Oxfam: Tax billionaires to fund vaccines for poor hit by pandemic
Inequality Kills: The unparalleled action needed to combat unprecedented inequality in the wake of COVID-19: “The wealth of the world’s 10 richest men [Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bernard Arnault, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Ballmer, and Warren Buffet] has doubled since the pandemic began.
The incomes of 99% of humanity are worse off because of COVID-19. Widening economic, gender, and racial inequalities—as well as the inequality that exists between countries—are tearing our world apart. This is not by chance, but choice: “economic violence” is perpetrated when structural policy choices are made for the richest and most powerful people. This causes direct harm to us all, and to the poorest people, women and girls, and racialized groups most. Inequality contributes to the death of at least one person every four seconds.
But we can radically redesign our economies to be centered on equality. We can claw back extreme wealth through progressive taxation; invest in powerful, proven inequality-busting public measures; and boldly shift power in the economy and society. If we are courageous, and listen to the movements demanding change, we can create an economy in which nobody lives in poverty, nor with unimaginable billionaire wealth—in which inequality no longer kills.”
THE GREAT RESET: Billionaire Wealth Has Soared As Millions Fell Into Poverty During Pandemic.
Related: The rich and powerful thrived as the rest of us suffered in the year of lockdowns.
Plus: “The biggest loser in early twenty first century America has been the working class.”
Also: America’s elites are waging class war on workers and small biz. “Lockdowns — where the laptop class stays home while working-class people bring them stuff — were enacted in many states. States that had them did no better, and often worse, than states that did not. This became obvious early but resulted in no change of policy. . . . So is it fair to call the overclass response to the pandemic a failure? Well, certainly not for the overclass, whose members are richer, more powerful and more secure in their positions than a year ago. For America? Well, that’s another story.”
- A High-Risk Medical Device Didn't Meet Federal Standards. The Government Paid Millions for More.
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- NYTimes
- Why planes might soon have just one pilot
- CNN Travel
- How a Hacker Controlled Dozens of Teslas Using a Flaw in Third-Party App
- Vice
- Project Torogoz: Extensive Hacking of Media & Civil Society in El Salvador with Pegasus Spyware
- CitizenLab
- New Apple Warning Affects All iPhone Users
- Forbes
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- Thomas Koenig
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- Bruce Schneier
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- NYTimes
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- WashPost
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- Krebs on Security
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- Ars Technica
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- Washington Consumers' Checkbook
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- NYTimes
- Tackling Hard Computational Problems
- Steve Nasis MIT News
- How Game Theory Changed Poker
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- Paper on finance and technology manias
- Andrew Odlyzko
- Wearing Many Hats: The Rise of the Professional Security Hacker
- Gabriella Coleman via PGN
- Info on RISKS (comp.risks)
The “highly skilled” are the enemies of your existence White Hot Harlots (Anthony L). Late to get to this but a fine rant.
What it’s like to make $100k+ walking dogs The Hustle
Now You Can Rent a Robot Worker—for Less Than Paying a Human Wired
THE WELL OF THE CONGRESS: The Wealthiest 10% of Zip Codes Provide 67% of ‘Maxed Out’ Contributions to Congressional Candidates, and the Richest 1% of Zip Codes Account for 25%Public Citizen. Explains why elected officials are so attuned to the pet needs of the so-called Professional-Managerial Class (PMC), which if you were to draw a Venn diagram, overlaps heavily with the top 10%.
Distrust in political, media and business leaders sweeps the globe Axios