Person of the Week: Warren Buffet
This Blog typically supports Main Street heroes, but this week we are saluting one of Wall Street’s greatest: Warren Buffett. Buffet is a rare breed, a multi-billionaire who has not lost touch with normal society and is a daily champion of Main Street America.
Appearing on BBC 2 Monday night, Warren Buffett once again called for a progressive tax system where the money of the rich is spread more equally throughout society. Some have called this socialism, but Buffett seems to think this it is just how a practical, realistic society should work. He decided to compare our modern society with that of a small group trapped on a remote island with no hope of rescue. Buffett wisely claimed that if 20 people were trapped on such an island and decided to grow rice, it would be ludicrous to assume that we would ask the five smartest people to simply trade futures on the rice. He added that it would be even more ludicrous to assume that these elites would be asked to give less back to the community than the people doing the actual work.
Buffett claimed that the rich in America – including himself and Bill Gates – are the beneficiaries of circumstance. Had they been born in another time or another place they may have been some animal’s lunch, but being born in America at the times when they were, these giants of capitalism were allowed to grow into the magnates that they are today. Men and Women like Gates and Buffett, though deserving of praise should not be treated as untouchable elites. Buffett famously showed the world that he paid a lower rate of taxes (about 17%) than the person who cleans his office (about 30%). It is time the tax system reflected more progressive social values rather than protect the rich and their interests.
Buffett’s main claims are easily comprehendible and should be quite easy for all to accept:
· The great heads of industry and capitalism should not “delude” themselves into thinking that they are somehow superior individuals
· The rich should play a larger part in repaying the masses of people who got the short ends of the sticks and allowed the privileged few to succeed
· The financial community needs to readjust its ideas of wealth to include values of social responsibility
Buffett was right to claim that Americans are infuriated by losses of jobs and foreclosures with no judicial intervention or punishment. A little more government regulation and taxation to repay the less fortunate should not send investors running for the hills (or in this case, the Cayman Islands and Switzerland), but rather it should be each person’s social duty to contribute their fair share to society.
Nobody is asking for fully equal distribution of wealth or a 90% income tax, but simply a sense of moral obligation and a reevaluation of the importance of personal wealth over societal wealth. It is time Wall Street stopped its selective learning of financial lessons from the Sage of Omaha and started respecting his social wisdom as well.
Assisted by Zach Kady
