their rent or mortgage, the wealthiest people on the nation are going to be avoiding $82 billion dollars of tax liability.
That is the real looting, taking place right under our noses. At a moment when so many of us have been brought to our knees financially, the very richest among us are taking advantage of the desperation to once again rob the wealth we have created and give it to themselves. Maybe it’s just me, but I find it fairly difficult to even pretend to care about Arby’s or Auto Zone. When the 400 richest American families own wealth the size of the UK economy, I could not care less about a protestor running out of a Target with an armful of goods.
As Bernie Sanders put it, the real looting has taken place for over forty years.
While Amazon cuts the measly 2 dollars an hour of hazard pay for its workers, their CEO Jeff Bezos is on track to become the worlds first trillionaire. Of course, he isn’t the only one of the nation’s richest to see astronomical increases in their wealth in the midst of this crisis.
Chuck Collins with CNN writes:
“Columbia University researchers project that poverty rates in the United States could soon reach their highest levels in half a century. Yet as my colleagues and I track in a new report for the Institute for Policy Studies, the wealth of America’s billionaires actually increased by nearly 10% over just three weeks as the COVID-19 crisis took hold.”
This doesn’t just apply to our CEOs. Former President Barack Obama is reportedly likely to be the first ex-president to become a billionaire, and that in it of itself, speaks to the very heart of the problem. A problem that — as we’re seeing before our very eyes — is absolutely unsustainable.
We are witnessing a response to decades worth of pain, trauma, and brutality. A response to years of political inaction, and the white moderates Martin Luther King warned of continuing to ignore the plights of the oppressed, telling them to just be quiet and ask nicely. Before we chastise these demonstrators for looting a Target, maybe we should pause and consider the real looting taking place. Instead of smearing these protestors and erasing their message because of the actions of a few, perhaps we should think about how in one of the worst economic crisis’ this country has ever faced in its history, the richest among us are taking our money to make themselves richer.
