NickColley/aoc-on-billionaires.txt

## aoc-on-billionaires.txt
Question from Instagram user: I respectfully disagree with you about billionaires. Because, I think you could be a billionaire.

AOC answering: The question of billionaires is less about being a "good" or "bad" individual and more about the immorality of a system and economy that not only allows abuse of everyday people, but financially rewards the powerful who profit off not paying workers a living wage, keeping medicine expensive, profiting off incarceration and war, building unethical and unsustainable food systems, or otherwise hoarding unthinkable levels of wealth for the very few by denying basic dignities of life for the many (aka a living wage, healthcare, peace, worker protections, not burning our planet to death for fossil fuel interests, etc)

If I had a billion dollars (which people need to understand is just not even on the same PLANET as having millions of dollars) while people are dying because they can't afford insulin it's important people understand that those two things are connected. It means I would likely have investments in systems that rely on exploitative models - inflated medicine prices, lobbying for low taxes or exploitation wages that mean we can't have universal healthcare, reliance on fossil fuels corps destroying our planet, industries that profit off our carceral system & prison labor or child labor, etc. I say that because a billion dollars is "systems" money - it is a scale that for the most part you don't get to with wages or savings or being a movie star. It doesn't matter how "good" a person I am or anyone is, that concentration of wealth and level of INEQUALITY is a social ill. Billionaires are a symptom of a society that does not afford people basic elements of dignity. Climate change, lack of healthcare, underpaying jobs, housing crisis, racial injustice & colonization these are all connected. But also I just don't want a billion dollars. Why would I? That concentration of wealth comes at a cost. And the cost is a destabilizing society.

If people want we can revisit the billionaire question when everyone has healthcare, climate change is addressed, people have actual dignified standards of living, etc.
	Question from Instagram user: I respectfully disagree with you about billionaires. Because, I think you could be a billionaire.

	AOC answering: The question of billionaires is less about being a "good" or "bad" individual and more about the immorality of a system and economy that not only allows abuse of everyday people, but financially rewards the powerful who profit off not paying workers a living wage, keeping medicine expensive, profiting off incarceration and war, building unethical and unsustainable food systems, or otherwise hoarding unthinkable levels of wealth for the very few by denying basic dignities of life for the many (aka a living wage, healthcare, peace, worker protections, not burning our planet to death for fossil fuel interests, etc)

	If I had a billion dollars (which people need to understand is just not even on the same PLANET as having millions of dollars) while people are dying because they can't afford insulin it's important people understand that those two things are connected. It means I would likely have investments in systems that rely on exploitative models - inflated medicine prices, lobbying for low taxes or exploitation wages that mean we can't have universal healthcare, reliance on fossil fuels corps destroying our planet, industries that profit off our carceral system & prison labor or child labor, etc. I say that because a billion dollars is "systems" money - it is a scale that for the most part you don't get to with wages or savings or being a movie star. It doesn't matter how "good" a person I am or anyone is, that concentration of wealth and level of INEQUALITY is a social ill. Billionaires are a symptom of a society that does not afford people basic elements of dignity. Climate change, lack of healthcare, underpaying jobs, housing crisis, racial injustice & colonization these are all connected. But also I just don't want a billion dollars. Why would I? That concentration of wealth comes at a cost. And the cost is a destabilizing society.

	If people want we can revisit the billionaire question when everyone has healthcare, climate change is addressed, people have actual dignified standards of living, etc.