A new category has been added to the latest Federal Reserve Board figures on the distribution of household wealth—the wealth of the wealthiest one-tenth of 1 percent (0.1%) going back to 1989.  the wealthiest .1% have been the recipients of major transfers of wealth during both Democratic and Republican presidencies. 

In 2019, to gain entry into the wealthiest .1% of residents of the United States required one to be worth over $43 million which was about three and a half times the entry point of $11.1 million for the wealthiest 1%.

There is a vast difference between those at the top of the .1%–people such as Musk, Bezos, and Gates–and those at the entry-level. One worth $43 million could not even afford to pay for two years, at $25 million a year, the annual cost to run Bezos’ $500 million yacht. As of September 30, Musk was the wealthiest of the trio. His net worth was put at $238 billion by the  Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That is a sum that is more than 2,300 times greater than that of a poorer member of the .1% who is worth a mere $100 million.

Despite setbacks during economic downturns, the share of the nation’s wealth held by the wealthiest .1% has increased from a low in the third quarter of 1989 of 8.6% to its highest level in the fourth quarter of 2021 of 13%, a more than 50% increase. During the same time, the share of the wealth of the .1% as a share of the wealth of the 1% also increased.

By the fourth quarter of 2021, the wealth holdings of the .1% had gone from being 2.3 times as much as that of the poorest 50%  in 1989 to almost 5 times more. 

The increase in the nominal dollar value (which is the dollar amount disregarding the impact inflation has on its purchasing power) during this period went from $1.76 trillion in 1989 to $18.46 trillion, a more than 10-fold (1,048%) gain which was a rate of growth more rapid than the rate of inflation during the period. It was far greater than the growth rate for the poorest 50% and poorest 90%. The wealth of the poorest 50% increased in nominal dollars 482% from $.77 trillion to $3.71 trillion and the poorest 90% wealth increased 530% in nominal dollars from $8.19 trillion to $43.45 trillion. The result is a more extreme concentration of wealth at the top with the growth of a much greater gap between the .1% and everyone else, even for those within the wealthiest 1%.

The Wealth of the U.S. Wealthiest One-Tenth of One Percent        – CounterPunch.org

 From the October 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Australian charity Foodbank’s annual Hunger Report surveyed more than 4,000 Australian adults, finding the problem extended beyond those on fixed incomes and was affecting many people in work.

The report estimates about 500,000 households on any given day experience food insecurity, which describes being uncertain about getting enough food and compromising on nutrition through to disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake.

The report said 21% of Australians – or more than 2 million people – had experienced severe food insecurity in the past 12 months. That was up from 17% on its 2021 report. Past estimates have put the rate of food insecurity in Australia between 4% and 14%, while a UN report said 16% of Australian children under 15 lived with an adult who was food insecure in 2017. 

The new Foodbank report said that among those experiencing food insecurity, 64% cited increased or high living expenses and 42% pointed to “reduced or low income or government benefits” as a key cause. Among those experiencing severe food insecurity, 67% said their circumstances were worse this year than last. Households with children reported food insecurity at 1.5 times the national average, while about a third of people in work had experienced it in some form in the past year.

Only two in five households who reported being food insecure had sought food relief, a statistic attributed to ongoing stigma and practical factors such as a lack of access or eligibility.

The report said the diverse range of people facing food insecurity was likely to increase “due to the range of external factors impacting households which may never have experienced food insecurity before”, such as the increasing cost of living, the frequency and severity of natural disasters and the pandemic.

Brianna Casey, the chief executive of Foodbank, said, “I’ve never seen anything like what we are seeing right now. It’s going to come as a surprise to many that we are seeing rates of food insecurity that are worse than at the height of the pandemic … People have come out of the pandemic in many instances in a more vulnerable position than they went in.”

Inflation and inadequate welfare fuelling Australia’s food insecurity crisis, Foodbank finds | Welfare | The Guardian

 Sasa Braun has been for the past six years a criminal intelligence officer with Interpol’s environmental security program.

