KitNotes

According to BBC News (RSS feeds - gotta love ‘em), the United Nations has found that 2% of the world’s population own nearly half the world’s wealth. So, while the majority of the world’s people - the 588 million remaining, get by on the other half, people like Bill Gates, pictured left, are living the life of Riley. The bastards.
This report should win the Award for Oustanding Achivement in Stating The Fucking Obvious.

However, what is interesting is that according to the BBC report, the report (on who owns what) doesn’t just judge wealth on income alone, in that it also includes assets such as land, property, shares, etc. and takes into account debt, too. So, the old statistic of “20% of the world’s people live on less than $1 a day”  which is often quoted in the anti-capitalist movement (but ironically never sourced - if anyone can fill me in on where exactly it comes from, I’ll be eternally grateful) can now finally be put to rest with a more shocking one.

Karl Marx, gawd bless ‘em, said that capital is dead labour, which only exists by leaching off the living, like a vampire. When we see the intense poverty in the world, you can see what he means. That capital could be used to feed the world much more than a RED (TM) American Express card (help the world escape poverty; go into debt! Thanks, AmEx) or Motorola phone ever could.

To be fair to Bill, he promises that his billions will go to eradicate Polio. All very nice, but rather than fund factories in Africa, where Polio is still in exsistance, thus providing employment and treatment, no doubt Bill will just pay companies like SmithKlineBeecham and Pfizer to mass produce the drugs at an extortionate rate, allowing SKB and Pfizer shareholders to make a massive profit, and still fuck over Africa with expensive drugs, and poverty - both economical and intellectual.
The sooner we get rid of this rotten system, the better.