Belling the cat: Marx and Engels on the practical organization of socialism

Bill Martin, 12th November 2020

Online talk hosted by the Oxford Communist Corresponding Society

In a week tech entrepreneur Elon Musk personal fortune has shot up by more than $15bn (£11.3bn). Musk is poised to become the world’s third richest person.

On Monday, it was announced that his electric car company Tesla has been accepted into the S&P 500, a major US stock market index. The California-based car firm would be the biggest new entrant onto the US index, with a stock market value of over $400bn. Musk’s 20% stake in Tesla his net worth rose to $117.5bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

His wealth has jumped $90bn this year

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54958293

 Hate crimes in the United States rose to the highest level in more than a decade.

The FBI’s annual report defines hate crimes as those motivated by bias based on a person’s race, religion or sexual orientation, among other categories.

There were 7,314 hate crimes last year, up from 7,120 the year before – and approaching the 7,783 of 2008.  There was a nearly 7 percent increase in religion-based hate crimes, with 953 reports of crimes targeting Jews and Jewish institutions last year, up from 835 the year before. The FBI said the number of hate crimes against African Americans dropped slightly to 1,930, from 1,943. Anti-Hispanic hate crimes, however, rose to 527 in 2019, from 485 in 2018. And the total number of hate crimes based on a person’s sexual orientation stayed relatively stable, with one fewer crime reported last year, compared with the year before, though there were 20 more hate crimes against gay men reported.

 Margaret Huang. president of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), which tracks hates groups, said, “Hate crimes are consistently under-reported due to the federal government’s failure to mandate hate crime data collection at the state and local levels.” 

Last year, only 2,172 law enforcement agencies out of about 15,000 participating agencies across the country reported hate crime data to the FBI, the bureau said. A large number of police agencies appeared not to submit any hate crime data. While the number of agencies reporting hate crimes increased, the number of agencies participating in the program actually dropped from the year before. In 2016 found that more than 2,700 city police and county sheriff’s departments across the country had not submitted a single hate crime report for the FBI’s annual crime tally during the previous six years.

“The total severity of the impact and damage caused by hate crimes cannot be fully measured without complete participation in the FBI’s data collection process,” the Anti-Defamation League’s president, Jonathan Greenblatt, said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/11/16/hate-crimes-rise-to-10-year-high-killings-highest-ever-fbi

  David Beasley told  the Paris Peace Forum that  “When I arrived at the WFP as Executive Director three years ago, the number of people on the brink of starvation was 80 million. That number spiked up to 135-145 million people in the last few years because of man-made conflict,” he said.  “Now, COVID comes on the scene and with economic deterioration and the ripple effect around the world, we’re moving from 135 million people on the brink of starvation to 270 million.”

 The 2020 Nobel Peace Prize-winning agency continues  “providing more aid than ever before”. 

The WFP spent over $8 billion in humanitarian assistance in 2020, but Beasley estimates that it will need twice that amount next year. He says the international community must put more resources into combating starvation.  He said. “Let me be clear – if we don’t get the money we need in the strategic locations, you will have famine, destabilisation and mass migration. It’s that simple.”

http://www.ipsnews.net/2020/11/wfp-focus-on-starvation-destabilisation-and-migration-to-avert-a-covid-19-global-food-crisis/

 The National Nurses United (NNU) reports that hospitals are raising costs for healthcare by as much as 18 times over the actual cost of services—hitting Covid-19 patients with medical costs amounting to tens of thousands of dollars. 

“These are not markups for luxury condos, they are for the most basic necessity of your life: your health,” tweeted NNU on Monday. 

The 100 most expensive U.S. hospitals charge up to $1,808 for every $100 of their costs. Nationwide, hospitals’ markups for healthcare costs have doubled over the past two decades, with medical centers charging an average of $417 for every $100 they actually spend providing care.

 In another recent study by FAIR Health found that average hospital charges for a Covid-19 patient with no comorbidity or complication were $42,486, while patients with major complications during their treatment are charged an average of $74,310.

Private Health insurance Companies do not provide healthcare – They only pay the bills. For this ‘service’, they skim 20% +/- off the top for themselves, leaving less of your money for your care. 

Private Insurance companies have no incentive to keep prices down in fact the more healthcare costs go up, the more money THEY make.

Private-based insurance companies make their money by DENYING Healthcare NOT by PROVIDING healthcare.

For Profit insurance means Less healthcare = more profit. How will that motive affect their decisions for you and your family?

Private-based insurance still leaves you with Corporate Death Panels. Their requirement for profit sits between you and your doctor and dictates what care is available to you, or not.

Private-based insurance still includes co-pays, deductibles, limits, MEDICAL BANKRUPTCY, and for most, ties you to your employer. If you lose your job, you probably lose your healthcare care.

