On American Wealth Disparity
By Thomas Crowne
The collapse of the Mayan and Incan Empires is no longer a mystery. Those civilizations did not simply disappear; they disintegrated in the presence of wealth inequality according to a recent essay by Damian Carrington 1 reviewing Luke Kemp’s upcoming book “Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse.” 2
The severe wealth disparity in America is apparent. Look at the numbers. The bottom 50% of Americans control only 3% of its wealth while the top 10% control 69% 3 (38 times more wealth). By comparison, in 1989 the top 10% controlled only 7 times as much as the bottom half 4. Our present wealth inequality has not been seen since the Great Depression 5.
America has always had oligarchic tendencies. Our Constitution made it clear that governing America belonged to white landowners 6. Since then, we have made great strides toward reaching the ideals of freedom and equality expressed in Constitutional Amendments and other writings of our founders. Noticeably since 1980 7; however, the power and influence of wealthy people and corporations have increased until we are no longer living in a democracy but an oligarchy.
The influence of this great and growing wealth can be traced to the heart of all that ails America.
Climate Change
Today 57 companies emit 80% of greenhouse gases 8. The top 10% alone emit almost half (48%) 9. The fossil fuel industry has known about climate change since at least the 1970s 10. As the scientific community began clamoring about global warming and then climate change, the coal, oil, and gas industries began spending vast amounts of money on mis/disinformation denying their existence to continue raking in short-term profits.
Scientific studies have shown that fossil fuel plastics are toxic to this planet and its inhabitants, findings that producers of this unregulated commodity have fraudulently denied. To bolster their position, fossil fuel plastics companies engage in costly public relations and lobbying campaigns to dispute scientific claims and to assert that Americans just need to recycle more. The amount of money these companies spend on the proliferation of these falsehoods reduces profits they could invest in renewable resources and advanced recycling technologies, which would reduce harm to the environment and health. In the meantime, the countdown to an environmental catastrophe continues unchecked as millions of tons of fossil fuel plastics pollute and overwhelm our landfills, waterways, and oceans each year.
Destruction of the Environment
The lives that we live, that were sold to us, have been provided by rich people and corporations that destroy the environment intentionally for more profit. As a result of their actions there are 1,340 Superfund sites in America 11 (land uninhabitable from decades of so much toxic pollution, they must be cleaned up). These one-time industrial sites were abandoned when extracting profit was no longer possible. The polluting companieswere legally structured in such a way that those who created and ran them could not be held financially responsible. Their founders and managers moved on to other profitable ventures without paying a cent toward cleanup. An additional 500+ active industrial sites in the U.S. currently emit so much pollution as to require monitoring 12. We, the American taxpayers, bear the costs of both cleanup and monitoring.
More than 25% of all children, minorities, households living below the poverty line, and people with less than a high school education live within 3 miles of one of these sites 12. Each of these groups has shorter life spans and worse health outcomes than the average American 13. In U.S. alone more than 100,000 people die annually from air pollution 14. If a dictator killed 100,000 of its citizens every year, it would be called mass murder.
Poverty
Continuing poverty is a policy choice by rich corporations and the wealthy. Those at the top of the income and wealth pyramid have consistently, successfully lobbied lawmakers to stop increases in the minimum wage, reduce or eliminate the social safety net, keep the definition of poverty below starvation level, curtail interest rate regulation, dampen controls on fees and service charges, break up monopolistic business practices, fight truth in advertising policies, minimize regulations affecting them, and create a fictive portrait that glorifies the rich and their actions while vilifying the poor.
More than 50% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck 15. More than 11 million children live below the poverty line 16 17 in the richest country in the world 16. Medicaid, SNAP, and other safety net programs for the most vulnerable are being cut 18. Housing costs are at an all-time high 19. The minimum wage has not increased since2009 20, while the cost of living has risen by 50% 21 (Restaurant wait staff can still be paid less than $3.00/hour 22). Additionally, there are 6.9 million Americans working as independent contractors (think Uber/Lyft and delivery drivers)23. For them there is no minimum wage, sick time, days off or vacation time, no maximum hourly work week, and no safety net24. When there is simply not enough to make ends meet, Americans get a second job and/or turn to payday loans/credit cards cheerfully provided at loan shark rates with exorbitant service fees furthering their indenture to a system rigged against them.
