Europe Pub (PieFed)Global economy must stop pandering to ‘frivolous desires of ultra-rich’, says UN expert
BrikoXwww.theguardian.com/environment/2026/mar/03/un-…
Olivier De Schutter says new economic agenda needed to tackle crises of rising inequality and ecological collapse
Archived version: https://archive.is/20260303174740/https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/mar/03/un-de-schutter-outlines-plan-for-redistributive-global-economy
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This sound like a dream. Too good to be true. :(
Organize! This does not need to be a dream or a utopia. Systems fall, changes are always possible. Only, the ultra rich with their frivolous desires won‘t give up their privileges and power because we ask nicely.
They will destroy the entire planet before they allow their aristocracy to be toppled
Get money out of politics and hold politicians to a higher standard.
Yeah shit like that is why the ultra rich have committed to destroying international organizations like the UN
OK, you’re right, in a purely ethical world.
But why would the economy change its behavior on a broad scale? What practical incentives would you use to adjust it?
HellsBelleThe French used a convincing method back in the day.
Punitive measures might feel emotionally satisfying in the moment, but what they actually incentivize is hiding the corruption and exploitation better (avoiding getting caught, rather than avoiding the bad activity in the first place). Also, while an angry mob might have a taste for violence and actually perform it for a little while, it doesn’t last and it’s not a basis for a stable government or economy.
If you want long-term stability you have to organize a system so that it incentivizes the behaviors that you want, even more than it disincentivizes the behaviors that you don’t want.
I’m not sure what that looks like in this context, in a practical sense. But ultimately the problem is that everything in our society rewards the hoarding of wealth. This is not just a problem with capitalism - every communist or supposedly socialist society ever established also rewarded hoarding of wealth.
For things to be different, actually different, a different value system with a fundamentally different reward structure needs to be established, and it needs to be competitive long-term with the current system in order to exist alongside it and/or eventually replace it.
Like I said I don’t really know what that looks like in practice. The only example I can think of is the “gift economy” described in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Green Mars, in which the participants in every exchange always seek to give more than they get (essentially the reverse of normal behavior).
TheDemonBuerThe practical incentives are there already, but far too many people are too greedy and shortsighted to recognize them. There are long term negative consequences to prioritizing short term individual gains over long term, sustainable prosperity for all. And achieving that sustainable prosperity does not require people to replace self interest with altruism, it requires that people to adopt a more enlightened, forward looking self interest. It’s getting people to understand that overindulgence and a zero sum mentality today, without thought for the consequences tomorrow is not self interest, it’s self destruction.
If that can’t work then civilization is fucked.
The percentage of sociopaths involved with defining a society should never be greater than zero.
Financial obesity is an existential threat to any society that tolerates it, and needs to cease being celebrated, rewarded, and positioned as an aspirational goal.
Corporations are the only ‘persons’ which should be subjected to capital punishment, but billionaires should be euthanised through taxation.
wonderingwanderer
SabataWhat if we sacrificed all the rich people to appease the god of CO2?
Maybe if our system didn’t allow mere individuals to collect a net worth equivalent to small countries…? Hate the game, not the players. Billionaires should not even exist in the first place.
I can, and will, hate both the game and the players.
The players at the top know exactly what they’re doing.
If me, a fucking nobody who reads while taking a shit, in between working all the time to pay the bills can understand what’s going on. There’s no way the richest in society, with the most leisure time and access to the world’s greatest educators etc, don’t.
Don’t get me wrong, billionaires are definitely sociopaths. But our society, instead of giving them the treatment they deserve (institutionalisation and a therapy to develop empathy would be a good start) rewards them instead with power and influence.
I see many people cluelessly asking why it seems like billionaires are all sociopaths. That’s because society rewards it and selects for it, and that’s what we need to change first and foremost.
To borrow an image from the Scorpion and the Frog, if you’re a frog and you’re taking scorpions on your back, it’s nonsensical to hate the scorpions for stinging you, that’s in their nature. Instead, we should focus on not taking scorpions on our back, that is, not putting sociopaths in positions of power and authority.
Yeah, we can’t. The ultra rich make all the rules. They aren’t going to reform themselves.
AllNewTypeFaceWe can have a revolution, and move to an economy that caters to the frivolous desires of the Party nomenklatura.
nothingcorporate
Zombie-MantisSays some egghead, and any normal sane person on the ground-level.
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I think he’ll find the ‘ultra rich’ don’t care. They’re too busy building their bunkers and think they’ll be able to wait it out until the proles have bred enough for their exploitation to restart.
HiddenLayer555treat them how you would treat anyone else… tax the fuck out of them, no backroom deals, if they don’t comply or break the law detain them and publically humiliate them and bring them to jail until such time that they either post bail, or their trial.
trials for anyone with net worth of 2m+ is done by citizens of the country and a judge oversees… we dictate their future… not their paid judges.
Instead of a maximum amount, a minimum amount would be more appealing, as I’d rather see fewer poor than fewer billionaires. Don’t get me wrong, I’d prefer to see neither, but the former seems more important.
yeah but like these people are kinda the economy, no? WE JUST CANT ALLOW THEM TO GET THAT RICH IN THE FIRST PLACE
Hear hear! The rich elites are doing just fine, let’s worry about the rest of us for once. So their billio s will grow a little slower. A billion dollars is more money than one person can spend on a lifetime anyways, and these fuckers have trillions. Time to wall them off on their little island. Yay, you won democracy! Now fuck off and let the rest of us get down to fixing the mess they’ve left behind.
“This moment offers us a realistic opportunity to shape the post-2030 agenda with a viable alternative that will reconcile planetary boundaries with social justice and the fight against poverty and inequalities. That’s the challenge and the opportunity.”
Yeah… that would be nice, but that would require people to think and act maturely, with forethought and intelligence. It would require people to not only think about their own well being but the well being of others and future generations. And I mean actual well being, not just immediate pleasure or gratification. I’m talking about having the self control to resist immediate rewards in favor of larger, long term benefits. That’s really, really hard for a lot of people, especially when at least some of the long term benefits aren’t theirs but someone else’s.
I don’t think there has ever really been a time in the US where the 1% have thought of anything but themselves
I don’t think there’s ever been a time in the history of civilization where the rich and powerful have thought of anything but themselves.
Also why post-2030? Why not now? We can’t just sit by idly. Why should I waste my youth waiting for change that may never come? Act now, without restraint.
mycodesucks
That doesn’t take an expert.
Knowing how they teach economics? ‘expert’ in this case probably refers to ‘capital cultist’ instead
This has been known for a long time, but nothing’s gonna change until they’ve totally wrecked everything of value. It’s the “if I can’t have it, nobody can” power trip.
Olivier De Schutter needs to read more theory.