Bezos Worth $200 Bill, Makes 4K Per Second As Millions Struggle, Protesters W/ Mock Guillotine

[appalachiablue]

'American Capitalism Is Off the Rails': Bezos Now Worth $200 Billion as Millions Struggle to Afford Essentials.' Protesters rally outside Bezos' D.C. Home to demand $30/hr min. wage for Amazon workers after world's richest man sets new wealth record. Brett Wilkins, Common Dreams, Aug. 28, 2020.

...The Washington Examiner reports former Amazon warehouse employee Chris Smalls led a Thursday protest outside Bezos' Washington, D.C. home in response to the news of the Washington Post owner's milestone. Around 100 protesters rallied in the tony Kalorama neighborhood, some of them building a mock guillotine on the sidewalk outside Bezos' $23 million mansion.

"If we're working for you and you're not taking care of us, we're coming for you," declared Smalls, according to Bloomberg Technology. "Give a reason why we don't deserve a $30 minimum wage when this man makes $4,000 a second," he added.

Smalls then led demonstrators in a chant of, "If we don't get it, shut it down!"

Hey Jeff Bezos, I'm going to let you know something today," said Smalls. "We are just getting started. We're going to every single location you've got across the country and set up shop until you meet our demands as workers."...

More,
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/08/28/american-capitalism-rails-bezos-now-worth-200-billion-millions-struggle-afford

https://democraticunderground.com/1016267211

Link to tweet

______________________________

With the huge profit increase from the coronavirus pandemic, on top of existing wealth, why can't Amazon pay employees for sick leave, hazard pay and personal protective equipment for warehouse workers? - Robert Reich.

[Budi]

1. Ok. They have an absolute legit gripe, BUT seriously? A guillotine?

That's as sick headed as the capitalism they're protesting.

This country needs to grow the fuck up.

😥

[appalachiablue]

2. The situation is desperate for many people, the guillotine

is symbolic if gruesome. Things have to improve, solutions must be implemented and pandemic relief extended.

Americans are without jobs and health insurance, others are sick with Covid, millions are going hungry, there's mass unemployment, eviction of tenants and foreclosures for mortgage holders.

It's a huge mess that needs competent leadership to guide us through this dangerous crisis period when the nation's stability and democracy are being seriously challenged.

[Budi]

3. Got it. So lets haul a freakun guillotine in front of Bezos' house.

Meanwhile where the fuck were these people in the most critical election of our time?

Weren't they the same ones screaming "Free Stuff" into their computer screans on social media back in 2016?

Now they got a guillotine. Great. They found a new target.

Tell ya what. Take that guillotine & roll it up to the White House. THAT IS THE PROBLEM.
If Trump is re-selected in November, they'll be screwed forever.

Choose any billionare for a target, it doesn't matter because if this country falls to Trump, America as they know it will cease to exist.

Trump is the PROBLEM. Get it?

[appalachiablue]

4. Can you provide insight and answer this?

With the huge profit increase from the coronavirus pandemic, on top of existing wealth, why can't Amazon pay employees for sick leave, hazard pay and personal protective equipment for warehouse workers? - Robert Reich.

[Budi]

5. BEZOS did't cause the Pandemic & the chaos we face because of it.

Take that guillotine to the White House.

Bezos ain't their freakin dad.
His charitable foundation has given billions of dollars to COVID research. To Scholarships. To Human Rights Causes.

And HE's the one they target to roll there guillotine to his doorstep?
Why. Because 'someone' told them it's Bezos' fault' our country is in the shitter.

They have 2 months to get their shit together & make the case to save America from Donald Trump and they're standing in front of Jeff Bezos' home in DC with damned guillotine.

What a bunch of weenies.
GO TO THE White House if they're truly serious about their country.
Bezos can't save America for them by himself.

They need to Grow up & stop fking off.
They have 2 months to get THIS election right.

[appalachiablue]

6. Some of them are Amazon employees, they have every

right to protest for better pay and conditions. Nobody said Bezos caused the pandemic, but why have some Amazon employees contracted COVID in warehouses due to lack of proper prevention equipment, and covering up infected employees? That has nothing to do with Trump.

But it's 'don't touch the money' by all means. The notion that it's all Trump and nothing but Trump, is a completely separate issue from this serious matter.

Bezos and the rest need to pay. their. taxes. period. Billionaire philanthropy in general, nein.

[Cha]

7. Mahalo, Budi...

Have they confronted trump.. whose fault it is the COVID Pandemic Spread, bc he called it a "democrat Hoax for 70 day"? While carting around the golf course & staging hatefest Rallies Against our Democracy?!

And, encouraging Americans to Not wear masks & drink BLEACH for god's sake?

[DanieRains]

8. Bezos Should Have To Pay Taxes Like I Have To

The system is rigged.

Tax wealth not work.

[appalachiablue]

12. Agree, very curious how some depart from that thinking

in Democratic circles of all things.