Food insecurity is rampant and housing obscenely costly for those at the bottom. This is exacerbated by virtual monopolies in housing, food production, and delivery25 26 27 28 29 30 that allow their managers to raise directly or shrinkflate consumer prices at will to squeeze every possible penny out of their ‘customers.’
The outcome of their investments is evident. It enforces continuation and maintenance of a workforce that will do any job, at any wage, under any conditions with little or no pushback, thereby promulgating increasing profit margins.
Political Division
The wealth gap has transformed politics in America. The corrupting influence of money is pervasive. The wealthy are no longer the ‘deep state’ massaging and influencing legislation that affect their interests 31. They can and do now openly buy Congresspeople, Senators, Presidents 32, Supreme Court Justices 33, entire political parties, and whole elections to ensure their insatiable need for more is baked into legislation that also absolves them of all financial or moral responsibility. Ah, homo sapiens: the only species for whom too much is never enough.
The corrupting influence of money also drives America’s culture wars 34. Moneyed interests ensure we, the people, are sufficiently entertained, distracted, and at each other’s throats to realize we are being robbed blind (interest and fees) and murdered on the streets (guns) or in our sleep (pollution) by their actions while they further rig the system to keep us from noticing our sentence of life in prison without parole.
These are but 4 of the most pressing problems in America. The rest of our difficulties also spring from the root of wealth disparity. If we do not change our trajectory, America will soon reach a medieval crescendo where only feudal lords and peasants remain. Long live the Patriarchy!
Let us lead the world, as we did in the 20th century, toward a better more just civilization by solving this enormous puzzle. If our democracy is to be revived, civilization to survive, we must achieve a more equitable wealth gap (1989 levels). This will require bold drastic action. We must take our would-be overlords in hand by reducing their income, regulating their actions for the common good, reclaiming the wealth stolen from us, reeducating our populace, and rewriting the Rich$peak 35 narrative that dominates our culture. We must raise our lighted torches, pick up our pitchforks, and prepare for the fight of our lives.
1 ‘self-termination is most likely’: The history and future of societal collapse (2025) The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/02/self-termination-history-and-future-of-societal-collapse (Accessed: 06 September 2025).
2 Goliath’s Curse: The History and Future of Societal Col. . . (n.d.). Goodreads. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/219301731-goliath-s-curse%20n.d.
3 “America has Never Been Wealthier: Here’s Why It Doesn’t Feel That Way”, New York Times by Talmon Joseph Smith, March 3,2025, (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/business/economy/wealth-cash-inequality.html)
4 Share of Wealth Held By the Top 1%, Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis, (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WFRBST01134 )
5 DeSilver, D. (2024, April 14). U.S. income inequality, on rise for decades, is now highest since 1928. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2013/12/05/u-s-income-inequality-on-rise-for-decades-is-now-highest- since-1928/
6 Interpretation: Article I, Section 2 | Constitution Center. (n.d.). National Constitution Center – constitutioncenter.org. https://constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/articles/article-i/clauses/762
7 Share of net worth held by the top 1% (99th to 100th wealth percentiles). (2025, June 20). https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WFRBST01134
8 Watts, J. (2024, April 4). Just 57 companies linked to 80% of greenhouse gas emissions since 2016. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/04/just-57-companies-linked-to-80-of-greenhouse-gas-emissions-since-2016
9 Rosane, O. (2022, September 30). Wealthiest 10% responsible for nearly 50% of greenhouse gas emissions, study finds. EcoWatch. https://www.ecowatch.com/greenhouse-gas-emissions-wealthy-poor-comparison.html
10 Ehb. (2024, May 1). Defense, Denial, and Disinformation: Uncovering the oil industry’s early knowledge of climate change - Common home. Common Home. https://commonhome.georgetown.edu/topics/climateenergy/defense-denial-and-disinformation-uncovering-the-oil-industrys-early-knowledge-of-climate-change/
11 Current NPL updates: New proposed NPL sites and new NPL sites | US EPA. (2025, July 7). US EPA. https://www.epa.gov/superfund/current-npl-updates-new-proposed-npl-sites-and-new-npl-sites#:~:text=The%20Superfund%20(About%20Superfund)%20program,NPL%20Site%20Narrative%20at%20Listing.
