This article was originally published by Tyler Durden at Zero Hedge
One man went to Davos and dared to say what Pepe Escobar thought no one would – that “it’s the inequality, stupid.”
Amid all the back-slapping exuberance of record high global stock markets and record high global net worth, John McDonnell, the U.K. opposition Labour Party’s spokesman on finance, came to the World Economic Forum in Davos with an uncomfortable message for the global elite…
“I just warn the Davos establishment: There’s an anger building out there that you need to recognize and deal with,”
As Bloomberg reports, most delegates in Davos have adopted an upbeat tone this week — reflected in the optimism of top bankers at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Deutsche Bank AG who told Bloomberg they see a continuation in a global boom in dealmaking.
But as McDonnell warns, there’s an “avalanche of discontent” out there among the masses.
But in the Swiss resort, “there’s almost a sense of euphoria, it is extraordinary, and I think there’s a sense of complacency.”
McDonnell’s warning carries weight because he would be chancellor of the exchequer if Labour came to power — something investors are preparing for.
“Out there, beyond the Davos compound, many people — we saw it in the Oxfam report — feel the markets have been rigged against them, not for them,” McDonnell said.
“When they’re told we’re coming out of that recession, growth is returning and they don’t feel they’re participating in the benefits of that growth, that’s when people become really alienated and angry.”
Bloomberg reports that McDonnell then laid out a recipe for regaining the trust of the masses, including:
- Paying workers a “real living wage” and allowing them to share in the profits of the companies they work for.
- Recognizing trade unions and appointing workers to company boards.
- A new “Hippocratic oath” for accountancy firms to tackle tax avoidance rather than encourage it.
- The rich and those in power should publish their income tax returns.
- A “Robin Hood” tax on financial transactions that would be used to fund public services and international development programs.
With the support of the far left fringes of Labour, both McDonnell and Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn have firmed up their grip over the party, appointing allies to the party’s National Executive Committee in recent months after fending of an attempted coup by moderate lawmakers in 2016.
“There has to be a radical new agenda where people share in the growth, share in the wealth, share in the benefits as the economic cycle turns,” McDonnell said. “I think there’s an avalanche out there of discontent and resentment and alienation if we don’t address these issues.”
Still, as Pepe Escobar previously noted, this year’s Davos theme was “Resilient Dynamism.” As a definition of the current woes of turbo-capitalism, a five-year-old in a favela, or slum, in Rio could come up with something more meaningful.
But then, Davos is a one-trick pony. “Resilience” remains a euphemism for the ever-expanding markets and low pay for workers syndrome. In a nutshell, globalization driven by huge multinational corporations.
We should scrap “Resilience” as the name of their game is “Inequality.” Davos, of course, does not do “inequality.”
In a study released by UC Berkeley, the wealth of the top 1% of Americans accrued by 11.6% in 2010, while for the other 99% it was a mere 0.2%. This is what is at the heart of hardcore neoliberalism and capitalist.
Davos should be discussing how a key segment of elites concocted the Wall Street-provoked financial crash. That was only ‘virtual’ business, but it was not ‘virtual’ national governments that had to intervene afterward to pick up the bill and bail out the banks.
No, I am afraid “Resilient Dynamism” will not do for Davos. But it is a good definition of China. While European and American elites accrue their capital to contain Beijing’s advance in Africa and Asia, China’s interventionism is of the business kind. It is a case of building roads, not wars.
Still, the question Davos refuses to ask remains: Why is it easier to imagine the total destruction of mankind, from nuclear war to a climate catastrophe, than to work on changing the system of relations spawned by capitalism?
Stay tuned for that one.
Give us our Universal Basic Income so we can buy guns, ammo and rope.
All of those greedy cunts deserve to HANG!! Power to the People.
My posts haven’t made it for all to see for saying much, much milder thing than this. What is up with that?
Thank god this populist moron isn’t in power. This is the exact sort of economic illiteracy that destroys capital and then entire economies. It is the economic version of the Democrat political BS that keeps the blacks down by always promising to “help” them and look out for their interests.
This guy isn’t a populist. He is a socialist and a collectivist and he is promoting inflation.
“Thank god this populist moron isn’t in power”
…yet.
