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World Economic Forum

Davos: Inequality Rocks The Magic Mountain

A major cause of such inequality is tax havens – which in the current casino atmosphere stand no risk of being regulated. The so-called globalized elites meet at the World Economic Forum in Davos this year under the specter of extreme turbulence. The WEF Global Risks Report is hardly reassuring. The top five most likely risks for 2018 all range from extreme weather/climate change disturbances to cyber-attacks. Yet, according to the report, in terms of impact, they are superseded by weapons of mass destruction – a direct consequence of the Korean peninsula standoff. Global elites are somewhat paralyzed by political inaction facing the most pressing questions of our time, just as the global economy is inundated by liquidity. Quantitative easing was actually the only concrete response to political inaction, adhered to by every Central Bank, from the ECB to the Japanese.

How Can We Bridge The Widening Global Inequality Gap?

For the past five years, I have carried Oxfam's call to tackle global inequality to the rich and powerful people attending the World Economic Forum in Davos. I don't sing alone there any more. I'm worried my message is almost mainstream, that I sound like I'm part of the choir. I bet nearly every politician and industry leader I meet in Davos this week will talk the talk about the evils of inequality and be very eloquent and believable, too. I mean, how could they not? The evidence is overwhelming. Surely, no stable genius attending Davos could possibly try to deny, minimise or justify 2018 levels of global inequality? Now that would be a controversial sideshow! Oxfam's report this year is as much about people's stories as it is about inequality's staggering statistics. These are the people around the world losing their lands and livelihoods as fast as ever.

Thousands Protest At World Economic Forum In Davos

Thousands of people took to the streets of Zurich to protest against Donald Trump‘s presence at Davos. The US president has planned to attend the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Switzerland this week. In response, anti-capitalist activists called for protests under the slogans ‘Trump Not Welcome!’ and ‘Smash WEF!’ Trump is due to speak on Friday at the WEF meeting in the Alpine town of Davos, an annual meeting of global business and political leaders. That march went off peacefully, unlike violent anti-WEF protests in several Swiss cities that were held in the early 2000s. More than 4,000 Swiss soldiers have been deployed to guard DAvos, alongside 1,000 police officers. A no-fly zone was also put in place to protect delegates.

Newsletter – Overcome Fear With Love

Instead of taking action to prevent or mitigate the next crisis, politicians are causing more harm as they work hand in hand with the wealthy elites who are trying to grab even greater power and extract even greater riches. Maryland's governor was quick to bring in the National Guard and militarized police, but just cut Baltimore education funding by $11.6 million to fund pensions, while last week the state approved funding for a youth jail the people in Baltimore don't want. This article provides five key facts about Baltimore and a graphic that shows how the United States built its wealth on slavery, Jim Crow and racially-based economic injustice and kept African Americans from benefiting the economy. Also, as a special addition to recognize BB King, he sings "Why I Sing the Blues" describing the history of African Americans from slavery until today.

The Davos Oligarchs Should Fear The World They’ve Made

The architects of the crisis-ridden international economic order are starting to see the dangers. It’s not just the maverick hedge-funder George Soros, who likes to describe himself as a class traitor. Paul Polman, Unilever chief executive, frets about the “capitalist threat to capitalism”. Christine Lagarde, the IMF managing director, fears capitalism might indeed carry Marx’s “seeds of its own destruction” and warns that something needs to be done. The scale of the crisis has been laid out for them by the charity Oxfam. Just 80 individuals now have the same net wealth as 3.5 billion people – half the entire global population. Last year, the best-off 1% owned 48% of the world’s wealth, up from 44% five years ago. On current trends, the richest 1% will have pocketed more than the other 99% put together next year. The 0.1% have been doing even better, quadrupling their share of US income since the 1980s. This is a wealth grab on a grotesque scale.

Newsletter: Our Task-The Future As A Frontier

Sam Smith gave this talk, “On Becoming and Being an Activist,” at a teen conference. The essence of his message is that we are facing serious crises and we have to make a choice of whether we will act or not. We are on a dangerous path and it takes courage to see that and not be paralyzed into inaction. It is easier to ignore the truth and succumb to the many distractions in our lives. Smith writes: “It is this willingness to walk away from the seductive power of the present that first divides the mere reformer from the rebel — the courage to emigrate from one’s own ways in order to meet the future not as just a right but as a frontier.” Smith goes on to describe that traditional tools for social change, working within the system, are not effective in this time. We must raise our voices, do the unexpected and try the improbable. We need to use our passion, our energy, our magic and music to burst the illusion being hand fed to us in the media and taught in our schools.

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Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! 

Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

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