Pandemic profits of billionaires could fund $3,000 stimulus checks to US citizens

[Resurgence]

America’s 651 billionaires have gained so much wealth during the coronavirus pandemic that they could fully pay for one-time $3,000 stimulus checks for every person in the United States and still be better off than they were before the crisis.

That’s according to new research released Wednesday by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS), groups that have been tracking the “pandemic profits” of US billionaires since mid-March.

In the nearly nine-month period between March 18 and December 7, American billionaires gained more than $1 trillion in wealth as people across the US lost their jobs, their businesses, their homes, and their lives to the pandemic. The collective net worth of US billionaires now sits just above $4 trillion—nearly double the combined wealth owned by the bottom 50 percent of the American population.

“As tens of millions of Americans suffer from the health and economic ravages of this pandemic, a few hundred billionaires add to their massive fortunes,” ATF executive director Frank Clemente said in a statement. “Their pandemic profits are so immense that America’s billionaires could pay for a major Covid relief bill and still not lose a dime of their pre-virus riches.”

“Their wealth growth is so great,” Clemente added, “that they alone could provide a $3,000 stimulus payment to every man, woman, and child in the country, and still be richer than they were nine months ago.”

https://consortiumnews.com/2020/12/09/pa...s-workers/