How Billionaires Could Race to Our Rescue [View All]

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from Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality:



How Billionaires Could Race to Our Rescue
September 25, 2010

A modest tax on all U.S. personal fortunes over $1 billion could raise more than enough revenue from the Forbes 400 alone to erase the combined budget shortfalls of every state in the nation.

By Sam Pizzigati


David Rockefeller, Sr., the only surviving grandchild of America’s first billionaire, has achieved still another distinction. At age 95, he currently rates as the oldest billionaire on the new Forbes magazine annual list of America’s 400 richest.

David Rockefeller, on this year’s list, has plenty of billionaire company. Every single one of the 400 deep pockets on that list holds an individual fortune worth at least $1 billion. In 1982, the first year the annual Forbes 400 list appeared, only 13 Americans could claim billionaire status.

Back then, nearly three decades ago, the Forbes 400 held a combined fortune of just $91.8 billion, the equivalent of about $208 billion in today’s dollars. The current top 400, Forbes reported last week, hold over a trillion dollars more in wealth. Their current combined fortune: $1.37 trillion.

The ten richest Americans on the new Forbes list carry, all by themselves, a combined net worth of $270 billion, more than the inflation-adjusted net worth of the entire initial Forbes list back in 1982.

How much of an impact on our troubled nation could these staggeringly massive accumulations of wealth have if modestly shared — or taxed?

One quick answer: A 15 percent “wealth tax” on all personal assets over $1 billion would this year raise $145.5 billion, more than enough to cover the entire $140 billion budget shortfall America’s 50 states are facing in the current fiscal year. .............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://toomuchonline.org/how-billionaires-could-race-to-our-rescue/