The 0.1 Percent
For the super-elite, a sense of meritocratic achievement can inspire self-regard, and that self-regard — especially when compounded by their isolation among likeminded peers — can lead to obliviousness and indifference to the suffering of others.
Eric Schmidt, by then the chairman of Google, admitted to a journalist in December 2011 that no one in his world thought much about Occupy Wall Street and the discontent of the 99 percent. “We live in a bubble,” he said. “And I don’t mean a tech bubble or a valuation bubble. I mean a bubble as in our own little world. . . . Companies can’t hire people fast enough. Young people can work hard and make a fortune. Homes hold their value.” What is striking about those remarks is that the unemployment rate in Santa Clara County, where Google’s Mountain View campus is located, was 8.6 percent, slightly higher than the national average. And some of the most violent and controversial Occupy demonstrations were in Oakland, a 45-minute drive from Schmidt’s office.
Chrystia Freeland has talked to a lot of billionaires over the last two decades, and now has a new book out about the 0.1 percent. Reuters has an excerpt from Freeland’s book, which takes a look at the bubble the super-rich enclose themselves in, why so many giants who work in finance have come to “hate” President Obama even though the $700 billion TARP bailout saved them, and why some of them understand that they’re contributing to the plight of the American middle class, but feel okay about it (“‘His point was that if the transformation of the world economy lifts four people in China and India out of poverty and into the middle class, and meanwhile one American drops out of the middle class, that’s not such a bad trade,’ the CEO recalled.”)
Photo: Guillaume Paumier, Friedman Thomas, ToddABishop
Uhhhhhm, helping poor people around the world is a laudable goal and everything, but I’m not sure American economic policy should have the aim of dropping one American out of the middle class to help four people from India enter the middle class.
@WaityKatie Exactly. It’s such a noble sacrifice for somebody else to pay.
The thing I find most annoying about statements like the quoted CEO’s is the false dichotomy.
Sure, sometimes there are stark either/or decisions to make like this – for example, you can donate one dollar to charity X or charity Y – but when it comes to the structure of our whole society, there are other options! Super-rich people could forgo some of their income for the public good! They and their corporations could quit tilting the regulatory and taxation playing field in their favor! And on and on. It’s really doesn’t have to be zero-sum between Indian workers and American workers.
@Sean Lai I think he meant that 1:4 is not zero-sum.
@Nick 1. If 1 person’s 100k is taken and distributed to 4 people at 25k each, that is zero-sum, though 4 gained and 1 lost.
2. You’re right, I’m sure he doesn’t think of it as zero-sum – he probably believes that consumer gains accrue to the American consumer, etc. And I believe that too. I’m certainly not against trade. I’m just saying that looking at the accelerating increase of wealth at the top, shrugging, and saying “globalization” is not an answer, it’s misdirection. Policy matters, and growing US inequality is neither inevitable nor optimal.
That is actually a good point that people often forget about, especially when bashing “Chinese factories” that apparently do nothing but evil. That said, most of the ways that the superrich warp public life to their advantage have little to do with the real structural changes going on in the international economy.
@stuffisthings SNL had a funny sketch about that last Saturday:
http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/tech-talk-iphone-5/1420759