12 New analysis shows extensive number of facilities across the U.S. that could get a Trump EPA pollution pass. (2025, April 7). Environmental Defense Fund. https://www.edf.org/media/new-analysis-shows-extensive-number-facilities-across-us-could-get-trump-epa-pollution-pass
13 New analysis shows extensive number of facilities across the U.S. that could get a Trump EPA pollution pass. (2025, April 7). Environmental Defense Fund. https://www.edf.org/media/new-analysis-shows-extensive-number-facilities-across-us-could-get-trump-epa-pollution-pass
14 Identifying sources of deadly air pollution in the U.S. (2020, July 15). Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability. https://sustainability.stanford.edu/news/identifying-sources-deadly-air-pollution-us
15 Batdorf, E. (2024, April 2). Living Paycheck to Paycheck statistics 2024. Forbes Advisor. https://www.forbes.com/advisor/banking/living-paycheck-to-paycheck-statistics-2024/
16 Child poverty statistics. (n.d.). https://datacenter.aecf.org/data/tables/43-children-in-poverty#detailed/1/any/false/2545,1095,2048,1729,37,871,870,573,869,36/any/321,322
17 Federal Poverty Level (FPL) - Glossary. (n.d.). HealthCare.gov. https://www.healthcare.gov/glossary/federal-poverty-level-fpl/
18 Copeland, L. (2025, July 4). Final House vote on devastating health and food assistance cuts. Medicare Rights Center. https://www.medicarerights.org/medicare-watch/2025/07/03/final-house-vote-looms-on-devastating-health-and-food-assistance-cuts
19 Wamsley, L. (2025, July 26). Home sales are down. So why are prices at an all-time high? NPR. https://www.npr.org/2025/07/26/nx-s1-5478757/home-price-record-mortgage-rates
20 History of changes to the minimum wage Law. (n.d.). DOL. https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/minimum-wage/history
21 Inflation Rate between 2009-2025 | Inflation Calculator. (n.d.). https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/2009?amount=1
22 Minimum Wage Tracker. (2025, July 1). Economic Policy Institute. https://www.epi.org/minimum-wage-tracker/#/tip_wage/
23 Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements Summary. (2024, November 8). Bureau of Labor and Statistics. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/conemp.nr0.htm
24 Monroe, M. (2024, November 20). How U.S. companies harm workers by making them independent contractors. Equitable Growth. https://equitablegrowth.org/how-u-s-companies-harm-workers-by-making-them-independent- contractors/
25 Lakhani, N., Uteuova, A., & Chang, A. (2022, November 5). Revealed: the true extent of America’s food monopolies, and who pays the price. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/jul/14/food-monopoly-meals-profits-data-investigation
26 Merging grocery giants threaten Americans’ food security. (2024, June 17). Center for Science in the Public Interest. https://www.cspi.org/cspi-news/merging-grocery-giants-threaten-americans-food-security
27 Overbay, M. (2024, December 8). The housing Crisis Monopoly: How BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street are taking over your neighborhood. MB’s Global politics. https://mikebaytoday.substack.com/p/the-housing-crisis-monopoly-how-blackrock
28 Corporate landlords are taking over — but tenants can use their monopolies against them. (2022, June 8). https://jacobin.com/2022/06/corporate-landlords-ca-tenants-unions-finance
29 Corporate landlords are taking over — but tenants can use their monopolies against them. (2022, June 8). https://jacobin.com/2022/06/corporate-landlords-ca-tenants-unions-finance
30 Stoller, M. (2024, September 30). Monopoly Round-Up: corporate slumlords and housing cartels. BIG by Matt Stoller. https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/monopoly-round-up-corporate-slumlords
31 Citizens United explained. (2025, January 14). Brennan Center for Justice. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/citizens-united-explained
32 Thadani, T., Ence Morse, C., & Reston, M. (2025, January 31). Elon Musk donated $288 million in 2024 election, final tally shows. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/01/31/elon-musk-trump-donor-2024-election/
33 Chafetz, J., & Williams, A. (2024). Corruption and the Supreme Court. Yale Journal of Law and Humanities, 36:2025. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4971946
34 Cunningham-Cook, M. (2022, September 16). How Wall Street is funding the culture war. The Lever.https://www.levernews.com/how-wall-street-is-funding-the-culture-war/