Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, and other billionaires who have seen their fortunes increase massively during the CoVid19 pandemic.
Bezos's own fortune is now valued at over $200 billion, that's around £152 billion GBP. A fortune that grew by over $10 billion in just one week as Amazon shares soared more than 5%. The increase in wealth has largely been due to the huge increase in online shopping that has taken place since we were all confined to our homes and we stopped spending as much money in the wider economy.
Other billionaires to see their fortunes rise during the pandemic include Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and CEO of Facebook, Elon Musk, of Tesla and Space-X, and Bill Gates, the Microsoft founder. Those three alone saw their wealth increase by $110 billion.
We can sometimes not even grasp how much $1 billion is, nevermind $200 billion. Essentially having $1 billion means that you are a millionaire 1,000 times over, or in Bezos's case 200,000 times over. In fact, the richest 10 people in the world are richer than 90 poorest countries combined.
This has led many to question the economic system, particularly as so many of us are struggling during the pandemic and experiencing the economic consequences of lockdown.
Joe Biden who is running for president as the Democratic party candidate, has said that he will increase the top-rate of tax if elected. However, many billionaires already have loopholes to hide their wealth. Bernie Sanders, a former primary candidate, said in response to the news of Bezos reaching the $200 billion milestone:
"While a record-breaking 5.4 million Americans recently lost their health insurance, 467 billionaires in our country increased their wealth by an estimated $731.8 billion during the pandemic. At a time of massive wealth and income inequality, when so many of our people are hurting, it is time to fundamentally change our national priorities. Instead of more tax breaks for the rich while more Americans die because they cannot afford to go to a doctor, let us expand Medicare and save lives by demanding that billionaires pay their fair share of taxes."
While Biden's plan is to take the top rate of tax to 60% this is nothing compared to the top-tax rates of the United States and the United Kingdom in the 1950s and 1960s when extremely high-incomes were taxed at over 90%.
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