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Let's begin with the fundamental problem: The Microsoft founder is a politics denier. Though he came to it late, he now acknowledges climate change facts. But he lives in flat, embarrassing denial about how politics works. His new piece on climate, published last week, approaches climate change without political context. He composes text ignoring political influence, and as if extreme wealth didn't exist.

Central Claim

His main contention is that funds are very limited, so the participants in the upcoming climate meeting in Brazil should redirect resources from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards environmental adjustment and investing in poverty reduction and healthcare.

Admittedly, resources for positive initiatives are insufficient, but this isn't due to universal principles, some implacable truth about human society. The reason is elite influence has declared war on public welfare investments, resulting in the elimination of development assistance and severe reductions in assistance funding of various states. Financial restraint stems from policy choices. The selection to enforce it originates with governments bowing to the wishes of billionaire class.

Current Funds

There are truckloads of money available. Shortly following Gates' latest publication, Oxfam revealed that the net worth of the 10 richest US billionaires increased by nearly $700 billion over the last year. That money alone, the growth in ten individuals' fortunes, is almost 10 times the yearly funding needed to eliminate severe poverty worldwide. Through what means did they accumulate of global wealth into personal accounts? Why can't society reclaim it through proper tax policies? The solution lies in their conversion of wealth into policy-making authority. With growing fortunes, the greater their ability to influence the state and economic system to their will, securing ongoing financial growth. But the philanthropist discusses nothing in his essay about how and where extra money for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be found.

'The article seems designed as appeasement toward Donald Trump.' Gates photographed with the former president for business leaders in Washington DC.

Wealth Inequality Relationship

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 holding down wages, increasing housing costs, undermining worker collectives and securing tax reductions and budget decreases, the ultra-rich thrive on impoverishing other people.

Investigation Conclusions

A notable research in Perspectives on Politics, one of the rare examinations of this private sphere, found that billionaires maintain completely separate political opinions from the general population. The wealthy respondents in the study, 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 strongly against wealth redistribution.

Policy Impact

Which perspectives dominate? The few wealthy or the many citizens? Although the research occurred during the Obama administration, it found that extremely wealthy individuals enjoyed greater political access than ordinary people. How about today? The situation hardly requires explanation.

Omissions and Assumptions

That's another telling absence in Bill Gates's essay: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. Were Gates to do so, he'd have to acknowledge that the second of his major assumptions is shaky: reductions in the cost of new green technologies lead inexorably to environmental progress. Of course it helps that wind, solar and other green technologies are becoming radically cheaper than traditional energy sources. But Trump and similar demagogues are employing every method to hinder the change.

In part due to these factors, traditional energy sources stay very profitable. This potentially clarifies why, even though Gates states his organization sold all direct fossil fuel investments in 2019, its investments in traditional energy securities have, truly expanded.

Cognitive Considerations

Regarding Gates, confronting extreme wealth power could appear inconceivable. I don't mean only that it clashes with his worldview. I mean that, judging by his remarkable silences on the issue, he may actually be unable to conceptualize it. This might indicate "wealth-induced cognitive distortion": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. Although extremely wealthy individuals are difficult to research, drawing conclusions from studies about wealth's impact on thinking could suggest that gaining massive wealth resembles experiencing brain trauma. Fortunes seem to disturb particular brain operations, particularly those related to empathy and perspective.

Tactical Elements

But perhaps there's also calculation here: his writing appears primarily as reconciliation with the former president. Trump definitely understood it as such: "We've defeated the climate change falsehood." Gates has confessed his total mistake. It took courage to do so, and for that we are all grateful. MAGA!!!"

Historical Context

Gates has always been completely WRONG on climate matters, though not for the reasons Trump imagines. He has continually trailed scientific consensus, echoing petroleum industry talking points (renewable energy could lower carbon output only with massive expenses) well after their refutation. He has spread confusion and misinformation, including the unsupported claim in his recent writing that the intention behind Sri Lanka's failed prohibition on synthetic fertilisers was "to cut emissions".

Additional Tough Truths

The billionaire titles his piece Three Difficult Climate Realities. So here's another tough truth he studiously ignores. If, as now seems likely, crucial Earth systems cross tipping points and suddenly collapse, the effects on human life, ignoring the persistence of additional organisms (an issue he regularly neglects), would destroy the smooth and steady progress he foresees. Given that climate alteration may not happen incrementally and steadily, but via abrupt transitions, the potential effects on human welfare are very difficult to forecast. His argument that we should align all funding to current "data-based analysis" of improvements in human welfare, while it might sound rational, introduces in the face of systemic change a profound irrationality, {prompting us to ignore the greatest