“The brutality and profit margins in the area of environmental crime are almost unimaginable. Cartels have taken over entire sectors of illegal mining, the timber trade and waste disposal,” he said. Braun listed examples of villages in Peru that had resisted deforestation efforts being razed to the ground by criminal gangs in retribution, while illegal fishing fleets had thrown crew overboard to avoid having to pay them.

According to the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol), environmental crime — the third most lucrative area of crime worldwide after drug trafficking and counterfeit goods — generates profits of between $110 billion and $280 billion each year. It is difficult to be more precise because there is an extremely high number of unreported cases. 

Environmental crime has many faces and includes the illegal wildlife trade, illegal logging, illegal waste disposal and the illegal discharge of pollutants into the atmosphere, water or soil. It is a lucrative business for transnational crime networks. 

Illegal waste trafficking, for example, accounts for $10 to 12 billion (€10.28 to 12.34 billion) annually, according to 2016 figures from the United Nations Environment Program. Criminal networks save on the costs of proper disposal and obtaining permits. For some crime networks, the profits from waste management are so huge that it has become more interesting than drug trafficking.

The profits from illegal logging have also grown. Well-seasoned tropical hardwood, which is used to build yachts for example, is increasingly rare and demand is high. According to a 2021 study by the German Association of Engineers (VDI), illegal logging accounts for 30% of activities in the global forestry sector. This figure can rise to almost 90% in countries that produce tropical timber.

“Too often in Europe, there is no real penalty for environmental crime. Lawbreakers can go unpunished and there are too few incentives to observe the law,” explained European Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevicius last year.

Environmental crime, where profit margins can be higher than the drug trade | Environment | All topics from climate change to conservation | DW | 16.10.2022

 NOVA  is a widely used food classification system that separates foods into four categories based upon their level of processing.

Group 1 is unprocessed or minimally processed foods (fruit, vegetables, meat, eggs, milk). 

Group 2 is made up of processed culinary ingredients such as sugars, oils and butter. 

Group 3 is processed foods (canned vegetables and fish, bread, jam). 

Group 4 is ultra-high processed foods, which are mostly low in protein and fibre, and high in salt, sugar and fat, and have undergone industrial interventions such as extrusion, moulding and milling.

In his book Spoon-Fed, the King’s College epidemiologist Tim Spector notes: “The ultra-processed nature of modern food generally means that the complex structure of the plant and animal cells is destroyed, turning it into a nutritionally empty mush that our body can process abnormally rapidly.”

Recent research suggests that high UPF consumption also increases the risk of cardiovascular disease, dementia and, according to a recent American study involving 50,000 health professionals, of developing colon cancer. Last month a study in Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology found that people born after 1990 are more likely to develop cancer before they’re 50 than people born before 1970. It’s suspected that UPF might be a contributing factor to this development.

As the UK is estimated to draw more than 50% of its calorie intake from UPF, this is no passing health scare.

King’s College Dr Sarah Berry, a nutrition expert in the area of cardio-metabolic health,  says: “There is very clear observational data showing that people who have higher intakes of ultra-processed foods have higher levels of ill-health, whether it be cancer, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, obesity or type 2 diabetes.”

Berry explains while the problem of UPF may be scientifically well-established, it isn’t easy, on an individual level, to deal with. After all, UPFs are so prevalent that stripping them completely out of our diet would be a logistical and time-consuming nightmare. What’s more, people enjoy their convenience and often relish their industrially enhanced taste.

The popularity of vegan cuisine in recent years has been mass-produced and carefully marketed. Yet so many of the glossily packaged plant-based substitutes are in fact UPFs.

“Look at oat milk, for example,” says Berry, citing a popular substitute for cow’s milk. “Its original structure has been taken out and it’s full of additives.”

Sophie Medlin, dietitian and chair of the London branch of the British Dietetic Association said: “The more you’re trying to make something imitate something that it’s not, the more processing it’s going to have to go through.” Medlin also said that it has become much easier to be a very unhealthy vegan.