[George II]

14. Bezos does pay taxes.

[DanieRains]

24. Not Like I Do

The game is rigged.

[Budi]

9. Tell me why Commondreams is sourcing the RW Washingtom Examiner

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/protesters-build-guillotine-in-front-of-jeff-bezoss-house-after-his-wealth-hits-200b?_amp=true&__twitter_impression=true


Here's the news source Commondreams used.

WA Examiner is RW and happens to be owned by Phillip Anschutz.
Conservative Christian & Billionaire.

Anschutz has been a billionaire for a long time. He's one of only two people who've made the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans every year since the first version was published in 1982.

On the first Forbes 400 list in 1982, Anschutz, then 42 years old, was ranked the seventh-richest person in the US with an estimated net worth of "over $1 billion." Today, he's the 40th-richest American.

He started Anschutz Corporation in 1965 and got into the family business of exploratory oil drilling, according to Bloomberg. In 1979, he discovered a massive oilfield outside of Evanston, Wyoming. A few years later, he made $500 million selling half of the field to Mobil.

Everything from Cochella to Railroads to Hollywood Entertainment and much more.

YUP, Philip Anschutz is the original BIG OIL FIELD Developer,

MEET PHILIP ANSCHUTZ
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.businessinsider.com/philip-anschutz-lakers-coachella-net-worth-lifestyle-2019-11%3famp


Ya know what. For all the claims of Bad Big Oil, Bad Billionaires & Bad Corporations & Bad Wall Street advocated from CommonDreams, I find it rather questionable that the source they use to "expose" a billionare being protested for his wealth,...is from another Billionaire!!

Not just ANY BILLIONAIRE, A BIG POLLUTING RW BIG OIL BILLIONAIRE!!..

So wtf Commondreams?
Did Christian Consertive Billionaire Anschutz put the Billionaire Bezos guillotine protest article in his Washington Examiner, and source it to Commondreams?

Maybe RW Billionaire Anschutz is playing a dirty little political game against Liberal Billionare Bezos.
And why is Commondreams the Source for RW Wa Examiner?

I'd kinda appreciate knowing why Commondreams seems to be 'talking outta both sides of their mouth.'

It does seem a bit fishy doesn't it.

I think I'll ask them for an explaination .

[betsuni]

10. +1

[appalachiablue]

11. You're focusing on anything but the subject & what was

asked about Bezos by Bob Reich, Amazon employees and many others- why can't Amazon afford to pay workers and provide personal protection from Covid? Issues which drive negative views & hard feelings toward him specificially.

The extent to which you knock yourself out over Common Dreams and the Washington Examiner is pointless.

The Examiner which I just saw in another post a couple weeks ago is used here occasionally, like Common Dreams when a legitimate story or item is covered. Again, they aren't the point in this case.

[Budi]

20. No. The subject IS RW Washington Examiner, sourced exclusively by Commondreams

and brought here.

The actual subject IS what I said it was.

[sheshe2]

22. +1

[ehrnst]

25. Horsehoe effect.

[George II]

13. A guillotine in front of his door is roughly equivalent to a noose in Bubba Wallace's garage.

[appalachiablue]

17. That door leads to a a property of 2 townhomes

c. 1900 that Bezos added 25 full bathrooms to in the recent lengthy renovation.

I've been in those S St. NW buildings which for many years were the interesting Textile Museum. I also worked next door at the National Trust historic property, Woodrow Wilson house of the former president and Edith Galt Wilson when they left the WH in the 1920s.

Those Kalorama area turn of the century structures are nicely built, for single residences; how Bezos pulled off multi occupancy even with 2 properties AND 25 new full bathrooms is a real stretch, bizarre.

I'm thinking Bezos isn't phased by the protesters and a guillotine, even it's a gruesome device. He can take a lot of heat with the business he's in, not only over the wealth but the monopolisitic practices, more. Still not budging on paying workers for sick leave, hazard pay and personal protective equipment for Covid exposure; pulling down $4,000 a second and paying no taxes.

[AmericanCanuck]

15. A guillotine? This is ugly

Bezos is rich because people who want a piece of his company are paying a premium to have that piece. That in turn makes the piece that Bezos has more valuable. It can just as easily come down when someone builds a better than Amazon mousetrap. It is not like he went and robbed a bank or swindled taxpayers.

[DenverJared]

16. Commondreams is losing it

Bezos' net worth is determined by the value of Amazon stock which he cannot sell or the value of his stock will go down 90% if he sold all of it.

It is not like he has built a house out of $100 bills. He has just the same amount of cash in salary as he did before Covid.

[appalachiablue]

18. Bezos, 1st man worth $200B was in bus. & gen. news this week.

Forbes, Aug. 26, 2020. Jeff Bezos Becomes The First Person Ever Worth $200 Billion,
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2020/08/26/worlds-richest-billionaire-jeff-bezos-first-200-billion/#5ffaf03e4db7

[DenverJared]

26. So what?

[PETRUS]

19. I appreciate your OPs, appalachiablue

Usually I don't comment, but I often read what you post.

