Several persons who experienced the phenomenon reported, “I’ve been poor, and I’ve been rich. Rich is better.” Since your Eyewitness has never been rich, he’ll take their word for it since it seems that it’s everybody – excepting Gandhi!! – wanna get rich. Eight billion people can’t be wrong, can they?? Well in today’s world, there’s rich and there’s those who qualify to be invited to the World Economic Forum (WEF) at the Davos ski resort in Switzerland!!
This conclave’s been going on since the early 1970s when a German named Klaus Schwab business leaders, billionaires and politicians on the premise that forging ties among the world’s elite could help solve global problems. Now some may say those very folks are the ones who’ve caused the world problems – but money talks and doubters had to walk!! Since even the richest are (still) human, Covid cancelled Davos since 2020. And of course, since then a lot of things have changed in the world of the rich and mighty!! According to an Oxfam Report published this week, the richest 1% accumulated nearly twice as much new wealth as the rest of the world in those two years! The rich don’t ever “throw back”, do they??
This year some 2,700 attendees – with 52 heads of state and government and nearly 600 CEOs, including JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon and BlackRock’s Larry Fink plus German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol and US climate envoy John Kerry have been hobnobbing since Monday!! Notably absent is no other than Elon Musk – of Tesla and Twitter fame! And no, it’s not because he lost US$200billion last year…his remaining US$151 billion still earned him an invite. However he not so politely declined, saying it would be “boring”!! Your Eyewitness figures it’ll take something REAL special to get Musk excited after his last year!!
Then again, maybe he’s a follower of Groucho Marx who’s once declared “I would not join a club who’d have me as a member!!” But say what you want, Musk is a fella who can spot trends and a lot of folks feel that Davos has passed its expiration date as globalization – pushed by the folks who gather there – seems to’ve tapered off. Outflows of cross-border investment hit a high in 2007. Some say “localization” is now displacing the forces of globalization!! Even this year’s theme, “Cooperation in a Fragmented World” conceded this thesis. George Soros the shadowy eminence grise of investors – who’s donated US$32 billion to influence global trends – was another no-show.
Schwab, however, exhorted the attendees to “master the future” in the face of current challenges!! Masters of the future??!!
…and wars
Even as champagne flowed at Davos, the war in Ukraine heated up as Zelensky addressed the gathering remotely and his Interior Minister died in a helicopter crash. But war is also business, no?? The US$100+ billion in military aid sent in only last year isn’t only money is it?? It’s “goods” like Patriot Missiles etc – that have to be manufactured by some business or other. At a profit, no?
Your Eyewitness understands that the Russian invasion had to be stopped and all that. He wouldn’t want another Munich, would he?? But there is that stubborn doctrine that when all else fails there’s nothing like a good, old dirty war to end a recession. And the developed world HAS been stagnant since the financial meltdown of 2008, hasn’t it?? So even though “Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention” – countries with McDonalds wouldn’t go to war with each other! – was violated maybe this injection of funds into the military-industrial complex will turn things around!!
It’s a wonderful world, ain’t it??
…and the burnt out
Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s PM – who’d become Prime Minister at just 37 and had attended the last Davos WEF of 2019 – has just resigned.
Said she’s run out of steam!! Power’s more than an aphrodisiac!!
