It Would Be Nice to Ignore the Tech Mogul on the Climate Crisis. But He's a Billionaire, So We Must Listen.
Let's begin with the fundamental problem: Bill Gates ignores the role of politics. While he was slow to accept it, he now accepts the realities of climate science. But he exists in stark, awkward denial about how politics works. His recent article on climate, shared days ago, approaches climate change without political context. He writes as if there were no such thing as political power, and pretending massive fortunes aren't relevant.
Primary Argument
His primary argument suggests that financial resources are scarce, so the representatives at the environmental conference in Brazil should redirect resources from "near-term emissions goals" towards climate "adaptation" and allocating funds for economic hardship and illness.
Certainly, money for worthy projects is limited, but that's not because of some natural law, some implacable truth about human society. This results from wealthy interests attacking on benign state spending, resulting in the elimination of development assistance and substantial decreases in support money of additional nations. Budget cuts represent political decisions. The selection to enforce it originates with authorities yielding to the demands of extremely wealthy individuals.
Current Funds
Massive amounts of wealth exist. Shortly following Gates' latest publication, data indicated that the combined assets of the top ten US fortune holders expanded by hundreds of billions over the last year. This amount by itself, the growth in ten individuals' fortunes, is almost 10 times the annual amount required to end extreme poverty worldwide. How have they managed to channel so much of global wealth into personal accounts? And why can't we get it back through appropriate revenue collection? The solution lies in their conversion of financial influence into governmental control. The richer they become, the stronger their capacity to shape government and financial structures to their desires, ensuring that they become richer still. But Bill Gates says nothing in his essay about ways and locations for more resources for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be identified.
'The article seems designed as appeasement toward Donald Trump.' Gates photographed with the former president for business leaders in Washington DC.
The Poverty-Wealth Connection
There's a direct link between the deprivation Gates says concerns him and the wealth he fails to mention. In the US, unhoused populations are reaching new highs, and so is the share of assets owned by the top 0.1%. While this might not be Gates's own business model, by suppressing salaries, racking up rents, busting trade unions and winning tax and spending cuts, extremely wealthy individuals benefit from others' economic struggles.
Study Results
A notable research in academic political journals, among limited studies accessing this exclusive domain, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the general population. The rich participants surveyed, in stark contrast to mere earthlings, viewed government debt as paramount of the issues it listed, and environmental collapse as unimportant. They were much more inclined to demand that social security and federal healthcare should be cut, and far less likely to believe that the unemployed should have a "decent standard of living", or that there should be stricter rules for petroleum corporations, banking entities and medical coverage companies. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.
Governmental Access
What opinions win out? The few wealthy or the many citizens? Although the research occurred during the Obama administration, it found that billionaires maintained closer relationships with government figures than ordinary people. And now? I scarcely think I need to spell it out.
Omissions and Assumptions
Here's another crucial exclusion from the billionaire's article: throughout thousands of words, Trump goes unmentioned. If Gates included this, he'd have to acknowledge that the second of his major assumptions is shaky: reductions in the cost of new green technologies lead inexorably to environmental progress. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than fossil fuels. But Trump and like-minded politicians are employing every method to hinder the change.
In part due to these factors, traditional energy sources stay very profitable. This potentially clarifies why, notwithstanding Gates' assertion about eliminating petroleum company stocks in 2019, its oil and gas financial assets have, truly expanded.
Psychological Factors
Regarding Gates, confronting extreme wealth power could appear inconceivable. This isn't just about conflicting with his perspective. I mean that, judging by his remarkable silences on the issue, he might be literally incapable of thinking about it. Possibly this represents "extreme wealth mentality": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. While the ultra-rich are notoriously hard to study, extrapolating from research into how gaining wealth and status affects cognition could suggest that obtaining enormous fortunes compares to cognitive damage. Fortunes seem to disturb particular brain operations, especially those involving compassion and viewpoint.
Strategic Considerations
But perhaps there's also calculation here: his article seems designed as appeasement toward Trump. Trump certainly took it that way: "Our victory over climate misinformation is complete." The billionaire has acknowledged his complete error. This demonstrated nerve, and we're thankful. MAGA!!!"
Historical Context
The billionaire has consistently been incorrect on this topic, even if not for the explanations Trump provides. He has continually trailed scientific consensus, reciting fossil fuel claims (clean technology could decrease pollution only through enormous spending) well after their refutation. He has propagated misunderstanding and inaccuracies, such as the groundless assertion in his new essay that the objective of Sri Lanka's catastrophic restriction on chemical fertilizers involved emission reduction.
Further Difficult Realities
The billionaire titles his piece Three Difficult Climate Realities. So here's another tough truth he studiously ignores. Should, as appears probable, vital planetary systems reach critical thresholds and suddenly collapse, the consequences for people, let alone the survival of other life forms (a subject he consistently omits), would eliminate the gradual advancement he predicts. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but through sudden changes of state, the possible impacts on human wellbeing are extremely hard to predict. His position that all resources should follow existing data-driven assessments of human betterment, even if it seems logical, creates significant illogic when confronting systemic transformation, {prompting us to ignore the greatest