The reactions in this thread seem very odd to me...

By any chance, have you read "The Triumph of Injustice," by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman?

[appalachiablue]

21. I've posted a few pieces by them but haven't read

'The Triumph of Injustice,' thanks for mentioning. Don't klnow how I missed it. Both are excellent like their associate Thos. Piketty, but will their ideas ever reach implementation I wonder esp. with the current US situation and election.

Thomas P. had a new book and film to be released that was delayed and limited. Haven't heard any more on it in months.

The Guardian, 'Triumph of Injustice,' Review, Oct. 15, 2019.
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/15/the-triumph-injustice-emmanuel-saez-gabriel-zucman-review

The Triumph of Injustice review – how to wrest control from multinationals. Written by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, who, like Piketty, are French but who work at the University of California, it analyses how the super-rich dodge taxes, what this means and what to do about it. In an age when the primary instinct of many left-leaning people is to yearn for a time machine, it is a bracing and brave formulation of a radical new approach to public funding.

..They not only argue that the wealthy should pay higher taxes, but dismiss the whole logic of the third way. Theirs is a cogent, reasoned and practical argument against the “tax competition” that has sent so many corporate profits to Ireland or Bermuda and they give clear and compelling policy solutions to change the direction of society itself. The authors’ core argument is that decisions on tax are the most important that a democratic society makes. It is a hope-inspiring book that should inform the manifesto of anyone keen to defend liberal democracy from the twin threats of inequality and multinational corporate power. Their recommendations would take back control, but for real, this time.

“Wealth is power. An extreme concentration of wealth means an extreme concentration of power,” they write. “We could have chosen to coordinate and we’ve chosen not to. We could have chosen to prevent multinationals from booking profits in low-tax places, but we let them do it. We can make other choices, starting today.”> The primary focus of The Triumph of Injustice is the US, which has gone further than other western countries in allowing the very wealthy to opt out of the obligations of citizens altogether:
> for the first time in modern history, income from capital is now taxed more lightly than income from labour, so rich Americans pay a lower rate of tax than schoolteachers.

But the lessons are relevant for Britain too, which has also slashed spending on tax enforcement, cut corporate tax rates, which are, in effect, the rates paid by the richest in society, and introduced exotic loopholes to lure multinationals to our cities. The proposals put forward by Zucman and Saez deserve to be read in full, but are elegantly explained and well formulated. They would both de-globalise tax policy and re-democratise it, cutting through the fiction that multinational companies such as Apple owns its most valuable assets in small islands with low tax rates, rather than in the western countries where it has its headquarters. If implemented, these companies – and, thus, their owners – would be forced to pay a fair price for their access to our markets.
> The authors’ core argument is that decisions on tax are the most important that a democratic society makes, since they shape everything else. Taxes are the price we pay for civilisation and civilisation cannot afford free-riders. When the liberal order is under greater attack than it has been for decades, that is a lesson we all need to learn – and quickly. This bracing treatise by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman advocates a radical approach to reducing inequality.

[PETRUS]

23. Nice review.

Thanks for sharing. I think their book is well worth reading, if you have the time and inclination. A couple other recommendations that come to mind are "Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World," by Anand Giridharadas (it's about the hollow and self-serving world of wealthy "philanthropists&quot , and "The Divide: Global Inequality from Conquest to Free Markets," by Jason Hickel (it talks about the ways rich countries siphon wealth away from developing countries).

Hope you're having a pleasant weekend!

[DenverJared]

27. I think Jeff Bezos is helping to keep the post office alive

In the past 2 weeks, 80% of my Amazon orders and 35% of the returns were routed through the post office.

For 2 years before that, 0% were coming from the USPS and all returns were handled by Kohl's or UPS.

There must have been a corporate decision at the highest level to do this in order to pump money into USPS.

I personally wish Jeff Bezos would buy Fox from the Murdochs and put a stop to the RW propaganda. He can easily do that.

[appalachiablue]

28. Bezos' buying Fox would be fantastic, a few years ago

some media people wanted Tom Steyer to buy Clear Communications which was up for sale, I think it controled most of radio. He's another one who could buy media if he wanted. But will they do it and when, before this country melts down even more.

Amazon deliveries thru USPS have been a boon in the last few years, every bit helps them survive the attacks.

The recent so-called 'urban leftist violence' scenario is blasting thru mainstream media, esp. RW and is impacting the views of many unfortunately. I was just reading an intense thread about life and perceptions of people in the upper Midwest.

The demonstrations and carnage in cities is a timely distraction from the Covid nightmare, and the unstable economy. And there will be more instances in other places I'm told and which will also be exploited by the right.

Like others, I wish Biden had been able to go to Portland and Kenosha to calm things down; the sincere phonecall he made to the WI victim's family was pure empathy and pure Joe. But how many people caught that on the news.

Hopefully Joe's trip to Madison on Monday will be productive and covered well by media.. Wish him the best.