Aren't Billionaires People, Too? Yes, but...

Ordinary Americans skip meals to afford healthcare, making it important for Democrats to maintain small “d” populist policies. Anti-billionaire sentiment is spreading within the Democratic Party, including among candidates who present themselves as billionaires who want to tax billionaires. Tom Steyer’s campaign emphasizes credibility through opposition from plutocrats and corporations, and highlights the Giving Pledge, promising to give up most wealth while alive. Public views increasingly frame billionaires as morally wrong and as threats to democracy, with growing support for wealth taxes in blue states. A central challenge remains: dismantling systems enabling unlimited billionaire influence may require help from the very beneficiaries of those systems.

"When ordinary Americans are forced to skip meals to afford healthcare, it's vital that the Democratic Party resist retreating from small "d" populist policies. How much has anti-billionaire sentiment pervaded the Democratic Party? Even the billionaires are getting in on the action."

"In the ultra-competitive primary for California governor, businessman Tom Steyer has sold himself as " the billionaire who wants to tax billionaires." He has spent much of the campaign touting the plutocrats and corporations who oppose him as a signal of credibility. And he has emphasized his commitment to the Giving Pledge, meaning he and his wife intend to give up most of their money while they're alive; as he put it, " I will not die a billionaire." (That makes 342 million of us.)"

"Steyer and his team recognize where the energy can increasingly be found in progressive politics. In a nation reared on Horatio Alger myths of self-made tycoons, 18 percent of Americans see being a billionaire as " morally wrong;" that figure is one in three among young people. Over half of American adults now believe billionaires are a threat to democracy. And as more blue states consider wealth taxes, it's clear the public is increasingly demanding a reckoning with extreme inequality."

"For the long-term health of democracy, the systems that have allowed the ultra-wealthy to exert unlimited financial influence over politics must be dismantled. But can those systems be toppled without the help of their billionaire beneficiaries? Excessive wealth inequality in the United States isn't new; we're not heading into season four of The Gilded Age for nothing. Yet it continues to soar to record highs."

Read at The Nation