VIDEO: Canadian Businessman Says It’s ‘Fantastic’ 85 People Have More Wealth Than Billions In Poverty

Canadian Businessman, TV host, and “Asshat of the Year” winner (and that’s impressive because it’s still only January) Kevin O’Leary says that it’s “fantastic” that the richest 85 people have more wealth than half the population on planet Earth. The video is worth watching just to see the reaction by O’Leary’s co-host, Amanda Lang.

Reference: Working for the Few – Oxfam International

“It’s fantastic, and this is a great thing because it inspires everybody, gets them motivation to look up to the one percent and say, ‘I want to become one of those people, I’m going to fight hard to get up to the top,’” said O’Leary. “This is fantastic news and of course I applaud it.”

Initially I found his comments to be remarkably callous, but upon further reflection it really shouldn’t be a surprise at all. People can be psychologically addicted to anything, and for many people who are super wealthy, their addiction is wealth. Their addiction is money.

In a telling New York Times op-ed, former Wall Street trader Sam Polk said, “There were plenty of injustices out there — rampant poverty, swelling prison populations, a sexual-assault epidemic, an obesity crisis. Not only was I not helping to fix any problems in the world, but I was profiting from them.”

This relates to O’Leary’s incredible comment because people like O’Leary lie to themselves and then they lie to us. They inflate their own self-worth and then they want the rest of the world to believe the same. But many of these people are not doing much to fix problems in the real world. Instead they are too busy stroking their egos.

“During the market crash in 2008, I’d made a ton of money by shorting the derivatives of risky companies,” said Polk. “As the world crumbled, I profited. I’d seen the crash coming, but instead of trying to help the people it would hurt the most — people who didn’t have a million dollars in the bank — I’d made money off it.” We know this is true, and we’ve heard countless third-party anecdotes, but in this case we get to read the first-hand experience of a Wall Street trader as he grows a conscience. O’Leary could take a lesson.

“Wealth addiction was described by the late sociologist and playwright Philip Slater in a 1980 book, but addiction researchers have paid the concept little attention. Like alcoholics driving drunk, wealth addiction imperils everyone,” said Polk. “Wealth addicts are, more than anybody, specifically responsible for the ever widening rift that is tearing apart our once great country. Wealth addicts are responsible for the vast and toxic disparity between the rich and the poor and the annihilation of the middle class. Only a wealth addict would feel justified in receiving $14 million in compensation — including an $8.5 million bonus — as the McDonald’s C.E.O., Don Thompson, did in 2012, while his company then published a brochure for its work force on how to survive on their low wages. Only a wealth addict would earn hundreds of millions as a hedge-fund manager, and then lobby to maintain a tax loophole that gave him a lower tax rate than his secretary.”

But what does O’Leary want us to think of people like him?

“What’s wrong with this statement? — If you work hard you might be stinking rich one day,” asked O’Leary. Yeah, and most people who do work hard every single day never become rich, but that is a reality O’Leary will probably never acknowledge.

So what are your thoughts? I actually feel like I might not have been forceful enough in my critique of this ass clown. Hit up the comments section below if this guy has you fully enraged.

Kevin o leary

EconomyNewsVideoWealth Inequality

#Amanda Lang#businessman#Kevin O'Leary#Oxfam#poor#poverty#rich#wealth#wealth gap#wealth inequality