$201.8 billion.

That’s where Forbes pegs the net worth of Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos as of 5:00 p.m. Friday.

• Bezos is actually worth $7.1 billion more than the gross domestic product of Iowa — the entire state of Iowa — for 2019. (You know that old saying: “Worth more than all the corn and caucuses in Iowa!”)

• According to the U.S. Department of Education, the average salary for public school teachers during the 2019-20 school year was $63,645. It would take 79,268 teachers working 40 years each at that salary to match the current “value” of this singular Bezos.

• Poor old Charles Koch — of the infamous Koch Brothers — is worth a paltry $46.7 billion. I don’t know how he gets by.

• Bezos is the only human being so far to exceed $200 billion in net worth.

• That’s something he first “accomplished” in 2020, when Amazon’s revenue grew 38% in a single year as millions of people around the world turned to the company for food, medicines, household supplies, and other essentials during the (still-unfolding) global coronavirus pandemic.

• Somehow — amid counting all that extra money — Bezos still had time to: find excuses not to pay Amazon workers substantially better wages; avoid making working conditions at Amazon warehouses significantly safer; and watch his company wield union-busting tactics when Amazon workers dared to try unionizing.

On Monday, Jeff Bezos will officially step down as Amazon CEO.

Apparently so he can devote more time to space travel. (Bezos is launching himself into space later this month. More on that in a future alert.)

“The only way that I can see to deploy this much financial resource is by converting my Amazon winnings into space travel,” Bezos said in 2018.

Meanwhile, 2 out of 3 Americans worry they won’t be able to retire at all. (And just shy of ALL out of ALL Americans are not about to launch themselves into space. Did I mention we’ll have more on that later?)

Please join me in a message to Jeff Bezos:

Congratulations, Jeff. You insinuated yourself into our lives through heretofore unimagined depths of raw, abject consumerism. You exploited your workers. Do you deserve a break? Well, here’s one thing for sure: America deserves a break from you. Happy “retirement”!

Add your name.

Thanks for taking action.

For progress,

- Robert Weissman, President of Public Citizen

P.S. The subject line of this email may have been a little misleading — in that I am of course being entirely sarcastic in wishing Jeff Bezos congratulations.

P.P.S. For half a century, Public Citizen has been advancing policies that put the needs of everyday Americans before the greed of billionaires and Big Business. That legacy of progress and that ongoing work could not matter more right now, as our nation transitions to a Joe Biden presidency that will be as progressive as we — you and Public Citizen, together — make it. We’re also busy undoing all the damage Trump did. And, like so many nonprofits and small businesses, we continue to experience financial strain related to the coronavirus pandemic. If you can, please make an emergency donation today to support the critical work we’re doing together or even join our popular Monthly Giving program. Thank you.
 
 
Public Citizen | 1600 20th Street NW | Washington DC 20009 | Unsubscribe