Sam Pizzigati

Why lawmakers so need to close the loopholes that let private equity kingpins “load businesses with debt, extract cash, and leave us with a burger that all bun and no beef.” #inequality @ineteconomics.bsky.social www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives...

“If we are serious about limiting the ability of #billionaires to buy #democracy, we have to go beyond worrying about campaign contributions. If they control everything we see and hear...they won’t have to spend a penny on elections.” @deanbaker13.bsky.social www.patreon.com/BeatThePress...

Since 2011 Mark Zuckerberg has spent $112 million buying 11 properties in a Palo Alto neighborhood and turning them all into a luxury private mega-compound. Small wonder that Zuckerman — net worth $250B — has no plans to exit California to avoid a $12.5B wealth tax. www.realtor.com/news/trends/...

“The sight of so many rich guys blasting off into outer space this year was the inspiration for this song. Here’s hoping Jeff, Elon and the rest will ‘take their time’ and ‘take their friends’ and be in no particular hurry to come back.” David Sands www.youtube.com/watch?v=0D_5...

U.S. CEOs doing a great job — at avoiding federal corporate income tax. New @itep.org stats: 706 top corporations paid just 10.4% of their $1.88 trillion in profits last year in tax. Current federal corporate tax rate: 21%. Comparable rate after WWII: 52%. myemail.constantcontact.com/Corporate-Am...

Economist Justin Wolfers: “Washington has discovered a brilliant financial strategy. Cut benefits for people who need them, cut taxes for people who don’t, and borrow the difference from people who aren’t old enough to vote.” @justinwolfers.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=74OK...

Are we on the precipice of another age of reform? Could be. New polling: The top tax priorities for voters are hiking taxes on #billionaires and curbing tax breaks for big corporations. robertreich.substack.com/p/the-billio...

A tablet for toddlers! What will Jeff Bezos think of next! Something to help little kids mature? No, something pediatricians warn will stunt kids’ ability to think independently — but will help Bezos make even more billions. @calebecarma.bsky.social oligarchwatch.substack.com/p/amazons-di...

No bigger vote in two weeks than California's Prop 40 wealth tax initiative. A vote yes on Prop 40 could set the stage for a national wealth tax campaign. After all, if we can beat the billionaires in California, we can beat them anywhere. #inequality @patrioticmillionaires.org

Elon Musk says he’s going to give every kid in America a share of his SpaceX stock. As the SpaceX founder, Musk paid essentially nothing for the stock. Giving the shares away will boost his fortune — the world’s largest — at U.S. taxpayer expense. @popular.info popular.info/p/beware-of-...

Google co-founder Sergey Brin has contributed $102 million to the group bankrolling two ballot countermeasures that would nullify Prop 40 even if it garners a majority of votes. www.latimes.com/business/sto...

New Pew polling: “Among those who say there’s too much #inequality and that at least major changes are needed to address it, only about one-in-ten Republicans (11%) and Democrats (8%) are extremely or very confident the economic system can be effectively changed.” www.pewresearch.org/social-trend...

A new National Bureau of Economic Research paper “finds that Norway’s recently increased taxes on business wealth pushed a handful of the super-mobile super-rich to move but produced more public revenue without hurting business.” #inequality dakotafreepress.com/2026/10/13/n...

Going, going, Gucci! Luxury giant LVMH and Hermès share values down 40% this year, with Gucci down nearly 30%. One reason: Wealthy Chinese who use offshore trusts to shield assets must declare and pay outstanding taxes from previous years by October 22. www.vietnam.vn/en/trung-quo...

“The main policies of President Trump during his second term in office have had the net effect of raising taxes and costs in 2026 for the typical American in every income group except for the richest 1 percent.” #inequality itep.org/impact-of-tr...

Portland city councilors are pushing to update their city’s groundbreaking tax on CEO pay over 100x median worker pay. Says councilor Angelita Morillo: We live in a a nation “that has created a trillionaire while schools are closing.” @councilormorillo.bsky.social www.portland.gov/council/dist...

