In A Different World

A world called Germany,

A group of rich Germans has launched a petition calling for the government to make wealthy people pay higher taxes.

The group say they have more money than they need, and the extra revenue could fund economic and social programmes to aid Germany's economic recovery.

The group estimates the German government could raise 100 billion euros (approximately $150 billion) over two years with a 5% wealth tax.

The group say the financial crisis is leading to an increase in unemployment, poverty and social inequality.

...

"The path out of the crisis must be paved with massive investment in ecology, education and social justice," they say in the petition.

Those who had "made a fortune through inheritance, hard work, hard-working, successful entrepreneurship, or investment" should contribute by paying more to alleviate the crisis.

Are these people insane? How could someone think that dealing with a crisis is more important than having more money than a mortal could spend?

Speaking of which, here is another tidbit I came across yesterday: Neil deGrasse Tyson trying to explicate really big numbers:

50 billion: This is what Bill Gates was worth before the recession. To understand this, imagine you make a reasonably good living in the low six figures. With such an income you would be too busy to stop and bend over to pick up a dime, but you would stop for a quarter. By scaling this number up to Gates' wealth, he would be too busy to bend over and pick up ... $45,000.

And finally, The BBC reports a man is suing the Bank of America for poor customer service. The amount he's claiming? 1780 billion trillion dollars.

It would in fact take 5,247 super-rich, Bill Gates-filled planets to just barely cover Mr Chiscolm's demand for $1,784 billion trillion.

Also too, if I've got all my figures lined up right, that would be the value of a cube of gold 13.436 kilometers on a side. Mount Everest is just under 5 km tall. Big rock candy mountain indeed. I personally am hoping he wins. He could pay for truly universal global health care, hunger, climate change, housing, and financial insecurity without even noticing the scratch in the side of his block.

On the other hand, that might just devalue gold a little bit.