Not so long ago the main criticism about UPF was that it lacked nutritional substance, and to counter that absence so-called healthy nutrients were added. Now food science is looking more closely at the different ways that natural food structures and ultra-processed foods are broken down by the human body. One theory is that food with its natural structure removed is the cause of inflammation, the body’s defence response to infection. A recent study that involved 20,000 Italian adults found that those with the highest consumption of UPF had the greatest risk of dying prematurely from any cause. It also found that inflammatory markers, such as higher white blood cell count, were most pronounced in those whose diets had the highest levels of UPF.

One of the big breakthroughs in understanding food nutrition in the 21st century is a greater understanding of the microbiome, the mostly gut-based micro-organisms that play a vital part in the digestion process. It’s known that some food additives such as sweeteners and emulsifiers commonly found in ultra-processed foods cause changes to the microbiome that increase inflammation.

Some researchers believe the body responds to elements of UPF as though they were a pathogen, as it would with an invading bacteria. This increase in inflammation throughout the body has been called “fast food fever”.

Fast food fever: how ultra-processed meals are unhealthier than you think | Food science | The Guardian

“The probability that the size of the world’s population will start to shrink in the next twenty years is much higher than we initially expected,” says  James Pomeroy, an economist at HSBC. He predicts that the world’s population could reach just over 4 billion by the end of the century because of the fertility rate’s sharp decline.

There are many reasons for the decline in fertility rates. The integration of women into the labor market delays the age at which they have their first child. The increase in real estate prices in rich countries limits the development of large families due to high costs. Increased education and better access to health care and contraceptive practices also play a role in families having fewer children. The pandemic has only accentuated the downward trend in births.

 In Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan, the current fertility rate predicts that populations in these countries will be halved by the end of the century.

In Europe, James Pomeroy notes “At the current rate, the population will have halved by 2070, with the continent at risk of losing 400 million inhabitants by 2100. Similarly, if we continue the current trend, India’s population would rise to 1.54 billion in 2050, while China’s would fall to 1.17 billion. France would then have 62.3 million inhabitants and Germany 70.3 million.”

This projected decrease in population numbers is good news in the fight against climate change and the conservation of biodiversity.

It is not the same for all countries, however.

 “The decline in fertility rates is global, but for some countries, such as those in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, the level, although declining, allows for continued population growth,” explains James Pomeroy. 

Africa’s share of the world’s population will increase, with a large number of young people who will need to be integrated into the world of work, either locally or in developed or emerging countries with labor shortages.

 La population mondiale risque de diminuer de moitié d’ici à 2100 | Les Echos

 A classified EU report on Frontex, the EU Border and Coast Guard Agency, details serious allegations of cover-ups of human rights violations. The EU’s best-funded agency, with a budget of €754m (£650m) has been under scrutiny due to reports of human rights violations at its borders, including illegal pushbacks of asylum seekers. 

The report, more than 120 pages long, is the result of a months-long investigation by Olaf, the EU anti-fraud agency. Until now the classified document has been available only to members of the European parliament under strict conditions. The report has been leaked, have now published the document in full.

It details how Frontex witnessed or concealed knowledge of pushbacks of asylum seekers from Greek territory.  Frontex staff expressed concern about “repercussions” from local authorities for reporting violations. The report testifies to the credibility of many of the pushback allegations investigated. Allegations concerning Greece make up a significant part of the investigation, but mention is also made of a serious incident of four migrant boats spotted in the Maltese search and rescue zone

EU border agency accused of serious rights violations in leaked report | Global development | The Guardian

 Variable monetary penalties (VMPs) were introduced in 2010 to enable the Environment Agency to directly levy fines for serious environmental offences without having to go through expensive and lengthy court proceedings, but to date the agency has not levied a single VMP against water companies.

