When @wef opens in #Davos , @Oxfam puts out their alternative State of the World rpt. This year's shows that:
• The richest 1% hold 45.6% of global wealth, while the poorest half of the world have just 0.75%.
• 81 Billionaires hold more wealth than 50% of the world.
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• 10 billionaires own more than 200 million African women combined.
The richest got WAY richer during the #pandemic -- the top 1% richest got 63% wealthier in 2020-21. We mere mortals got only 10% richer in 2 years, on average.
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Food & energy costs are the main drivers of #inflation; companies in those sectors in 2022:
• made $306bn in windfall profits;
• increased profits 256% in 2022 compared w/the 2018–2021 average;
• paid $257bn to stock shareholders in 2022
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- 76% of them increased their profit margins
Meanwhile:
- For the first time in 25 years, extreme wealth
& extreme poverty have sharply increased simultaneously.
- Between 702 to 828 million people faced hunger in 2021– almost a tenth of the global population
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- high-income economies bounced back in 2021; poorer ones did not
- this was partly due to #COVID19#vaccine inequality; vax rates proved a strong predictor of economic recovery
- 1/5th of developing countries will have a lower per capita GDP in 2023 than in 2019
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Despite their enormous gains in personal & corporate wealth over the last two years, taxation of the Super-Rich has declined in most countries. Taxes fall proportionately hardest on lower income consumers, as VAT (value-added tax).
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The Cayman Islands doesn't have a deep water port -- ships must anchor at sea, and shuttle in smaller boats.
BUT most of the world's mega-yachts are registered in Caymans.
Why?
Same reason Uber-Rich park their wealth in the sandbar-country's banks: Secrecy.
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Concentration of media ownership in the hands of a few Super-Rich poses a challenge to reforms.
- France: 11 billionaires own over 80% of newspapers sold daily, 57% of TV market & 47% of radio
- Mexico: Most media is owned by the country’s richest man, #CarlosSlim
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- US: #JeffBezos#MichaelBloomberg#RupertMurdoch & #ElonMusk – have significant control over national news
- India: 72 TV channels reaching over 800 million people are owned by one billionaire, Mukesh Ambani
But, @OXFAM says, if the ultra-rich paid full taxes👇🏽
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Many Americans prefer to ignore our Nation's legacy of slavery or worse: claim there were "happy slaves" in the Old South. #Brooklyn once had the world's largest freed & escaped slave community, thanks to the Underground Railroad.
This #Christmas --
MORE nytimes.com/2022/12/20/nyr…
...you may make a year-end contribution to help save one of the original Stations on the Underground Railroad, an key part of African American history. Helping "the Tents" means recognizing that the flight to freedom is at the core of our National story. unitedorderoftentseasterndistrict3.org/home
It seems the gofundme link has gone dead. I'm trying to track down a better way to donate. Apologies.
Dear Mr. Musk (@elonmusk );
You are destroying @Twitter in countless ways. The most egregious are your calls for Star Chamber prosecution of #TonyFauci . But you have done so much more damage -- enough, that @Tesla is suffering as its stock drops & EV buyers turn elsewhere.
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2/ Despite the snarky & sometimes cruel comments levied against me @Twitter (including more than one death threat) I have usually found it a terrific platform. It's like a great newspaper: you have a window into everything from pop music to astrophysics, kittens to kinases.
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3/ @Twitter has been a place for all sorts of perspectives -- you never know what comment or video might blow your mind, taking your day on an unexpected tangent. Most Twitterati strived to be smart, funny, maybe snarky -- not pernicious, deliberately false or threatening.
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It's World AIDS Day: time to take stock. Because there is no #HIV#vaccine and women can't compel men to use condoms, people continue to get newly infected. And because the majority of them live in poor parts of the world, the undeclared #pandemic is very expensive.
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2/AIDS
Inside the USA federal spending on HIV/AIDS $7.6 billion/year.
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3/AIDS
Of that, about $780 million goes to the @CDCgov for prevention programs -- and much of that is passed onto the States.
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Since returning from California I've given comments like yours, @JezebelKat a lot of hard thinking: of course, YOU ARE CORRECT. A Zoom talk is still crossing a picket line. I was not paid for the Berkeley or SF talks & the SF one was sponsored by the Global Health Alliance.
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2/ There are many reasons folks all over the world -- not just Californians -- should pay close attention to the UC @UAW strike. It's the largest higher education labor action in history, affecting tens of 1000s of striking grad students, postdocs and teaching assistants.
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3/ Here in NYC the strike is barely noted in news media, and is poorly understood. But in Calif support for the strike is growing. And it's easy to see why. MORE latimes.com/california/sto…
They named them the Borg. And they affect #ClimateChange.
They are ancient, and unlike anything ever seen before. #JenniferDoudna & colleagues discovered the Borgs -- segments of archaea DNA that enter bacteria capable of oxidizing methane.
MORE nature.com/articles/s4158…
3/ Global warming's speeding thawing of permafrost and bogs, peat etc. resulting in huge increases in CH4 release. Methanoperedens bacteria oxidize methane -- which is good.
The researchers discovered 19 "Borg" types that "assimilate" the bacteria, giving them CH4-eating genes.