This acclaimed British novelist takes inspiration from the 1970s American TV detective Columbo, who came into rich people’s lives and tore them apart, without them even knowing what he was doing until he’d already done it. @ianrankin1.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/books/2026/o...

New data from Americans for Tax Fairness: Trump’s MAGA Inc. super PAC has raised over $222 million from billionaires since January 2025. Of the dollars Maga Inc. has collected, $1 of every $2 has come from a billionaire. @4taxfairness.bsky.social www.commondreams.org/news/billion...

“If 2026 feels like a banner year for the world’s tech billionaires, the numbers bear it out.” Elon Musk now rates as a trillionaire again, and tech’s top 100 billionaires gained $845 billion over this year’s first 9 months. www.bloomberg.com/billionaires...

“No American alive today has ever lived in a nation where the richest individuals owned more of what our nation produces. It is not your imagination. It is not vibes. We are, measurably, blazing new frontiers in #inequality.” @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/the-war-ag...

The roughly 100 tech fortunes among the world’s 500 richest people gained a combined $845 billion through September 30, the most ever for the first nine months of a year #inequality #billionaires finance.yahoo.com/technology/a...

Will AI be creating ever more #billionaires? Or is the AI bubble going to be popping sometime soon? An ace analysis from the Center for Economic and Policy Research economist Dean Baker. @ceprdc.bsky.social @deanbaker13.bsky.social deanbaker22.substack.com/p/an-ai-bubb...

A victory for California’s proposed billionaire wealth tax on Election Day “will amount to the first time that a government in the U.S. has successfully taxed the assets, rather than the income, of extremely rich people as a class.” @newyorker.com www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

Campaign filings show efforts to block California’s proposed one-time tax of 5 percent on billionaire wealth have now raised over $187 million. What a stunning victory over #oligarchy passage of the wealth tax will be! #inequality fortune.com/article/how-...

Only 12% of humanity collects more than $100 dollars a year in income from the ownership of assets. @lseinequalities.bsky.social www.equals.ink/p/who-makes-...

Earlier this week, the day after Donald Trump opined that only Americans who “want to be poor” and “live in a crime-infested area” would say no to a local data center, the president hosted AI’s billionaires in a White House love-in. @calebecarma.bsky.social oligarchwatch.substack.com/p/the-gang-g...

AI: “a technology of, by and for oligarchs, with hardly any of the benefits trickling down to regular Americans.” #datacenters #inequality paulkrugman.substack.com/p/one-more-r...

For every dollar the median employee at the computing giant Oracle made last year, the company’s co-CEO pocketed $6,623. #inequality www.forbes.com/sites/antoni...

In an economy going to hell, entry prices for NY luxury condominiums “have climbed to what used to be the very top of the market.” At 262 Fifth Avenue, the tallest all-residential building on Fifth Ave, units start at $7.5 million. www.mansionglobal.com/articles/man...

Naomi Klein on taxing away billionaire wealth: “We’re not calling for the guillotine. All we want for these #billionaires is to just have to live in the same world as us. It’s not so bad down here.” www.irishtimes.com/life-style/p...

Jeopardy! host @kenjennings.bsky.social opposes repealing his state’s millionaire tax. He wants “an America where it’s embarrassing for wealthy people to say, ‘Even though I could afford this, and it will improve public services in our state, I’d rather fight it.’” www.nytimes.com/2026/09/27/u...

Will AI make our world more unequal? Absolutely — if we allow the pattern of previous industrial revolutions to repeat. But that repetition need not be automatic. @computerweekly.bsky.social www.computerweekly.com/feature/AI-p...

A near half-century of corner-office greed. From 1978–2025, top U.S. CEO pay rose 1,316%. Over those same years, typical worker pay rose 28%. www.epi.org/publication/...

The 22 California billionaires bankrolling the ad blitz against the tax-the-rich proposal on their state’s November ballot held a combined wealth of $439.8 billion on Jan 1 2025. Their wealth now sits at $722.1 billion. @ips-dc.org @chuck77.bsky.social inequality.org/article/the-...

