this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2023
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America’s wealthiest people are also some of the world’s biggest polluters – not only because of their massive homes and private jets, but because of the fossil fuels generated by the companies they invest their money in.

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[–] Marxine@lemmy.ml 95 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Every day we're here just to learn billionaires & families should be crushed and their wealth redistributed amongst third world countries.

[–] Tim@programming.dev 17 points 1 year ago (3 children)

That would just make other billionaires somewhere else. The problem is the system not the people

[–] DrQuint@lemm.ee 17 points 1 year ago (3 children)

He did not say "once". I think they're suggesting a systematic approach. I periodic Purge if you will. Like some shitty movie.

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[–] Mangoholic@lemmy.ml 77 points 1 year ago (4 children)

If anyone is asking how do we pay to solve the climate crisis. I think its pretty clear who should be paying.

[–] kautau@lemmy.world 26 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

This is true for almost anything. Major corporations, and the investors that profit off of them, pay so little in taxes compared to the average citizen. Instead, their money is devoted to lobbying and setting up careful corporate international glass houses so they don’t have to pay the taxes they should. We can push much harder on tackling social issues, but the top 10% don’t exist in society, they lord over it

the top 10% don’t exist in society, they lord over it

I think you mean they run it

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[–] const_void@lemmy.ml 62 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So fucking sick of billionaires

[–] Valmond@lemmy.ml 29 points 1 year ago (2 children)

What do you even do when you exceed 100 Millions?

They must be mentally sick in some way "just one mooare billion pleaaase"

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 19 points 1 year ago (2 children)

If you have over a billion dollars, you could spend every waking moment shovelling money into a fire and you would still have over a billion dollars when you die

[–] SnowdenHeroOfOurTime@unilem.org 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

When I first started reading this sentence, I thought I was with you, but by the end I was scratching my head.

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 11 points 1 year ago

My point is how much money a billion is. You literally couldn't get rid of it fast enough to keep it from piling up (assuming it is accruing risk free interest).

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[–] utopianfiat@lemmy.world 59 points 1 year ago

The US subsidizes fossil fuels to the tune of 600B per year. You pay for pollution with your taxes.

[–] Veraxus@kbin.social 48 points 1 year ago (3 children)

We need a 95% tax bracket for anyone that makes more than a few million/year.

[–] Valmond@lemmy.ml 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And a wealth tax for people having more value than like 10 millions (or less actually).

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[–] 7heo@lemmy.ml 37 points 1 year ago

TL;DR: one doesn't become rich by respecting others.

[–] Especially_the_lies@startrek.website 33 points 1 year ago (9 children)

Anyone else just feel like we should eat the rich?

[–] Hobbes@startrek.website 14 points 1 year ago

I think it's way overdue.

[–] 7heo@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

On one hand, yes, on the other, eating shit isn't very appealing.

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[–] Zippy@lemmy.world 27 points 1 year ago (9 children)

This is a piss poor metric. It is not what these people personally emit but what they emit by all the companies that they may own. Even though those companies produce products you and me consume.

In other words if I am a massive farmer and in the ten percent wealth category, my carbon footprint includes all the food produced and you consume from my farm.

[–] yogsototh@programming.dev 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I feel that I see more and more articles that give the false impression that rich are the only people we should put a pressure for pollution. This will give more and more people the illusion that they can pollute because their pollution is very minor compared to the pollution of the rich.

The reality is while richer people pollute more. The ratio of pollution between a rich and a normal person is not comparable to the ratio of the wealth difference.

In fact, for pollution, everyone effort has a real effect.

More precisely I read an article that made it clear that if a super rich has 100000x more money, they will pollute directly only 40x more than most people. (the number are probably wrong but the order of magnitude is correct).

This mean that pollution is not just for the rich, but for everyone. And your personal effort count.

[–] Stoneykins@mander.xyz 10 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Pollution is a truly a systemic problem, not a personal responsibility problem, even for the wealthiest heaviest polluters. It certainly doesn't help when people treat their surroundings like trashcans, but that will always pale in comparison to the scale of pollution produced by industry.

The reason wealthy people are still the issue is that they have an insane overabundance of control over industry, governments, and economic systems, and that control is currently being wielded irresponsibly.

