How do we get beyond the rhetoric of “the one percent” to discuss the ruling class in twenty-first century America? Thursday host Allen Ruff digs into this and other questions about the American ruling class and “who’s controlling the show” with Doug Henwood through the lens of his latest Jacobin article, “Take Me To Your […]
Inside the World of the Wealth Hoarders
As many Americans have struggled to make ends meet during the pandemic, the wealth of Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and other billionaires has gone up by $1.3 trillion. And there is an entire professional sector—including tax attorneys, estate planners, accountants, and wealth managers—dedicated to help wealthy individuals and corporations protect, preserve, and accumulate […]
Pandemic has played into the hands of the Wealthy
647 individuals in the U.S. have amassed almost a trillion dollars during the pandemic, at the same time as millions of Americans have struggled to make ends meet. Researcher for the Program on Inequality and the Common Good, Omar Ocampo, recently authored an article “Billionaire Wealth vs. Community Health” where he discusses Trump’s bailout dollars […]
The Intertwined Histories of Policing, Private Property, and Capitalis...
Abolishing the police requires abolishing capitalism, argues historian Peter Linebaugh. Today, he joins Allen on the program to discuss the origins of policing as an institution in the eighteenth century; the relationship between policing, private property, and wealth; and the intertwined histories of racial capitalism and state violence. Peter Linebaugh is a historian who has […]
Big Money and the Pandemic — Who’s Profiting from the Crisis?
“Extreme wealth inequality has become America’s pre-existing condition,” writes Chuck Collins in a new co-authored report from the Institute for Policy Studies, “Billionaire Bonanza 2020.” In the past six weeks, as a record 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment, the 630 billionaires of the United States have seen their shared wealth go up $406 […]
Bridging the Racial Wealth Divide with Dedrick Asante-Muhammad
What is wealth? What are the barriers of access to economic security—and how do we overcome them? Today on the show, Ali explores these questions in-depth with Dedrick Asante-Muhammad, one of the authors of the new report “Ten Solutions to Bridge the Racial Wealth Divide.” He offers a clear overview of the racial wealth gap, […]
