Wealth gap widens between super rich and rest yet ...
Is Iran sleepwalking towards an extra income for all?
| Another rent dividend now exists. Some senators consider another one. And such sure are needed. We trim, blend, and append six articles, two of 2010 and four of 2011, from: (1) Energy Bulletin, Dec 20, on Irani oil by Tom Whipple; (2) BBC, Dec 23, on Irani subsidies by Mohsen Asgari; (3) International Institute for Environment and Development, Feb 12, on income grants by Rachel Godfrey Wood; (4) Ghana Business News, Feb 7, on plunder by Stephen Yeboah; (5) Truthout, Feb 11, on commons by James K. Boyce; and (6) Reuters, Feb 2, on wealth gap by Chrystia Freeland. |
by Whipple, by Asgari, by Wood, by Boyce, and by Freeland
- Peak oil review
Tehran announced major cuts in food and gasoline subsidies. The subsidized price will increase to roughly $1.60 a gallon. Some of the increase will be offset by direct government payments of around $80 a month into everyone’s personal bank accounts. Later the payments are to be modified according to ability to pay.
The charges for cooking gas are to increase five-fold, and electricity, and water three-fold. Three years ago when the government instituted an earlier price increase, rioters took to the streets burning gasoline stations. This time, a heavy police presence around gas stations appears to have been effective in stemming disorder.
To see the whole article, click here
- Fears of unrest after Iran cuts food and fuel subsidies
According to official statements the price of flour could be 40 times higher, petrol would cost between four and seven times more, gas five times more, and electricity and water about three times more. This could make life very expensive in big cities like the capital, where many residents already work two jobs to cover their living costs.
The government has transferred 810,000 rials ($80) to the bank accounts of Iranians who have registered for compensation for the sudden price increases. They are due to receive the stipend every two months. President Ahmadinejad promised to double this compensation next year.
Blanket subsidies swallow a large share of the national budget and are criticized by economists for causing wastefulness. As much as one-third of bread made with subsidised flour in Iran is said to be simply thrown out.
To see the whole article, click here .
- Is Iran sleepwalking towards a universal income grant?
Iran’s allowing households to choose how to spend profits from resource extraction could be a good example of how fossil fuel subsidies in many developing countries could be repealed without adversely impacting the poor.
There is an ever-increasing consensus in development and environmental circles that most subsidies for fossil fuels are bad. Firstly, they encourage high carbon dioxide emissions. Secondly, subsidies of energy are not specifically targeted at the poor. Because the rich consume more, they benefit more from lowered prices.
Paul Segal of the University of Sussex figures that if rents for resource extraction were paid directly to citizens in the form of a ‘resource dividend’, the impacts in terms of poverty and inequality reduction would be substantial. If applied across developing world countries, the number of people living on under $1 a day would be cut by 27-66 per cent, while countries like Russia, Egypt, and Iran would be transformed into ‘highly egalitarian countries’.
To see the whole article, click here .
JJS: As more societies share natural rents, even as more argue for sharing rents, and more people see the rightness of sharing and the injustice of hoarding, then acts of hoarding become more difficult to pull off.
- EITI Report reveals plunder of mining revenues in Ghana
A glaring plunder of mining revenues has been revealed in the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) aggregate report of Ghana.
In 2006, there was a discrepancy of GH 511,660 and GH 2,753,111 for 2007 between mining company payments and government receipts. In 2008, there was a discrepancy of GH 370,697. Mining payments were for mineral royalty, property tax, corporate tax, dividends, ground rent, and mineral right licenses made by about 11 mining companies including Anglo Gold Ashanti (Obuasi and Iduaprim), Gold Fields (Ghana) Ltd, Abosso Gold Fields, Chirano Gold Mines, Newmont Ghana Gold Ltd, Ghana Manganese Ltd, Ghana Bauxite Company, Central African Gold, among others.
In March 2006, according to the aggregated report, dividend payment of GH 830,928.06 by AngloGold Ashanti was not captured as government receipts. Exactly where the money went to still remains a mystery.
To see the whole article, click here .
JJS: Are Third World societies ahead of First World ones in feeling and knowing that the worth of Earth belongs to everyone to share?
- The Environment as Our Common Heritage
The claim that the environment belongs in common and equal measure to us all may strike some as a utopian ideal -- nice-sounding words but devoid of practical content. Yet I believe that the fair sharing of our common environmental heritage is not only a real possibility, but that it is in the process of becoming a reality here in America and across the world.
US Senators Maria Cantwell (D-Wa) and Susan Collins (R-Me) plan to reintroduce the Carbon Limits and Energy for America’s Renewal (CLEAR) Act. It would sell emission permits at monthly auctions. Most of the money from the permit auctions -- 75% -- will be returned directly to the American people in the form of equal per person dividends paid out monthly via ATM withdrawals, electronic deposits into bank accounts, or checks in the mail. The other 25% will be devoted to clean energy investments.
If enacted into law, this cap-and-dividend policy not only will curb carbon emissions. It also will translate into very concrete practice -- and into people’s pocketbooks -– the principle that our country’s share of limited capacity of the Earth’s atmosphere to absorb carbon emissions belongs to all Americans in common and equal measure.
To see the whole article, click here .
JJS: There sure is a need for fair distribution.
- Wealth gap widens between super rich and rest
As the global economy has grown overall, the gap between rich and poor has increased.
This winner-take-all phenomenon has been particularly stark in the US, where, between 2002 and 2007, 65% of all income growth went to the top 1% of the population.
But the divide has also widened in Britain, Canada, Germany, and Scandinavia. Also, communist China now has a gap between rich and poor as big as that of the US.
This split between the super-rich and everyone else prompted three Citigroup analysts to conclude that "the world is dividing into two blocs -- the plutonomy and everyone else".
The rich are a trans-global community of peers who have more in common with one another than with their countrymen back home.
A World Economic Forum report, Global Risks, notes, "a 21 Century paradox: as the world grows together, it is also growing apart."
To see the whole article, click here .
JJS: Over a century ago, the classic Progress and Poverty by Henry George showed us what to do about it. ee, there are already good taxes for recovering rents, but there's also bad politicians in cahoots with corporations, domestic ones, too. So, sure, argue for passing new taxes and leases and royalties and dues, but be sure to argue for enforcing existing ones, too.
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Editor Jeffery J. Smith runs the Forum on Geonomics.
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Also see: Mongolians Demand Dissolving of Parliament
Australia and Kenya propose ways to settle claims
Cap and dividend could break logjam |
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