Taking Care of the Rich

By Emir Sader on December 25, 2017

It has now formally taken place through new laws in the United States, in Argentina and in Brazil and other countries concrete measures have been taken too that all add up to a dramatic reduction in the amount of taxes that the rich will have to pay.

Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff reminds us that people have to be taken care of and that at the base of any society should ultimately be about taking care of the poorest and most vulnerable people.

But current right-wing governments, all enshrined in the neoliberal model, are dedicated to caring for the rich. It is no longer enough to be rich. They have to be taken care of and pampered. If not, they may decide not to invest their money won from the sweat of someone else’s work. They have to be tempted to make investments, convinced and persuaded to take a little risk making new investments. And in the process create products and who knows perhaps even create some new jobs.

That is the logic of the ministers and the right-wing storytellers, both in labor and tax reforms. They assume the crying of the big businessmen, they whine that investing is very expensive and carries a lot of risk, too.

That the costs of hiring workers are too high. That is not possible to do and it is not worth it.  Better just to put the money in the stock market, where no one is hired, practically no tax is paid, and the money can flow through another country’s stock exchange if it is more profitable.

Another argument is that it is necessary to lower the costs of hiring workers at the expense of their rights so that more people can be hired. Workers have to adapt to this cycle and the needs of the fluctuating nature of capital, which is the engine of society. You might get to work two hours today, no work tomorrow, perhaps 14 hours of work another day, if the capitalist machines demand it.

By the way, the current system is called capitalism. Its center is capital. Everyone has to adapt to the movement of capital. If the capitalists are interested in traveling to a distant island, conditions have to be made for them to make that trip. If they want to return, conditions for their welcome have to be created.

Without capital there is no capitalism, there are no capitalists, there is not even employment for many people. The government that is in charge of the development of a country has to take care of the capital, which in turn will take care of the country and themselves. Right?

When tax reform is mentioned, employers rub their hands gleefully; Excellent! Less taxes and increased unfair taxation. The one who earns more, pays more. No. It is the one who wins the most who pays the least. That is the incentive of the system. You have to pay less tax to be encouraged to make more investments and maybe hire some workers for a while.

It is the Christmas bonus from the governments of the rich to the rich, for their good behavior, good financing, for loaning their minions to the government to help take care of them. If others don’t like it, well, they can leave and take the risk of selling their labor elsewhere.

Less taxes, forgiveness of debts, and financing at low interest – these are the conditions for having the support of the kings of business. Take care of the rich, bail them out so they do not abandon us for some other kind of lucrative paradise.

If they do not do that they will become prisoners of the poor, of those who live off the sweat of their work, of those who do not exploit anybody, of those who produce all the wealth of a country, of those who associate, organize, mobilize. To avoid being like them it is necessary to continue to introduce labor reform, pension reform, tax reform. To those who have nothing everything will be taken away. Take care of the rich so that we can be considered a rich country, so that others will think there is not enough for everyone, and know that in capitalism the one who has capital wins.

And if a government of the rich does not care for the rich, who will?

Cuidar a los ricos

Source: Cubadebate, translation by Resumen Latinoamericano, North American Bureau