If the income of America’s 1% were divided out among the population “commie-style”, every man, woman, child, tranny, freak, (what-have-you), would ALL TAKE HOME OVER SEVEN HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS PER YEAR.
ALL POLITICIANS INCLUDING ORANGE JULIUS ARE LIARS, CROOKS, AND CHEATS. PERIOD. NO EXCEPTION. TIME TO START IN BUILDING GUILLOTINES IN DC AND ON WALL STREET.
Bad math. 700,000 X 300,000,000 = 210,000,000,000,000.
There are not that many dollars.
Here you go….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slTF_XXoKAQ
And that is why they are poor.
According to the Census Bureau’s “population clock,” there are over 327,000,000 people in the United States, today. Is it truly your contention that the income of “America’s 1%” is so large as to provide each of those 327 million people with not just $700,000.00 once, but every year? To ask it another way, do you truly believe the top income earners in the US have an total annual income of 228.9 trillion dollars?
He is a commie that believes the fair share doctorine. Robin Hood tax?
You know the funny thing about Robin Hood?
He was not fighting the rich, he was fighting the tax collector. It was the state that made the people poor, not the wealthy.
So if Robin Hood wood be alive today, the same people to scream for a “Robin Hood tax” would be his worst enemys.
McDonnell neglected to mention in his list of things the rich should do to calm the masses…. “die, and die quickly; for if the people finally rise up having had enough, you’re all going to find your ends ……. very slowly and painfully”.
Just give up.
They needed us for something before. They don’t now. You’re fired.
Darwin always bats last.
Bullets work on a ‘Robin Hood’ just like on anyone else. The globalists don’t realize the hell they’re going to unleash on themselves.
The Deplorable Braveheart
Ordo ab Chao, out of chaos, order.
Let it all fall apart and “They” who no-one can identify if they walked down the street will sit it out, finance group against group and become the phenix rising from the ashes. Actually I think they’re looking at it as an opportunity to solidify power.
+1
The truth is human beings are selfish and greedy. A democracy is about the worst kind of government you can have. We either need to go to a rights based authoritarian government, or turn back into a republic of soveigrn states like the original constitution established.
Democracy is and always will be 3 men at a table, 2 vote for the third guys shit, money buys propaganda so money is law.
Robin Hood stole from the tax collector and gave it back to the taxpayer. Lazy asses didn’t get a dime.
Rather than whine and bitch as the masses covet the wealth they should use the opportunity to better themselves.
No one, neither the rich crooked bankers or the moronic, Pavlovian commies seem bright enough to comprehend Article 1, Section, 10, Clause 1 of the US Constitution. What good is a solution if the people are too f**king dumb to use it?
Kevin2, that’s all the more reason why they should be liquidated. As long as they’re alive they’re a threat to all of humanity.
Who are they? Where do they live? How many are there?
Remove one and the line is a mile long for their replacement. Their power structure needs to be removed, No Fiat Currency, No Fractional Reserve Banking, No Monopolistic Media Ownership, No Central Bank. Thats a start.
On the turning away from the week and down trodden. Free food for all? Sounds nice? Growers will have to work double time? Processers ,distributers , will have there hands full? Such a Delema? We’re here a short time , then long gone?
With the courses they are taking ,demographically? They must have a super weapon for the masses? Or they are, I inherited millions and think I can control them with money? And food is the greatest weapon? In the End?
This Labour Party muppet fails to mention his party were the ones who not only caused the Global Financial Crash with their spendthrift policies, they bailed the banks out on a global scale with British tax payers money.
The anger is building but it isn’t in favor of more immigrants, welfare spending, white genocide, and the other policies favored by the Labour Party. People are going far, far to the right of that – just look at Brexit.
There will be probably be a right-wing ‘coup’ in the Conservative Party and the ‘Government of all the Harpies’ will be thrown out and replaced with something run by Jacob Reece-Mogg (Moggie) and Boris Johnson (Bojo). An All-English Party of Good Values and Free Markets.
Let’s just put this way, if the elite in America don’t include the middle class in their huge profits they can kiss their A$$’s good-by…PERIOD..!!! Yes our Nation is on the verge of Revolution and these greedy moron better wake-up or they will end up at the end of rope..!!!