Mastering the Universe

Auteur

Rob Larson is a professor of economics at Tacoma Community College and author of Bit Tyrants: The Political Economy of Silicon Valley, and Capitalism vs. Freedom. He writes for Jacobin, In These Times, and Dollars & Sense. He is the House Economist at Current Affairs. Larson lives in Tacoma, Washington (because Jeff Bezos has made Seattle unliveably expensive).

Texte du rabat

**Economist Rob Larson combines wit, righteous anger, and clear-eyed analysis as he dissects the lifestyle, moral bankruptcy, and stupidly large sums of money hoarded by the disgustingly wealthy.

The fact that we live in one of the most unequal societies in the history of the world is becoming common knowledge. And while lists of "richest people in x country" may be easy to come by, how much do we really know about the billionaires who sit atop our global economic system? Who are they, really? How did they accumulate their ill-gotten gains? And what kind of depravities do they use to maintain their positions?

Turning their own weapons of class-war against them-from the fawning profiles found in the Mansion section of the Wall Street Journal to the national income data buried in white papers meant solely for investors and technocrats-Larson crunches the numbers so you don't have to. But he doesn't stop there, because appreciating the sheer scale of the global wealth gap doesn't even touch on all the ways the ruling class are making us miserable, breaking our society to pieces, and destroying the planet in their pursuit of ever-increasing power and profit. As we behold whole continents on fire, pandemics thrashing public health systems to smithereens, and declining lifespans for the vast majority, Larson argues that the only way forward is to yank on the emergency break and give capitalism the boot.

Contenu

Prologue—The Fun Percent
Introduction—Atlas Ran (Who’s in charge here?)
Chapter 1—The Numbers (Just how rich are we talking about?)
Chapter 2—The Lifestyle (It’s worse than you think)
Chapter 3—The Classes (What about the rest of us?)
Chapter 4—The Clans (Ruling class subspecies)
Chapter 5—The Burden (The jet set’s debt to climate)
Chapter 6—The Lies (The Right’s feverish “liberal elites”)
Chapter 7—The Plan (The socialist movement to stick it to the Man)