Despite this, the environment secretary, Ranil Jayawardena, last week announced a 1,000-fold rise in the cap on VMPs, from £250,000 to £250m, and said the bigger financial penalties “will act as a greater deterrent and push water companies to do more, and faster, when it comes to investing in infrastructure and improving the quality of our water” and that “the polluter must pay”. The government’s pledge to raise the cap on the amount of money the Environment Agency can fine water companies for sewage pollution to £250m has been described as “hot air”. 

“Punishments are only relevant if you have a regulator who is willing to impose them,” an Environment Agency insider said.

After frequent deep budget cuts, the agency’s chief executive, Sir James Bevan, has said the regulator is no longer sufficiently funded and that it would have to pause or stop some of its environmental protection activities. The regulator has told its staff to “shut down” and ignore reports of low-impact pollution events, saying it does not have enough money to investigate them.

The Environment Agency has also slashed its water-quality monitoring regime, and has downgraded 93% of prosecutions for serious pollution over four years, despite recommendations from frontline staff for the perpetrators to face the highest sanction, and agency staff say that cuts and operational decisions have made it “toothless”.

Ash Smith, the founder of Windrush Against Sewage Pollution, said: “Presumably, someone at Defra [Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs] was tasked with coming up with something that sounded powerful and cost nothing. Raising the level of monetary penalties that are not even used would have been the perfect soundbite…” Smith continued, The reality is that deliberately weak regulation and flawed privatisation has created a polluting for-profit-fest which has attracted ownership from all over the globe to extract money for nothing and take it offshore tax-free. We can expect more desperate threats and promises like raising penalties that won’t really be used, as the government tries carefully not to scare the shareholders or show what a massive scam has been perpetrated on the public.”

‘Hot air’: plans to crack down on UK water polluters dismissed as toothless | Water | The Guardian

 An unrelenting series of crises has trapped vulnerable Haitians in a cycle of growing desperation, without access to food, fuel, markets, jobs and public services, bringing the country to a standstill, warn the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP). Natural hazards and political turmoil have taken a toll on Haitians who were already in need in both rural and urban areas. The onset of the global food crisis, with rising food and fuel prices, has led to growing civil unrest that has plunged Haiti into chaos, completely paralyzing economic activities and transport.

 Hunger has reached Catastrophic levels, or the highest level, 5 on the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), in Cité Soleil, an urban neighborhood in Port-au-Price, Haiti. A record 4.7 million people are currently facing acute hunger (IPC 3 and above), including 1.8 million people in Emergency phase (IPC 4) and, for the first time ever in Haiti, 19,000 people are in Catastrophe phase (IPC 5). Food security has also continued to deteriorate in rural areas, with several going from Crisis (IPC 3) to Emergency phase (IPC 4). Harvest losses due to below average rainfall and the 2021 earthquake that devastated parts of the Grand´Anse, Nippes and Sud departments are among the shocks that worsened conditions

Cité Soleil has seen a worrisome rise in food insecurity over three years. Currently, 65 percent of its population, especially the poorest and most vulnerable, are in high levels of food insecurity with 5 percent of them in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. Increased violence in Cité Soleil, with armed groups vying for control of the area has meant that residents have lost access to their work, markets and health and nutrition services. Many have been forced to flee or hide in their homes.

The basic food basket is out of reach for many Haitians. Inflation stands at a staggering 33 percent and the cost of petrol has doubled. The situation is being further exacerbated by a recent cholera outbreak and the lack of drinkable water which is likely to push more people to the brink of survival.

“We need to help Haitians produce better, more nutritious food to safeguard their livelihoods and their futures, especially in the context of a worsening food crisis,” said José Luis Fernández Filgueiras, FAO Representative in Haiti. 

FAO urgently requires some $33 million to assist more than 470,000 of the most vulnerable people. FAO aims to scale up operations in Haiti from 560,000 people targeted in 2022 to 876,000 people in 2023.

Catastrophic hunger levels recorded for the first time in Haiti – Haiti | ReliefWeb