Personal Reflections of a Middle-Aged Man

Reminder: 290 and 67. The 290 represents how many U.S. House of Representatives members it takes to override a presidential veto (all Representatives are up for reelection this year). It takes 67 U.S. Senators to override a presidential veto (35 Senators are up for reelection this year with 22 of those being Republicans—the ones we have to concentrate on the most). These numbers are very important this year at the ballot box because it will take this number of votes to help right this vast ship of a country for all of us, not just the billionaire class.

On Friday, a single person in the entire world became, at least on paper, history’s first trillionaire. A trillion dollars: $1,000,000,000,000. If one would start counting now, from one to a trillion, it would take roughly 31,710 years. Spending $1,000 a day would take about 2.74 million days to spend a trillion dollars. Spending a million dollars a day would take 2,740 years. Basically, no one will ever spend a trillion dollars in their lifetime, nor their children or grandchildren, and even further down the line, in their lifetimes.

I’m sorry, but that is just obscene. I have nothing against anyone living well, nor having multiple homes, traveling the world, or even owning a yacht. But this amount of wealth in the hands of one person is more than a bit over the top, it is, to me, downright dangerous.

Now, if that person has committed to using those funds for the good of the planet, that’s one thing. Even if the person, being a U.S. citizen decided to only help those in the U.S., a lot of good could be done with those funds. 

For example, here are some ideas of pressing need in our country this person could start with:

• There are approximately 772,000 homeless persons living in the U.S. (some people who are homeless chose to be so, but most do not). If each of these people were given just $100,000 that must be used as a down payment for a home or towards rent, it would cost only $77,200,000,000, alleviating homelessness across the country.
• There are approximately 14 million children suffering food insecurity in the U.S. If the families of these children received $300 a month for a year, this would cost $50,400,000,000 to help lift families up for a year, which for most of those families would lift them up for a lifetime.
• There are approximately 17 million people experiencing medical debt in the U.S. (14 million owing at least $1,000, the remainder over $10,000). We know how easily medical debt can happen, even with insurance. It would cost around $220,000,000,000 to erase that debt. Thus lifting millions of families for a better life.
• There are approximately six million people experiencing utility debt in the U.S. of around $789 each. We all know in trying times, a choice must be made between food for our kids, gas to get to work, buying medicine for a sick child, paying rent, or paying the electric bill. Erasing that debt would cost around $4,734,000,000. Again, lifting millions of people to a better life.
• The Women, Infants, and Children’s Program (WIC), which Congress recently cut funding towards, costs roughly $7.4 billion a year. These funds help lift families and create healthier children, which in the long run helps reduce medical costs for us all and a trillionaire could cover easily.
• Child care, one of the most expensive costs for a working family, can mean the difference between working or not working, which then means a family then may need to apply for government assistance to survive. Universal Pre-K for three- and four-year-olds, for all in the U.S., would cost about $35 billion a year. This would allow for more parents to work, thus lowering the cost of WIC, SNAP, TNAF, and other government assistance programs.
• Since school is mandated by law, school breakfast and lunch should be provided at no cost to all families. The total cost of school meals for K-12 costs around $18.7 billion a year. If this cost is paid, it would lift up all families and prevent the stigma attached to children whose families earn too much for a free or reduced priced lunch, but not enough to cover the cost of a meal for their children (packed or school lunch)—thus causing their children to go without these meals.
• There are approximately 110,000 traditional public and charter schools in the U.S., many which aren’t able to afford full-time music, PE, and art teachers for their students. If each school had those costs covered, it would cost about $24.4 billion. What would academic achievement look like each year since art and physical education has been proven to show a positive effect on student achievement?

A trillionaire who was altruistic would be easier to digest if they were using those funds to help society at-large. But we already know this isn’t the case because they weren’t really doing this while only having hundreds of billions of dollars. There is no evidence their mindset will change.

For some additional perspective, the top 20 richest people in the United States are worth around $3,636,000,000,000. Yes, that is over three trillion dollars for just 20 people.

If this $3.636 trillion was taxed at just five percent, it would yield $181.8 billion in tax dollars to be used to solve some of the U.S. challenges mentioned above. In fact, it would cover almost the total cost of the needs above.

Now, if those 20 people were taxed at just the lower rate of a middle-class working family, which is about 25%, that would yield about $909 billion. That amount far exceeds the cost of the challenges above. After those costs, the remaining funds could be used towards other societal needs, such as bridges, highways, pot holes, electrical grid, or even paying down the national debt. 

This trillionaire and the billionaires would continue earning more money each year. They would definitely not be destitute or living in poverty by any means. Their positive effect on society would be immeasurable.

Will they do it? We all know the answer to that question without evening having to pause to think about it. 

But they could, and that they won’t makes it all the more sadder.

So we have the world’s first trillionaire, whoop de do. Who cares?!