🔗 Share this article

LWe must begin with the fundamental problem: Bill Gates is a politics denier. While he was slow to accept it, he now accepts the realities of climate science. But he operates in blatant, cringeworthy denial about how politics works. His latest essay on climate, published last week, discusses the topic as though politics didn't matter. He writes as if there were no such thing as political power, and no such thing as billionaires.

Primary Argument

His primary argument suggests that funds are very limited, so the participants in the upcoming climate meeting in Brazil should shift funding from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards climate resilience and allocating funds for economic hardship and illness.

Yes, the funds available for any good cause are scarce, but that's not because of some natural law, an unchangeable fact of civilization. This results from wealthy interests attacking on public welfare investments, leading to the destruction of USAID and substantial decreases in support money of additional nations. Budget cuts represent political decisions. The selection to enforce it originates with governments bowing to the wishes of extremely wealthy individuals.

Current Funds

There are truckloads of money available. Shortly following Gates' latest publication, Oxfam revealed that the net worth of America's wealthiest ten individuals expanded by hundreds of billions over the last year. This amount by itself, the increase in a handful of billionaires' net worth, is almost 10 times the yearly funding needed to eliminate severe poverty worldwide. Through what means did they accumulate of global wealth into personal accounts? And why can't we get it back through effective taxation? The explanation involves their transformation of economic power into political power. The richer they become, the stronger their capacity to shape government and financial structures to their desires, ensuring that they become richer still. But the philanthropist discusses nothing in his essay about how and where extra money for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be located.

'The article seems designed as appeasement toward Donald Trump.' The billionaire alongside Trump at an exclusive meal for business leaders in Washington DC.

Rich-Poor Dynamic

There's a direct link between the poverty Gates claims to care so much about and the fortunes he ignores. 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, undermining worker collectives and achieving lower taxes and diminished public funding, billionaires prosper while others experience hardship.

Study Results

A remarkable study in Perspectives on Politics, among limited studies accessing this exclusive domain, found that extremely wealthy individuals hold vastly distinct political perspectives from the great majority. The rich participants surveyed, in stark contrast to mere earthlings, considered fiscal shortfalls as critical of the issues it listed, and environmental collapse as unimportant. They were far more likely to insist that public retirement benefits and government medical care should be reduced, and much less inclined to think that jobless individuals deserve adequate living conditions, or that there should be stricter rules for petroleum corporations, banking entities and medical coverage companies. They were strongly against wealth redistribution.

Policy Impact

What opinions win out? The few wealthy or the many citizens? Though the study was conducted in the Obama years, it found that extremely wealthy individuals enjoyed greater political access than regular individuals. How about today? The situation hardly requires explanation.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

This represents another significant omission in Gates' writing: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. Should the billionaire address this, he'd have to recognize that an important foundation of his argument is unstable: lower prices for sustainable technology inevitably produces environmental improvement. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than traditional energy sources. But Trump and similar demagogues are taking all possible actions to block the shift.

In part due to these factors, oil and gas continue generating substantial profits. This potentially clarifies why, notwithstanding Gates' assertion about eliminating petroleum company stocks in 2019, its fossil fuel stock and bond holdings have, actually grown.

Mental Aspects

To Gates, overthrowing the power of the ultra-wealthy may be unthinkable. It's not merely incompatible with his outlook. Based on his notable omissions regarding this topic, he might be literally incapable of thinking about it. Possibly this represents "extreme wealth mentality": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. Although extremely wealthy individuals are difficult to research, inferring from investigations about money's effect on mental processes could suggest that obtaining enormous fortunes compares to cognitive damage. Riches appear to disrupt specific mental processes, particularly those related to empathy and perspective.

Political Calculations

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." Gates has confessed his total mistake. It took courage to do so, and for that we are all grateful. MAGA!!!"

Background Information

Gates has always been completely WRONG on climate matters, even if not for the explanations Trump provides. He has repeatedly been behind current understanding, reciting fossil fuel claims (green technologies could reduce global CO2 emissions only at a "beyond astronomical" cost) significantly following their debunking. He has propagated misunderstanding and inaccuracies, including the unsupported claim in his recent writing that the intention behind Sri Lanka's failed prohibition on artificial fertilizers aimed at pollution decrease.

More Challenging Facts

The billionaire titles his piece Three Difficult Climate Realities. Thus, here's another difficult reality he carefully avoids. Should, as appears probable, vital planetary systems reach critical thresholds and rapidly fail, the effects on human life, 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 rapid shifts, the potential effects on human welfare are very difficult to forecast. His claim that financial support should match current analytical approaches to quality of life, while it might sound rational, generates substantial unreasonableness when addressing fundamental change, {prompting us to ignore the greatest