The new Pope, Pope Leo XIV, has spoken out concerning the revenue hole between employees and the wealthiest, particularly citing controversial businessman Elon Musk and his just lately introduced almost $1 trillion pay-package. Chatting with Crux Now, Pope Leo mentioned a “very important” challenge right this moment is the “constantly wider hole between the revenue ranges of the working class and the cash that the wealthiest obtain.”
“For instance, CEOs that 60 years in the past might need been making 4 to 6 occasions greater than what the employees are receiving, the final determine I noticed, it is 600 occasions greater than what common employees are receiving,” he mentioned.
Pope Leo went on to quote Tesla’s current announcement that it might pay Musk as much as about $1 trillion, making him the primary (publicly identified) trillionaire on the planet. “What does that imply and what’s that about? If that’s the solely factor that has worth anymore, then we’re in huge hassle,” Pope Leo mentioned.
Tesla’s board just lately accepted a performance-based compensation plan for Musk, the corporate’s CEO, that will pay him around $975 billion if he can drive Tesla’s income up from the place to stands right this moment, at about $1 trillion, to $8.5 trillion. Musk must obtain numerous different milestones to get the total payout.
Pope Leo XIV is the primary Pope from the USA. His Papacy started in Might this yr following the loss of life of Pope Francis in April. Pope Francis additionally spoke out about the problems of growing income inequality and the way persons are being left behind. “The world is wealthy, and but the variety of poor individuals is swelling throughout us,” Pope Francis mentioned in 2020.
Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Darrell West told NPR recently that income inequality is “utterly uncontrolled” and that the US “truly has its worst revenue inequality within the final century” proper now. The results of individuals like Musk and others holding a lot wealth are quite a few and important, West mentioned.
“We’re shifting from being a democracy to turning into an oligarchy simply because we’ve got a bunch of billionaires who have already got gone into authorities,” West defined. “We now have very rich individuals outdoors of presidency who’ve extraordinary entry to the highest of presidency. It is affecting tax coverage, training coverage and well being care coverage. So the danger is that America could find yourself being in a system that promotes the pursuits of some and ignores the pursuits of all people else.”
The challenge of revenue inequality within the context of gaming got here up just lately following Microsoft’s newest spherical of mass layoffs and wider cuts, together with at Xbox. Towards that backdrop, Stephen Totilo of Game File reported that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s compensation for the newest fiscal yr was $79.1 million, in comparison with the median annual compensation of a Microsoft employee of $193,744.