It happened again. Thousands of supporters of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro stormed the country’s government buildings on January 8 in protest of their newly sworn-in president. The riots occurred almost two years to the day after the assault on the US Capitol by supporters of outgoing President Donald Trump.
The similarities are striking: the violence and vulgarity of the attacks against democratic institutions and the aim to sow chaos while claiming to be law and order. In both cases, political leaders questioned the results of elections, and, in general, the values of democracy.
Over half the world’s population lives under authoritarian regimes, and movements that clearly call individual and public freedoms into question and foster xenophobia persist at the ballot box. There are many reasons for this, but among them is a near-universal sense of grievance. So many citizens around the world suffer from economic hardship while a sliver of the population — the wealthy and the corporations they own and control — is doing extremely well.
As the world faces a decade of crises, it’s time for those who benefit to pay their fair share to help alleviate these grievances. And that can partly be done through taxes.
Take, for example, the coronavirus. Three years after the emergence of Covid-19, a jarring disconnect has emerged between the human toll and the historic profits of many large companies, money which benefitted shareholders, who cashed in on a bonanza of dividends, stock buybacks and sky-high share prices. The pharmaceutical giants have made billions in profits from Covid-19 vaccines, which they wouldn’t have been able to develop without university research and government subsidies. And Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine has allowed energy and food corporations to increase profit margins by 256% in 2022 — compared with the 2018 to 2021 average — even as ordinary families struggle to pay their bills. The shareholders of these companies received $257 billion — or 84% of windfall profits — last year alone, according to an Oxfam report, “Survival of the Richest,” published this week to coincide with Davos.
To continue reading this oped by Joseph E. Stiglitz, go to: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/19...profits-tax-stiglitz
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