  The lifting of the first COVID-19 lockdown earlier this year did little to improve the incomes of people in Britain who lost out from the restrictions, and lower-earning households have borne the brunt of the hit, a  Resolution Foundation said in a report.

Adults in highest 20% income band, or an average of 64,000 pounds ($84,400) a year, were more likely to have seen their family budgets improve than deteriorate from before the pandemic as many managed to save more.

By contrast, low-income households on 13,000 pounds a year were more than twice as likely to have seen their budgets deteriorate.

With unemployment on the rise in Britain, the proportion of adults reporting a drop in incomes improved only slightly to 23% between July and September from 27% in the April-June period.

Three-in-ten of the adults who took a sustained income hit were unable to afford some basic household costs such as heating and fresh fruit and vegetables, the report said.

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-health-coronavirus-britain-incomes/end-of-lockdown-did-little-for-incomes-of-uks-hardest-hit-study-idUSKBN27V0RR

The chief executive of The Hut Group (THG) is to receive one of the biggest payouts in UK corporate history after the recently listed online retailer’s share price rose.

Matthew Moulding, who founded the company in 2004, will receive at least £830m in shares after the share price of the company rose to hit targets set at its flotation on the London Stock Exchange in September. His total share awards could rise further if the company’s market value reaches £7.25bn.

As well as the share awards, Moulding will receive a base salary of £750,000 a year – a large increase from the £318,000 he took as salary in 2019. In total last year, Moulding’s company paid him £4.7m, mostly in share awards.

Luke Hildyard, the director of the High Pay Centre, a campaign group, said: “Payments worth hundreds of millions of pounds are far more than any individual needs or could possibly ever spend…” Hildyard said THG was guilty of a “litany of corporate governance abuses”, including an arrangement under which Moulding will receive £19m a year in rent from the company on properties he owns.

Hildyard also criticised the company’s remuneration committee. He said: “As is often the case, THG’s remuneration committee is comprised of other serving executives who personally benefit from the prevailing culture of excessive top pay, and have no incentive to think critically about its costs and benefits – to the business or wider society.”

Share awards kick in for Moulding and other senior executives – including the chief financial officer, John Gallemore, and the commercial director, Steven Whitehead – when the market value of the company’s shares breaches certain levels. As long as the market value remains above those “milestone” levels for more than 15 days, the payouts are triggered.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/nov/15/hut-group-ceo-to-receive-one-of-uk-biggest-payouts-after-share-price-rise

 Sales of £15m-plus English country homes breaking records as wealthy families ‘recalibrate their priorities’. The world’s super-rich are seeking to escape from coronavirus lockdowns in cities by buying multimillion-pound English country estates to create Downton Abbey lifestyles, complete with butlers, cooks, housekeepers and armies of gardeners.

Savills, which has 320 staff in a special unit dedicated to such estates, said it had sold – or was on the verge of selling – 21 estates valued at £15m-plus since the first nationwide lockdown in March. For comparison, just one such property sold in the whole of 2019. Rival high-end estate agents also reported record sales and soaring prices. Knight Frank said a “record-breaking run of activity driven by a race for space post-lockdown” had “translated into the strongest price growth seen in more than four years”.

Crispin Holborow, Savills’ country director, said “Very rich people have often been thinking of buying a place in the country and doing something environmental, but the first lockdown really was the slam-dunk catalyst that caused them to actually buy. The pandemic has made people realise how important family is, and they are wanting a big place where they can all live together with space and activities. They were busy jumping on planes travelling the world running businesses, and they didn’t need a country place. But they’ve realised they can now settle, and they like it.”

“£15m-plus gets you a lot. There’s always a pool, always stables, a tennis court, and outbuilding for cars or whatever the passion of the owner is. There’s also often shooting for entertaining guests…These houses need anything from three to eight or 10 staff,” Holborow said. “You need at least one housekeeper, whose husband might be chef. Or a husband and wife team working as cleaner and driver. You’ll also need outside staff, from two-to-five gardeners depending on how immaculate you want it to look. Horses need grooms, and you definitely need someone on maintenance duties, which is not a luxury.”

Among those up for grabs is the Bowden Park estate, near Chippenham in Wiltshire, on the market with a guide price of £35m. For that the buyer will get a Grade I-listed 18th-century country house set in 1,450 acres of park and farmland. It has formal gardens, a swimming pool, tennis court, eight farmhouses, a “historic grotto”, and 12 cottages on the boundaries of the estate that could provide “excellent accommodation for extended family members, guests and staff”.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2020/nov/14/super-rich-downton-abbey-estates-england-country-coronavirus