LWe must start with the core issue: Bill Gates ignores the role of politics. Though he came to it late, he now acknowledges climate change facts. But he operates in blatant, cringeworthy denial about political realities. His new piece on climate, published last week, approaches climate change without political context. He pens words that disregard governmental authority, and as if extreme wealth didn't exist.
His primary argument suggests that funds are very limited, so the participants in the upcoming climate meeting in Brazil should redirect resources from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards climate resilience and spending on poverty and disease.
Yes, the funds available for any good cause are scarce, but that's not because of some natural law, some implacable truth about human society. This results from wealthy interests attacking on benign state spending, causing the dismantling of aid agencies and severe reductions in assistance funding of other countries. Austerity is a political choice. The choice to implement it comes from authorities yielding to the demands of the ultra-rich.
Massive amounts of wealth exist. Soon after the billionaire released his essay, research showed that the total wealth of the top ten US fortune holders expanded by hundreds of billions during the previous twelve months. That money alone, the increase in a handful of billionaires' net worth, is nearly tenfold the yearly funding needed to eliminate severe poverty worldwide. How have they managed to channel so much of global wealth into personal accounts? And why can't we get it back through effective taxation? The explanation involves their transformation of financial influence into governmental control. The richer they become, the more they can bend the state and economic system to their will, securing ongoing financial growth. But the billionaire mentions nothing in his essay about methods and sources for additional funds for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be identified.
'The article seems designed as appeasement toward Donald Trump.' Bill Gates, right, with the Trumps at a private dinner for business leaders in Washington DC.
An obvious relationship appears between the economic hardship Gates professes to address and the riches he overlooks. In the US, homelessness is breaking records, and so is the share of assets owned by the top 0.1%. While this might not be Gates's own business model, by suppressing salaries, driving up rental prices, busting trade unions and securing tax reductions and budget decreases, the ultra-rich thrive on impoverishing other people.
A notable research in political science publications, among the very few to have penetrated this secretive world, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the great majority. The multimillionaires it interviewed, completely unlike ordinary citizens, viewed government debt as paramount of the issues it listed, and climate breakdown as the least. They were significantly more prone to argue that public retirement benefits and government medical care should be reduced, and far less likely to believe that the unemployed should have a "decent standard of living", or that there should be increased oversight of energy firms, financial institutions and insurance providers. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.
Which perspectives dominate? The tiny minority or the great majority? Even though the investigation happened under Obama, it found that the very rich had far more access to politicians and officials than average citizens. What about currently? I scarcely think I need to spell it out.
That's another telling absence in Bill Gates's essay: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. If Gates included this, he'd have to recognize that an important foundation of his argument is unstable: lower prices for sustainable technology inevitably produces environmental improvement. Certainly, it's positive that clean technology prices are falling dramatically than traditional energy sources. But The former president and comparable figures are employing every method to hinder the change.
To some degree because of this, fossil fuels remain highly lucrative. This potentially clarifies why, notwithstanding Gates' assertion about eliminating petroleum company stocks in 2019, its fossil fuel stock and bond holdings have, truly expanded.
Regarding Gates, confronting extreme wealth power could appear inconceivable. This isn't just about conflicting with his perspective. Considering his significant avoidance of this subject, he may actually be unable to conceptualize it. This might indicate "wealth-induced cognitive distortion": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. Even though billionaires present research challenges, drawing conclusions from studies about wealth's impact on thinking could suggest that gaining massive wealth resembles experiencing brain trauma. Riches appear to disrupt specific mental processes, notably those concerning understanding and outlook.
Yet, political maneuvering could be present: his writing appears primarily as reconciliation with the former president. The former president clearly interpreted it this way: "We've defeated the climate change falsehood." Bill Gates has finally admitted that he was completely WRONG on the issue. This demonstrated nerve, and we're thankful. MAGA!!!"
The billionaire has consistently been incorrect on the issue, although not for Trump's stated reasons. He has continually trailed scientific consensus, echoing petroleum industry talking points (green technologies could reduce global CO2 emissions only at a "beyond astronomical" cost) significantly following their debunking. He has disseminated uncertainty and false information, including the unsupported claim in his recent writing that the intention behind Sri Lanka's failed prohibition on artificial fertilizers aimed at pollution decrease.
The billionaire titles his piece Three Difficult Climate Realities. Thus, here's another difficult reality he carefully avoids. Should, as appears probable, vital planetary systems reach critical thresholds and suddenly collapse, the impact on humanity, not to mention the existence of other species (a topic he fails, as usual, to mention), would eliminate the gradual advancement he predicts. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but through sudden changes of state, the conceivable consequences for people's quality of life are nearly impossible to anticipate. His argument that we should align all funding to current "data-based analysis" of improvements in human welfare, while it might sound rational, creates significant illogic when confronting systemic transformation, {prompting us to ignore the greatest
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