Lawmakers in Portland, the first U.S. city to levy a special tax on corporations with CEOs making over 100x their worker pay, are now pushing to raise the tax penalty’s rate. @councilormorillo.bsky.social @councilorgreen.bsky.social www.oregonlive.com/portland/202...

Momentum is building to create an “International Panel on Inequality,” a global research body that would work to fashion a strong scientific consensus on the scale of the #inequality problem, its drivers, consequences, and solutions. oxfamgbnews.bsky.social www.equals.ink/p/a-very-popular-panel

UN secretary-general António Guterres yesterday: “Equality is not a dream. It is a decision.” gadebate.un.org/en/81/secret...

Making great wealth off of people’s poor health: 15 of the billionaires on the new Forbes list of America’s 400 wealthiest owe their fortunes to health-related corporations. #inequality #healthcare www.medpagetoday.com/special-repo...

The historic proposed billionaire wealth tax on California’s November ballot still holds a 45%-to-43% polling lead, despite massive billionaire spending for a “no” vote. Among undecideds, 65% lean yes, 15% no. #inequality www.politico.com/news/2026/09...

“It’s often said that modern democracy isn’t one man/one vote, but instead one dollar/one vote. In reality it’s worse than that. A hundred billion dollars buys you a lot more than a hundred billion votes.” #inequality @oliverbullough.bsky.social www.codastory.com/oligarchy/th...

“The oligarchs of today...fervently believe that they are the masters of the universe, and that they, through their enormous wealth and power, have been ordained to rule the world.” Sen. Bernie Sanders, Sept 21, 2026 www.commondreams.org/news/bernie-...

The % of the total U.S. economy going to workers as wages has now fallen to a record low of 52.9%, down from over 65% when tracking began in 1947. Who's been gaining what workers have lost? Corporate execs and investors. #inequality robertreich.substack.com/p/the-rise-o...

Six Nobel laureates have penned an open letter backing the proposed California ballot initiative that would place a one-time 5% tax on #billionaires. Recent polling has the initiative up by 6 percentage points. #inequality www.ft.com/content/94ec...

The minimum net worth needed to rank among the 2026 Forbes 400 richest Americans: $4.4 billion, $600 million over the 2025 minimum. A record 590 U.S. #billionaires ended up too poor to make the 2026 top 400, up from 500 in 2025. #inequality www.forbes.com/sites/kirkog...

CEO pay at America’s top 350 firms last year averaged $27.9 million. That total does not include the Elon Musk pay package. In 1965, CEO pay outpaced worker take-homes by 21 times. The ratio last year: 325 times. #inequality @epi.org www.epi.org/blog/ceo-pay...

Only just over 250,000 people worldwide — about 0.003% of the global population — fly on private jets. The rest of us subsidizing their joyrides. ips-dc.org/report-high-...

A panic over AI's consequences is sweeping through elite circles. This panic’s weird aspect: We already have laws that prohibit the harm AI execs are doing. But in America we simply do not enforce the law against the powerful. @matthewstoller.bsky.social www.thebignewsletter.com/p/ai-is-an-e...

Our #crypto billionares in disbelief after their prized Clarity Act bill fails to advance in Congress. Laments on X Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogtatz (net worth $5.8 billion): “Govt feels broken. 18 months of work...and Clarity falls apart on the 5-yard line.” finance.yahoo.com/markets/cryp...

Years ago, we feared nukes might destroy civilization. So we bargained treaties to minimize that risk. But nobody back then proposed handing the arms race over to corporate giants. Yet that’s close to what we’re doing with AI. @pitchforkeconomics.bsky.social lesleopold.substack.com/p/why-the-co...

47% of Americans would like U.S. labor unions to have more influence, a record Gallup polling high and twice the 23% who want to see less union influence. The share who want to see more union influence has soared from a record low of 25% in 2009. #inequality #unions news.gallup.com/poll/713936/...