We can’t possibly know what is going to happen in our political life in the U.S. We could see voters repudiate Trump and take power in Congress away from the MAGA leaders in the 2026 election, or we could see troops in the streets and a bogus fixed election that solidifies fascist authoritarianism. In any case, it’s going to take a long time for our country to recover from what is happening currently.
I think it’s important that we build a powerful vision now of what we want on the other side of the current debacle. I don’t think we want to go back to what we had in the last few decades. While it may have been preferable to the rising fascism of today, it was grossly unfair and failed to meet many people’s basic needs. From 1975 – 2023 our economy moved $79 trillion from the working and middle classes to the top 1%. Millions of people here in the richest county in the world have been suffering from hunger, lack of health care, houselessness, and economic insecurity for years. We want to aim for a society that works better than that.
There are many ways to think about this and to organize our priorities. I believe the following three principles should undergird our work to establish democracy, address the climate crisis, and build a society that works for everyone.
One, we must eliminate the extreme concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. In the United States the top 0.1% have more wealth than the bottom 50%. The top 10% have added an additional $40 trillion to their wealth since 2020 — that’s almost 10 times the total wealth of the bottom 50%. Wealth is created by everyone who works (whether that work is paid or unpaid). Our current system moves massive amounts of wealth to a very small minority at the top. It is time to redistribute that wealth so it is shared much more equally among everyone in the country.
We need to take this wealth away from the ultra-rich for two primary reasons. First, this much wealth has led to tremendous corruption and domination of our politics by the ultra-rich. We cannot have democracy or effective climate action while people and corporations with this much wealth are dedicated to preserving their own power and wealth at the expense of the common good. Second, this money is needed by the people of the country so we can have adequate health care, housing, food, climate action, education, and economic security for everyone.
Two, we need to make changes in our economic system so that economic decisions are guided by the common good, instead of being based on profit. Profit-seeking alone (distorted by the manipulations of the wealthy) leads to decisions that are not in the public interest. (The expansion of fossil fuel production, the excessive growth of AI, and the building of horribly polluting chemical plants are some current examples.)
Alternatively, there is also a long history of government intervention for the public good — from subsidizing the construction of canals and railroads in the 1800s to incentivizing renewable energy in our own time. There is no reason not to use federal funds now to promote needed affordability, climate action, and equity. We can also require corporations to include the public welfare, in addition to stockholder profits, in their decision-making criteria. There are many needs and lots of wealth; it’s time to use that wealth to address the needs.
I think basing decision-making on the common good instead of profit will lead to very different national decisions about health care, gun control, housing, education, the climate crisis, reproductive rights, racism, immigration, LGBQT+ rights, voting rights, international relations, and many other important issues.
Three, in the wealthiest country in the world, it’s time to eliminate poverty, houselessness, and hunger for everyone. “The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members,” is a quote often attributed to Mahatma Ghandi. Whether Ghandi actually said this or not is a matter of some debate, but the wisdom of the statement stands. Providing an adequate standard of living for everyone is not a new idea in the United States. In 1969 Republican President Richard Nixon, (before he was discredited by the Watergate scandal) proposed a national minimum guaranteed income for all Americans, to replace existing welfare programs. It failed to pass Congress, but it garnered major support across the country. Over 1,200 leading economists endorsed the plan at the time.
All of these ideas will be challenging to implement, of course. They will require organizing and struggle. But we are in a time when there is widespread understanding that the current system is not working. The excessive control billionaires have over our government has been exposed and is widely viewed as harmful. More people than ever appear ready for change.
Russ Vernon-Jones lives in Amherst and is a member of the Steering Committee of Climate Action Now (CAN). The views expressed here are his own. He blogs regularly on climate justice at http://www.russvernonjones.org and can be reached there.