It Would Be Nice to Ignore Bill Gates on the Climate Crisis. But He's a Billionaire, So We Must Listen.

Let's begin with the fundamental problem: Bill Gates is a politics denier. While he was slow to accept it, he now accepts the realities of climate science. But he exists in stark, awkward denial about political realities. His recent article on climate, published last week, treats the issue as if it existed in a political vacuum. He composes text ignoring political influence, and pretending massive fortunes aren't relevant.

Central Claim

His main contention is that funds are very limited, so the representatives at the environmental conference in Brazil should direct money away from "near-term emissions goals" towards environmental adjustment and investing in poverty reduction and healthcare.

Admittedly, resources for positive initiatives are insufficient, but that's not because of some natural law, an unchangeable fact of civilization. It's because oligarchic power has waged war on benign state spending, leading to the destruction of USAID and severe reductions in assistance funding of other countries. Financial restraint stems from policy choices. The choice to implement it comes from authorities yielding to the demands of the ultra-rich.

Current Funds

There are truckloads of money available. Shortly following Gates' latest publication, research showed that the total wealth of the 10 richest US billionaires grew by $698bn in the past year. This amount by itself, the growth in ten individuals' fortunes, is almost 10 times the yearly funding needed to eliminate severe poverty worldwide. How have they managed to channel so much of global wealth into personal accounts? And why can't we get it back through appropriate revenue collection? The answer is their translation of wealth into policy-making authority. With growing fortunes, the greater their ability to influence political and economic frameworks to their will, ensuring that they become richer still. But Bill Gates says nothing in his essay about ways and locations for more resources for both climate action and poverty relief could be located.

'The article seems designed as appeasement toward Donald Trump.' The billionaire alongside Trump at an exclusive meal for industry figures in Washington.

Rich-Poor Dynamic

A clear connection exists between the deprivation Gates says concerns him and the riches he overlooks. In the US, unhoused populations are reaching new highs, and so is the portion of wealth controlled by the wealthiest fraction. Even if this doesn't characterize Gates' specific methods, by suppressing salaries, racking up rents, undermining worker collectives and winning tax and spending cuts, extremely wealthy individuals benefit from others' economic struggles.

Investigation Conclusions

A notable research in academic political journals, among the very few to have penetrated this secretive world, found that billionaires maintain completely separate political opinions from the great majority. The rich participants surveyed, completely unlike ordinary citizens, considered fiscal shortfalls as critical of the issues it listed, and environmental collapse as unimportant. They were significantly more prone to argue that social security and federal healthcare should be cut, and significantly less prone to accept that jobless individuals deserve adequate living conditions, or that there should be more regulation of oil companies, banks and health insurers. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.

Policy Impact

What opinions win out? The small elite or the vast population? Although the research occurred during the Obama administration, it found that extremely wealthy individuals enjoyed greater political access than regular individuals. And now? The current reality seems obvious.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

This represents another significant omission in Gates' writing: across extensive text, the former president receives no reference. Should the billionaire address this, he'd have to acknowledge that the second of his major assumptions is shaky: lower prices for sustainable technology inevitably produces environmental improvement. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than fossil fuels. But Trump and similar demagogues are taking all possible actions to block the shift.

To some degree because of this, fossil fuels remain highly lucrative. This could be why, even though Gates states his organization sold all direct fossil fuel investments in 2019, its investments in traditional energy securities have, in fact, increased.

Mental Aspects

To Gates, overthrowing the power of the ultra-wealthy may be unthinkable. I don't mean only that it clashes with his worldview. Based on his notable omissions regarding this topic, he may actually be unable to conceptualize it. Possibly this represents "extreme wealth mentality": a profound incapacity to see the world from other people's point of view. Although extremely wealthy individuals are difficult to research, inferring from investigations about money's effect on mental processes could suggest that gaining massive wealth resembles experiencing brain trauma. Wealth seems to scramble certain cognitive functions, especially those involving compassion and viewpoint.

Political Calculations

But perhaps there's also calculation here: his article seems designed as appeasement toward Trump. Trump certainly took it that way: "I (WE!) just won the War on the Climate Change Hoax. The billionaire has acknowledged his complete error. It took courage to do so, and for that we are all grateful. MAGA!!!"

Historical Context

The billionaire has consistently been incorrect on the issue, although not for Trump's stated reasons. He has repeatedly been behind current understanding, repeating traditional energy arguments (green technologies could reduce global CO2 emissions only at a "beyond astronomical" cost) well after their refutation. He has propagated misunderstanding and inaccuracies, such as the groundless assertion in his new essay that the purpose of Sri Lanka's disastrous ban on synthetic fertilisers was "to cut emissions".

Additional Tough Truths

Gates calls his essay Three Tough Truths About Climate. Thus, here's another difficult reality he carefully avoids. Should, as appears probable, vital planetary systems reach critical thresholds and rapidly fail, the impact on humanity, let alone the survival of other life forms (a subject he consistently omits), would destroy the smooth and steady progress he foresees. Since ecological transformation probably won't occur slowly and predictably, but via abrupt transitions, the possible impacts on human wellbeing are extremely hard to predict. His position that all resources should follow existing data-driven assessments of human betterment, while it might sound rational, creates significant illogic when confronting systemic transformation, {prompting us to ignore the greatest