A Tale of Two Pities: Graeme Harts superyacht vs Salvation Army Christmas hampers

Two stories that tell us everything about where we are as a nation right now…

NZ’s richest man reveals covid lockdown project: A custom built superyacht

Kiwi billionaire Graeme Hart has taken delivery of his latest superyacht, said to be a 102-metre custom-built feat of engineering.

Specifications released by the manufacturer, Feadship, reveal the yacht has four outdoor hot tubs and a pool occupying the full height of the main deck, accessed via a pool deck.

It also has a helipad and a hangar and the largest tender boat garage door that the firm has ever installed on a luxury vessel.

…vs this…

Salvation Army forced to quit Christmas meal hampers

The cost of living crisis has forced The Salvation Army New Zealand to make a national decision to stop providing its traditional Christmas meal hampers.

It’s possibly the first year it’s had to make the call but divisional director for community ministries Vikki Stevenson said the organisation couldn’t justify the cost of the Christmas treats when an increasing number of Kiwis needed everyday grocery items.

This comes as The Salvation Army released its State of our Communities 2023 report this week, with respondents highlighting unaffordable housing, and soaring prices of essentials like food, petrol and power as their main concerns.

“Food shortage is a big thing, even people with jobs are finding it hard and have nowhere to turn to,” one respondent shared.

…post Covid we all sacrificed equally in an unequal society.

NZ is now a tale of two pities.

There is a class war happening in NZ right now to exclude the under class, the beneficiaries, the working poor, state house tenants, prisoners, exploited migrant workers, the disabled, drug addicts, workers, the 600 000 reliant on food banks each month, the 300 000 living in housing and energy poverty and renters, but thanks to middle class Wellington activists who have stolen all the political oxygen for their woke identity politics virtue signals, we don’t have the vocabulary to articulate class war.

Our past history of egalitarianism is now a mere pretension used by the Woke to feel superior while the mega wealthy continue to avoid any focus on their obscene wealth.

Bernard Hickey has argued, “We could have gotten $200 billion in extra tax revenues if only there had been a fair tax system which meant that capital gains were taxed at the same rate as every other type of income.”

In a liberal progressive democracy, it doesn’t matter what role you play in the complex super structure of our society and economy.

It doesn’t matter of you are a garbage collector, a dr, a nurse, a drain layer, teacher or tradie – if you all stopped doing your jobs the system can’t work.

Everyone deserves to share the collective harvest of civil society with public services and policies focused on the public good enshrined in the intrinsic civil liberties each individual has.

Wealthy individuals who become mega rich thanks to the landscape generated by those values are required to pay more back into the system they have benefited from beyond the bare necessity of ruthless accountancy practices.

These rich pricks have designed the system for themselves, ‘you can’t tax unrealised capital gains’ the Right scream, like bullshit we can’t!

Council rates are based on valuation and you can borrow against that capital gain.

If it means the mega rich have to sell a mansion or two to pay the tax bill, so fucking be it!

There are 14 Billionaires in NZ + 3118 ultra-high net worth individuals, let’s start with them, then the Banks, then the Property Speculators, the Climate Change polluters and big industry.

Making these levels of extreme profit right before the looming recession of late stage capitalism is an outrage!

Unfortunately the middle class woke Left are too focused on Social Justice Privileges to fight for Economic Justice Rights!

No poor family in NZ are sitting around the kitchen table cancelling each other for misusing pronouns.

 

Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice going into this pandemic and 2020 election – please donate here.

If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media.