The only way for non-wealthy people to truly fight climate change is collective action. The top 1% on the other hand could damn near personally begin reconstructing problematic parts of our polluting economic systems, but they simply aren't motivated to do so because that wouldn't increase their capital, at least not as much as the way they are currently behaving does. They are only motivated by increasing their wealth, apparently, based on how they behave.

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[–] hh93@lemm.ee 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Or if I'm in the 10% bracken and have invested most of that money in the Stock-Market I'd get a fraction of the emissions of all companies in the world?

I feel like those articles are just so people have someone else to point fingers at and feel as if they don't have to change anything themselves.

Sure personal responsibility alone won't help without laws but those laws won't happen if people show that they are behind those measures.
I want to see a politician trying to triple the gas prices and the prices on meat and see that politician be elected.
People really think they are existing in a vacuum and companies are only polluting for the fun of it - but don't accept how the by far biggest contribution is the average Livestyle of everyone...

Banning private jets and things like that is probably a good idea to get people behind you but I feel as if it's mostly a gesture compared to a law that would slash meat consumption in half or tackle the fact that everyone sees going everywhere in their truck when biking or walking would've worked fine. The single person doesn't have power but everyone together has and politicians want to get elected so they only tackle an issue when they feel the people are behind them.

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[–] Jazsta@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The study's primary metric appears to include both supplier and producer emissions proportional to income and investments. What alternative do you suggest?

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[–] AlexWIWA@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There's a steep cliff between the 95% and the .01%. I wonder what proportion is just the .01

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[–] MaxPower@feddit.de 20 points 1 year ago

Got it. Eating the rich for protecting humanity by protecting the climate.

[–] MonkderZweite@feddit.ch 20 points 1 year ago

CO² tax on oil and fuel production i say.

[–] WhollyGuacamole@lemmy.world 19 points 1 year ago (5 children)
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[–] varogen@lemmy.world 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

The picture they paint in this article, of the ultra rich with their private jets and yachts, does not align with the statistic presented in the title.

the wealthiest 10% in the US, households making more than about $178,000

I'm sure many of you know people in this group. Two adults each making 90k a year is enough to break into the 10%. And clearly they're not flying around in private jets.

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[–] mojo@lemm.ee 14 points 1 year ago

They may as well be polluting methane gas because they're so full of shit

[–] BarryZuckerkorn@beehaw.org 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

but because of the fossil fuels generated by the companies they invest their money in.

Lemme go ahead and roll my eyes here. Yes, American Airlines produces a significant percentage of the world's greenhouse emissions. But they burn that fuel for the passengers, not just for the benefit of shareholders. Same with ExxonMobil, BP, etc.

Consumption is what drives pollution. Investments to profit off of that consumption is secondary.

[–] rikudou@lemmings.world 9 points 1 year ago

Their biggest success is convincing common folks it's out fault.

[–] Bartsbigbugbag@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Consumption driven by advertising based on Edward Bernays work, which explicitly intends to create fissures within people and then sell them cures to the fissures they created,m. Just disallowing advertising would have a substantial effect on consumption.

[–] Designate6361@lemmy.letthewookiee.win 10 points 1 year ago (4 children)

As much as I understand the hate towards rich people governments are just as much at fault for subsidising, directly funding and giving land to those companies in the first place for people to be able to make money off them.

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[–] Snapz@lemmy.world 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

A long time ago, this kind of reckless excess moved the French to remove the top 10% of their ruling class' bodies.

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[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 9 points 1 year ago (8 children)

This is the best summary I could come up with:


America’s wealthiest people are also some of the world’s biggest polluters – not only because of their massive homes and private jets, but because of the fossil fuels generated by the companies they invest their money in.

That gave a carbon footprint for each dollar of economic activity in the US, which the researchers linked to households using population survey data that showed the industries people work for and their income from wages and investments.

The report also identified “super-emitters.” They are almost exclusively among the wealthiest top 0.1% of Americans, concentrated in industries such as finance, insurance and mining, and produce around 3,000 tons of carbon pollution a year.

Kimberly Nicholas, associate professor of sustainability science at Lund University in Sweden, who was not involved in the report, said the study helps reveal how closely income, especially from investments, is tied to planet-heating pollution.

Sometimes when people talk about ways to tackle the climate crisis, they bring up population control, said Mark Paul, a political economist at Rutgers University who was also not involved in the study.

Globally, the planet-heating pollution produced by billionaires is a million times higher than the average person outside the world’s wealthiest 10%, according to a report last year from the nonprofit Oxfam.


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