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LWe must begin with the fundamental problem: The Microsoft founder ignores the role of politics. While he was slow to accept it, he now recognizes environmental science. But he operates in blatant, cringeworthy denial about the realities of power. His new piece on climate, released recently, approaches climate change without political context. He composes text ignoring political influence, and pretending massive fortunes aren't relevant.

The Main Contention

His primary argument suggests that financial resources are scarce, so the participants in the upcoming climate meeting in Brazil should redirect resources from "immediate carbon reduction objectives" towards climate "adaptation" and allocating funds for economic hardship and illness.

Yes, the funds available for any good cause are scarce, but that's not because of some natural law, an unavoidable reality of communities. It's because oligarchic power has waged war on government social programs, leading to the destruction of USAID and severe reductions in assistance funding of additional nations. Financial restraint stems from policy choices. The choice to implement it comes from leaders submitting to the preferences of billionaire class.

Available Resources

Massive amounts of wealth exist. Shortly following Gates' latest publication, Oxfam revealed that the net worth of the 10 richest US billionaires expanded by hundreds of billions over the last year. These funds independently, the increase in a handful of billionaires' net worth, is nearly tenfold the annual amount required to end extreme poverty worldwide. What methods enabled such concentration of economic resources into private hands? And why can't we get it back through appropriate revenue collection? The answer is their translation of financial influence into governmental control. The richer they become, the more they can bend political and economic frameworks to their preferences, securing ongoing financial growth. But Bill Gates says nothing in his essay about how and where extra money for both climate solutions and hardship alleviation could be located.

'His writing appears primarily as reconciliation with Donald Trump.' Bill Gates, right, with the Trumps at a private dinner for business leaders in Washington DC.

Wealth Inequality Relationship

There's a direct link between the deprivation Gates says concerns him and the fortunes he ignores. In the US, unhoused populations are reaching new highs, and so is the portion of wealth controlled by the wealthiest fraction. While this might not be Gates's own business model, by suppressing salaries, increasing housing costs, weakening labor organizations and securing tax reductions and budget decreases, extremely wealthy individuals benefit from others' economic struggles.

Study Results

A remarkable study in Perspectives on Politics, among the very few to have penetrated this secretive world, found that billionaires maintain completely separate political opinions from most people. The rich participants surveyed, sharply different from average people, viewed government debt as paramount of the issues it listed, and ecological crisis as insignificant. They were much more inclined to demand that social security and federal healthcare should be cut, and far less likely to believe that the unemployed should have a "decent standard of living", or that there should be more regulation of oil companies, banks and health insurers. They were fiercely opposed to redistribution.

Policy Impact

Which perspectives dominate? The tiny minority or the great majority? Although the research occurred during the Obama administration, it found that billionaires maintained closer relationships with government figures than ordinary people. How about today? The situation hardly requires explanation.

Missing Elements and Presumptions

That's another telling absence in Bill Gates's essay: at no point in its 5,000 words does it mention Donald Trump. Were Gates to do so, he'd have to admit that another key premise is questionable: reductions in the cost of new green technologies lead inexorably to environmental progress. Certainly, it's positive that clean technology prices are falling dramatically than fossil fuels. But Trump and similar demagogues are taking all possible actions to block the shift.

In part due to these factors, traditional energy sources stay very profitable. This potentially clarifies why, notwithstanding Gates' assertion about eliminating petroleum company stocks in 2019, its oil and gas financial assets have, actually grown.

Psychological Factors

To Gates, overthrowing the power of the ultra-wealthy may be unthinkable. It's not merely incompatible with his outlook. Considering his significant avoidance of this subject, he might be literally incapable of thinking about it. This might indicate "wealth-induced cognitive distortion": a fundamental failure to comprehend alternative viewpoints. Although extremely wealthy individuals are difficult to research, extrapolating from research into how gaining wealth and status affects cognition could suggest that obtaining enormous fortunes compares to cognitive damage. Wealth seems to scramble certain cognitive functions, notably those concerning understanding and outlook.

Political Calculations

However, strategic thinking might also be involved: his essay reads like nothing so much as a peace offering to Donald Trump. Trump definitely understood it as such: "We've defeated the climate change falsehood." Bill Gates has finally admitted that he was completely WRONG on the issue. This demonstrated nerve, and we're thankful. MAGA!!!"

Historical Context

Gates has always been completely WRONG on climate matters, even if not for the explanations Trump provides. He has continually trailed scientific consensus, reciting fossil fuel claims (clean technology could decrease pollution only through enormous spending) significantly following their debunking. He has propagated misunderstanding and inaccuracies, like the baseless statement in his latest article that the intention behind Sri Lanka's failed prohibition on artificial fertilizers aimed at pollution decrease.

Additional Tough Truths

Gates calls his essay Three Tough Truths About Climate. Therefore, here's another challenging fact he deliberately overlooks. If, as now seems likely, crucial Earth systems cross tipping points and quickly deteriorate, the impact on humanity, ignoring the persistence of additional organisms (a topic he fails, as usual, to mention), would ruin the consistent development he anticipates. Because environmental change is likely to proceed not in gradual and linear ways, but through sudden changes of state, the conceivable consequences for people's quality of life are nearly impossible to anticipate. His position that all resources should follow existing data-driven assessments of human betterment, while it might sound rational, introduces in the face of systemic change a profound irrationality, {prompting us to ignore the greatest