The working class will rise again!

Workers' Liberty
the emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class

                                     Workers Liberty Australia


Newsletter May 2000: rich and poor

The pockets of the rich

The world's richest seven million people - about one in a thousand of its total population - now have a total of $43 trillion in their pockets. That amount, $7,000 for every child, woman and man on the globe, is just their cash and easily-cashed financial assets, without counting their business assets, their houses, or the like.

$28,000 may look like a useful windfall for a family of four, but not enough to be worth making a social revolution for. Bear in mind, though, that a large part of the world's workforce labours for US$1 (A$1.60) a day or less. For those workers, $28,000 would be more than a lifetime's total income.

Just the ready cash in the pockets of the super-rich would be enough to ensure food supplies, decent housing and clothing, clean water, and basic health care and education for everyone in the world.

(Information from the Australian Financial Review, 4 May).

Australia's millionaires

Australia now has 240,000 millionaires, and the wealthiest one per cent of the population - fewer than 90,000 families - own 16% of all wealth. More than that, the top one per cent owns about 70% of the wealth that brings real power, company shares. Despite all the ballyhoo about Australia having proportionately more people owning some company shares than any other country in the world, 90% of shares are owned by the top 10%.

The "wealth" of the majority consists almost entirely of our superannuation funds and the houses we live in. Well-off professionals, and some better-paid workers, may own some rental property or small-business assets, but the truly rich have wealth which enables them to control the labour of others and the whole direction of economic life. The rich have become spectacularly richer in the last three or four years, with the number of millionaires doubling.

(Information from The Age, 8 April).