These 20 Americans Own More Wealth than Half of All US Citizens Combined – And It’s Getting Worse

An outright jaw-dropping report was released on Monday that draws attention to the staggering wealth of just a small handful of people.

The report, titled Billionaire Bonanza: The Forbes 400 and the Rest of Us, “exposes the extreme wealth concentrated within the fortunes of the 400 wealthiest Americans and compares this wealth to the much more meager assets of several different segments of American society.”

Chuck Collins and Josh Hoxie, the authors of the report, described a compelling picture about the top 20 of those 400 people.

America’s 20 wealthiest people — a group that could fit comfortably in one single Gulfstream G650 luxury jet –­ now own more wealth than the bottom half of the American population combined.

Let that sink in. A group of people that could stand in your living room owns more wealth the 160,000,000 other Americans.

So why is that?

Of course, becoming rich is no reason for alarm. Many people work very hard to save money and acquire wealth. However, it is how these few people gain such vast amounts of wealth, that is cause for concern.

The ruling elite in the United States quite literally hand-pick politicians and pay for their campaigns to put them in office. More than half of all donations provided to the 2016 presidential candidates, in both parties, proves this notion as they came from a mere 158 families. 

The 158 families, who’ve donated billions of dollars to these candidates, have entirely different reasons for choosing their politicians versus Joe Sixpack. Consequently, it is for this reason that Joe Sixpack’s requests are completely ignored by the next puppet to be placed in office who claims to represent him.

image: http://tftppull.freethoughtllc.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/ForbesTop20.jpg

The United States government is, by design, a machine to redistribute wealth. This wealth redistribution, however, is not what the political blowhards on the TV and radio say it is. Since the inception of the income tax, and the Federal Reserve, the United States government has become excellent at separating you from the product of your labor.

While you’re told by the Sean Hannitys of the world that the government takes from the rich to redistribute to the poor, the reality is actually the opposite. The state fleeces the poor and middle class in America, and that money is, in turn, redistributed to the most wealthy Americans.

As Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, David Cay Johnson, points out, the result of such a government system are,

“policies that take from the many and redistribute to the already rich few through stealth techniques that rarely make the news but can be found in the public record. Among these policies are a failure to enforce the laws of business competition, severe restrictions on unions and subsidies galore for big companies.”

When the topic of the ultra-rich controlling elite is brought up, most of the time the free market gets the blame. But most of these opinions fail to take the role of the state into consideration.

“Such massive inequality reflects not market economics but political influence that tilts the economic playing field,” explains Johnson. “And because of their political influence, those at the very top get tax favors, especially the deferral of taxes into the distant future, which transforms the burden of taxes into a bonanza of increased profits.”

The reason that nothing ever seems to get accomplished in Washington D.C. is because your elected officials have no loyalty to you.

As we’ve seen from nearly every political candidate in the last century, the “promises” made on their campaign trails are but fleeting memories once they get into office. After all, how can a politician keep true to their campaign promises when they are busy creating and passing into law, loopholes and subsidies for the very small group of people who put them in power?

The only solutions proposed by those within the system to offset the ruling elite and their fleecing of the citizens is, ironically, more legislation — because it’s worked so well in the past right?

Attempting to change the system by using the criminals within the system is akin to asking a mugger to stop mugging you.

The good news is that people are beginning to understand this exercise in futility and they are creating and operating systems that exist outside of the state-controlled monopoly. Bitcoin is an excellent example.

On the other hand, many people are so infatuated with the perceived benefits of taxation, i.e., roads, police, military, schools, that they conveniently ignore the fact that they have become slaves on the tax farm which is America.

Statism has become so prevalent that many Americans have become enthralled with the idea of being ruled and they develop a religious-like worship of politicians. They never end up realizing that the man or woman in the suit is merely an actor whose job is to serve their financiers.

As they stand there in their star-struck daze, staring up at their almighty oligarchs, the political class is robbing them blind. 

The fleecing is actually getting worse too. Politicians have become so addicted to stealing the product of your labor, that they have created a virtual black hole of debt that is impossible to ever pay back. It is a mathematical certainty that this unsustainable system of fascism and theft will come crashing to the ground.

The US government has become a snake – eating its own tail.

Johnson lays out this situation quite clearly as he expands on the analogy put forward by Collins and Hoxie,

So think about that image — a top-of-the-line Gulfstream G650 jet and 160 million Americans, each with the same net worth. Now imagine a much smaller jet, with 12 or so oligarchs, and ask yourself just why you are paying taxes to enhance their fortunes instead of your nest egg.