A Rough Idea: The left need to get more confident at communicating solutions
Takeaways from the World Inequality Conference in Paris.
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I didn’t meet anyone else working in communications at the World Inequality Conference last week.
OK, maybe this space wasn’t meant for media folks. It is an economics conference, after all. Organised by the World Inequality Lab and featuring high-profile speakers like Lucas Chancel, Gabriel Zucman and Grace Blakeley, the three days of panels marked the launch of the ambitious Global Justice Report.
The Global Justice Report lays out a plan for how to limit global heating, tackle wealth inequality, and build a socially and ecologically sustainable world by 2100. Some key proposals include:
Wealth redistribution so that income inequality is on a 1:5 ratio (so the richest person can only earn 5 times more than the poorest, and wealth inequality is 1:10. (Current income inequality is 1:50,0000 - the richest person earns roughly 50,000 times more than the poorest. Wealth inequality is more extreme, with the richest 10% owning three quarters of the world’s assets).
Sufficiency principles: Reducing working hours and material production and shifting to an ‘immaterial’-first economy where some of the main sectors are healthcare, education and leisure.
Rapid decarbonisation of energy systems to limit global heating to 1.8 C by 2100.
All this would be paid for through a Global Justice Fund that spends 10.3% of global GDP each year. This Fund would be filled through a wealth tax on billionaires, and a progressive income tax.
The report is not perfect, but it’s doing what many climate organisations and leftist movements fail at: it’s creating a utopia. It presents something for us to aspire towards, rather than a series of terrifying projections, and offers credibility to the idea that tackling inequality and avoiding the most catastrophic climate pathways are technically feasible..
And of course, the armchair internet critics immediately dismiss it as unrealistic. Can’t be done. The political will is lacking, the ‘public’ (which seemingly doesn’t include us?) will not get on board, and there are no clear leaders to pioneer these transformations.
The cynicism and doomism of the left, while understandable, is not really helping our cause. If we have so little faith in our own vision of a positive future, how can we persuade others to join our movement?
