Okay, but Can We Shame Billionaires?

Lately, the misdeeds of the wealthy feel inescapable. Whether it’s Trump’s blatant corruption and grifting (which has netted him $3 billion so far this term) or the Epstein Files, I can’t recall a period in my life where it has been clearer that the wealthy are not bound by the same laws and sense of morality as us mere mortals.

One of the clearest distillations of this distinction can be found in The Haves and Have Yachts: Dispatches on the Ultrarich. In it, journalist Evan Osnos writes:

“America’s record in recent years suggests that shamelessness might be a larger problem [than shame].”

To support this claim, he examines in lavish detail the spending sprees and controversies of the ultrarich: everything from the cost of flying in an aging rapper to emcee your birthday to throwing an adult temper tantrum on a Monaco pier because your superyacht got a less-desirable berth.

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Reading this book is an exercise in toggling between astonishment and rage; on the one hand, fantasizing about what that lifestyle must be like before snapping back to disgust that people could spend this selfishly while around the world children are starving and dying of preventable diseases. (Peter Singer WOULD NEVER.)

As I have argued at countless Seattle cocktail parties, no human needs a billion dollars. A billion is a thousand million. It’s a number so large that it’s hard for us to comprehend.

In the United States, we have 902 billionaires. Worldwide, there are 2,640. Depending on how stock valuations go, Elon Musk may become the world’s first trillionaire. That’s a thousand billions!

Have these billionaires achieved such levels of wealth by generously compensating their employees? Absolutely not! While Bezos spent roughly $50 million on his second wedding, Amazon fulfillment workers lack air conditioning and bathroom breaks. Rob Walton spent $4.65 billion to buy the Denver Broncos while paying Wal-Mart employees poverty wages that push a large proportion of full-time workers onto government assistance.

This is greed, pure and simple. It’s superyachts for me and food banks for thee! I can only guess that billionaires rely on a thick blanket of denial to get to sleep at night.

So, is Osnos right? In our era of superrich exploitation, is shamelessness more of a problem than shame? Should we start MASS SHAMING BILLIONAIRES?

Not so fast. As we looked at earlier this month, the urge to shame can come from different needs, like a lack of accountability. In the case of the Have-Yachts, the problem of “shamelessness” doesn’t mean that we necessarily want rich people to be publicly pilloried, but that we want them to develop a sense of morality and responsibility.

I mean, even Spiderman knew that “with great power comes great responsibility,” but billionaires often act as if they don’t owe anyone anything. And they’re propped up by a trio of American cultural beliefs around wealth. We believe that the wealthy deserve their riches because:

* They’re self-made. Read enough rich people biographies and you’ll notice a pattern. All of these wealthy folks actually came from humble beginnings! They’ve worked so hard to get here, and they’re not even really that rich, more like “middle class.” Again and again, they downplay the loans, gifts, and personal connections that got them where they are.

* They’re smarter than us. Or so the story goes. For all the media doting on figures like Musk and Bezos and touting their intelligence, I’ve seen little evidence of it. Anyone who’s worked for their companies knows how much chaos and mismanagement goes on behind-the-scenes at their companies. And that’s not even taking into account things like Musk’s ketamine-fueled gibberish tweet storms. The truth is there are plenty of very intelligent people working construction or ringing up groceries at this very moment; intelligence is not a guarantee of economic success.

* They “attracted” their fortune. Bro, do you even know how wealthy you could be if you had the right MINDSET? Oh, excuse me…GRINDSET? Even discounting the numerous influencers who peddle “mindset coaching” there are books like The Secret and The Alchemist. It’s like there’s a whole industry trying to convince people that they’re in complete control of how much money they earn. If you’re wealthy, it’s because you deserve it, same if you’re poor.

For an especially devious twist on this belief, add in the Prosperity Gospel heresy (as exemplified by charlatans like Joel Osteen) that God “blesses” the best Christians with material wealth.

This mythology was built to justify greed. If I alone am responsible for my wealth, I have no obligation to reinvest in the community that got me here. If we are all in complete control of our economic destinies, there is no need to worry about the poor, who should probably just work harder.

These myths, (along with those like “rich people have good taste” and “people are rich because they're thrifty”) bring to mind another myth that was used to oppress the masses and prop up the elite: The Divine Right of Kings. Per Encyclopedia Brittanica:

“[The] divine right of kings…asserted that kings derived their authority from God and could not therefore be held accountable for their actions by any earthly authority such as a parliament.”

For hundreds of years, European monarchs were untouchable because, after all, they were put in power by God. Overthrowing a monarch was impossible…until it suddenly wasn’t. Enlightenment thinking, the Protestant Reformation, and royal misbehavior (hello Marie Antoinette) eventually led to monarchs ceding power to parliamentary democracy.

Think about it: there are 902 billionaires in America and over 349,000,000 non-billionaires. 90% of Americans agree that we’re in a cost-of-living crisis. The only thing preventing us from reforming our laws and tax code is a government (run largely by wealthy people) who distract us with wedge issues.

But before you think I’m over here sharpening my guillotine, I’ll say this: I don’t think we should use the threat of violence or public shaming to try and induce change, even in billionaires. I do think, however, it’s incumbent on us to call out greed and corruption when we see it, and to work together to draw lines around what is acceptable.

What will these lines look like? For Dorothy Day of the Catholic Workers movement, it was owning multiple coats. (“If you have two coats, one of them belongs to the poor.”) For us, it might be “don’t own multiple homes during a housing crisis.” I have friends who refuse to own a car, which I admire even if, logistically, I can’t make that work right now.

We may not always agree on the small details, but even trying to hash out a framework would help us move the goalposts back towards sanity.

It feels like we must be reaching the apex of greed and kleptocracy. I only hope that as all this rot is finally surfaced, it will lead to a reckoning and actual reforms, both culturally and politically.

What do you think? How many coats should one own? Should billionaires be publicly shamed? Have you ever fantasized about this? (Oh yeah, uh…me neither.)

As always, I love to hear your thoughts, questions, and arguments in the comments.

Thanks for reading Heretic Hereafter! This post is public so feel free to share it.

BONUS MATERIALS:

* Osnos’ yacht essay is a great read

* Wanna hear a bunch of rich people talk about how they’re actually “middle class”? Check out this episode of “If Books Could Kill”

* Did you know? Up to 50% of congress are millionaires (we don’t even know the exact number!)

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