Dear President Trump,

I think you may be an expert on this issue so I’ll ask you first – do you think ultra wealthy people engage in philanthropic actions more to distract others from their misdeeds and greed or to assuage their own guilt and cement their sense of entitlement?

Either way, it was refreshing that Danish historian, Rutger Bregman, called out this critically important, yet largely taboo, topic at Davos yesterday. After chiding the literal jetsetters on their choice of transportation to hear a talk on climate change, Bregman pointed out that the ultra wealthy have a laser focus on nominally saving the world through donor-directed/self-congratulatory philanthropy when it should be on ponying up their fare share for the common good by actual payment of actual taxes owed (I’m paraphrasing quite a bit here). Even under the currently severely skewed-to-favor-the-wealthy tax system, this would help the world tons.

I bet he won’t be invited back any time soon. Regardless, he named the herd of elephants stomping around the proverbial room and only the dimmest of you all can go on pretending this is a non-issue.

And did you catch the clip of Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International, giving the former CFO of Yahoo, Ken Goldman, what for in response to his lame-ass “what about the low unemployment rates” pushback on Bregman? She calmly, matter-of-factly pointed out that he and those like him (which includes you, in case you are wondering) are counting the wrong thing when you all trot out the low unemployment rates because you are willfully ignoring the fact that most jobs are without dignity and do not provide people with the means to live securely.

Actually, you and your organization have illustrated this phenomenon quite recently in having summarily fired all of the undocumented people (people) who worked (worked) for you (you) for years (years) so you can stop being a hypocrite. It served you and your precious bottom line to have these vulnerable people work for you with no real security and no dignity and now that they are a political liability to you, they’re out the door and in jeopardy of deportation. Your appallingly inhumane way of handling this situation is no surprise at all, but hopefully there will be a silver lining in that more people will realize what a disloyal scumbag you are.

May we be safe from greedy do-gooders.
May we be willing to call out hypocrites.
May we be healthy and strong through this time of upheaval.
May we have the courage to embrace peaceful protest of the social order.

Sincerely,
Tracy Simpson