31 Billionaires are worth more than the US Treasury has in cash
cnn.com
cnn.com
Also why I'm a (reluctant) supporter of the 2nd Amendment.
If you literally meant, any individuals having more wealth was better than the government, I don't see how the power structures here wouldn't just turn into these hyper rich effectively being the government, but with no oversight via democracy
The charade of democracy camouflaging what is a kleptoplutocracy with layers of indirection including politicians and lobbyists to keep up the pretense.
Power corrupts, absolute power...
Which is how it was supposed to start out to begin with.
How did things get to be the way they are?
Borrowing from Wall Street banks to fund excessive ambitions (such as the Civil War) which could not be paid back in a single generation just led to more of the same.
Something about regulatory capture. This isn't the first time the Treasury had less access to cash than the financial manipulators. Guess who has more power in that case?
To pay for government extravagance those in power got the bright idea of taxing earned income more so than capital, even though that was unconstitutional:
>The origin of the income tax on individuals is generally cited as the passage of the 16th Amendment, passed by Congress on July 2, 1909, and ratified February 3, 1913. However, its history actually goes back even further. During the Civil War Congress passed the Revenue Act of 1861 which included a tax on personal incomes to help pay war expenses but the tax was repealed ten years later. However, in 1894 Congress enacted a flat rate Federal income tax, which was ruled unconstitutional the following year by the U.S. Supreme Court because it was a direct tax not apportioned according to the population of each state. The 16th amendment, ratified in 1913, removed this objection by allowing the Federal government to tax the income of individuals without regard to the population of each state.[0]
Later that same year the Fed reared its ugly head:
>The founding of the Fed came in response to the financial panic of 1907, with advocacy from J.P. Morgan
>It was created on December 23, 1913 [1]
The panic of 1907 was a result of growing inequality to begin with.
This all proved to be not enough to satisfy creditors, then in order to devalue the dollars held by the citizens, gold needed to be made illegal to hold and was confiscated in exchange for Federal Reserve Notes in 1933.
So overall during a period of nearly 60 years, the massive wealth of the working citizens was systematically transferred to a government which was almost constantly in debt to those who could best afford bonds issued by the Treasury, redeemable only in Federal Reserve Notes.
Then basically sold for a profit in 1971 by Nixon, et. al.
And here we are.
[0]https://guides.loc.gov/this-month-in-business-history/april/...
Have you considered the possibility that this group of 31 people essentially aligns with the government to protect each other's interests?
Unless you're a billionaire, then you're advocating against your own best interests because their way is to spend on themselves, take more from workers, and add more hoops to jump through like forcing disabled people who cannot work to do the impossible.
Firearms won't help you because the billionaires have the government, and the government has the monopoly on more violence than you can ever hope to bring. So unless you're planning another Jan 6 insurrection, 2a is only going to help hunt deer or with self-defense against an individual act of attempted criminal violence.
The Founders did their thing without a Second Amendment.
As it turns out, A Government without the consent of the Governed is not as powerful as it likes to project when it thinks it solidly has said consent.
Their intent was to ensure that if needs be it would be even more likely that any subsequent overthrows have a reasonable chance of succeeding.
Privately run corporations never abused? Oh come on. Without a government, they will burn, rape and steal for one dollar of profit more.
And what comprises the wealth of a nation? Is it G(D|N)P? Military might? Control of natural resources? Global cultural influence?
Nation states still leverage a lot more wealth than even the largest companies.
We have a rule, a.k.a. the debt ceiling.
This is independent of the absolute powers of the United States.
Texas AG enters the chat. Top cop, but crooked as a $3 bill and will help steal an election for the right price.
Rudy Giuliani will sell you a presidential pardon for the low, low price of only $2m.
Anyone who is rich cannot count their money by definition. Liquid net value is a more-or-less discrete probability distribution function that varies by immediacy.