More than 11% of the world’s more than 2,000 billionaires have run for election or become politicians, according to a study highlighting the growing power and influence of the super-wealthy.
While billionaires have had mixed success at the ballot box in the U.S., billionaires around the world have a “strong track record” of winning elections and “lean to the Right ideologically,” said the study, which is by three professors at Northwestern University.
“Billionaire politicians are a shockingly common phenomenon,” the study said. “The concentration of massive wealth in the hands of a tiny elite has understandably caused many observers to worry that the ‘super-rich have super-sized political influence.’”
There are now 2,000+ billionaires? We’d better get to eating.
The irony is you have to be a billionaire to have a big enough walk-in freezer…
To quote Bubba Gump:
Anyway, like I was sayin’, [billionaire] is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. There’s uh, [billionaire]-kabobs, [billionaire] creole, [billionaire] gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There’s pineapple [billionaire], lemon [billionaire], coconut [billionaire], pepper [billionaire], [billionaire] soup, [billionaire] stew, [billionaire] salad, [billionaire] and potatoes, [billionaire] burger, [billionaire] sandwich. That- that’s about it.
“Eat the rich” is only an expression, not a literal call for cannibalism. Do not report this comment.
They already run the world. They just don’t want to do it behind closed doors anymore.
The old capitalists were smart… they knew that hiding behind politicians camouflaged the class structure that enabled their privilege and power. But now it seems they’ve forgotten the lesson of the guillotine…
They didn’t forget it, they discarded it when they realised a docile middle class will vote against their own self interests almost indefinitely.
They didn’t forget it, they discarded it when they realised a docile middle class will vote against their own self interests almost indefinitely as long as nobody in power gives them the option of voting in their own interests.
FTFY - it’s the only true “western” contribution to statecraft.
That’s because they have the technology to just fuck off to some private island surrounded by a private army if things get shitty.
That’s why they don’t fear the people anymore, they can’t just be dragged from their castles and chopped to bits like the French Revolution.
That’s because they have the technology to just fuck off to some private island
You mean… technology they don’t have the foggiest clue how to maintain and operate themselves? Who will be mining the precious minerals and extracting the fuels that technology requires? And if things really get that shitty, their money isn’t going to be of much use to their army of private goons, is there?
That’s why they don’t fear the people anymore,
Oh, they do… the fact that their first-choice in goon institutions - publicly-funded police - still exists prove that beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Yes, I’m glad they added this (on why there are more billionaire politicians in authoritarian countries):
‘We surmise that this is due to stronger wealth-protection motives for political entry in autocracies and the wide array of ‘stealth’ pathways to informal political influence in democracies,” the study said.
Billionaires in (so-called) democracies don’t need to get their hands dirty. They can control the whole polity via well-paid lackeys.
Back to feudalism!
Yes, let us farm mud and actually belong to the oligarchs who still had more money than us.
Glory days.
I mean… politicians have been rather wealthy throughout history. You think our founding fathers worked fields? They were significant land owners with influence.
Basically anyone could come settle land (literally free real estate), that’s why they had to borrow a system of indentured servitude to produce. While white indentured servants were initially preferred, the Dutch trade routes and invention of the cotton gin turned in to the institution of chattel slavery of primarily Africans as we know it. Out of this period came the modern notion of “race” and conceptions of white-supremacy as a justification. Then you basically had a merchant economy in the north and an agricultural one in the south, and what was a moral concern for the north was the foundation of the economy in the south. Even after they lost Andrew Johnson basically gave all the planters back their seats in local governments.
