In response to Jeff Bezos’ scheduled space flight, Robbie Silverman, Senior Advocacy Manager for Oxfam America made the following statement:
“Jeff Bezos’ 11-minute thrill ride to space is an insult to the millions of people here on planet Earth who struggle every day to feed their families and make ends meet. Many of them are the very Amazon workers who helped make Bezos the richest man in the world. We can’t forget that our backwards and corrupt tax system has allowed the same person who pays next to no federal income tax to blow $7.5 billion on his own private aerospace company.
“This is truly not rocket science. While hard working American families pay an average of 14% income tax each year, Bezos and the other billionaires in this obscene race to space should be required to pay their fair share.
“Congress can and must unrig the rules by increasing the corporate tax rate, closing loopholes that enable corporations to abuse tax havens, increasing the capital gains rate for the wealthiest Americans and raising the marginal tax rate for those earning more than $400,000—all proposals included in President Biden’s American Jobs Plan and American Families Plan. Additionally, introducing a 3% wealth tax would generate $6 billion in revenue from Bezos’ $200 billion fortune alone, enough to provide childcare to every child under 4 in his home state of Washington –440,000 children.
“The real innovation we need is a fair tax system that would allow desperately needed investments into well-paying jobs, adequate care for our children, and efforts to save the planet we all live on from the climate crisis.”