Why won't billionaires like Amazon's Jeff Bezos fix world problems? The answer is greed.

Have you ever wondered why the world's millionaires and billionaires don't use their money to fix some of the world's biggest problems? It's been said that a small chunk of their collective wealth could solve issues like world hunger and poverty. Global Citizen estimates that if every billionaire donated just one percent of their wealth, they could together save the lives of six million children. So what's stopping them? Well, Twitter user TSearcaigh had the same question, and posted it to the social media platform. After her tweet went viral on the blogging site Tumblr, someone came forward with a pretty great response. They claimed if billionaires cared about the world's poorest and most vulnerable, they would never become billionaires in the first place.

TSearcaigh stated in a now-deleted tweet, "I don't get people like Bezos. If I had billions of dollars, I would impulsively start fixing sh*t. Homeless vets? I don't think so. Hungry children? Not on my watch. He could be Batman. What a waste." What a waste, indeed. If you had billions of dollars just lying around, there's no doubt you would put it to good use. Especially during a pandemic. However, in the recent past, billionaires of tech giants have been accused of sitting on their *sses while getting wealthier off of the recent outbreak. If we lived in a perfect world, there'd be some way to correct that (ahem, taxes), but we don't. Tumblr user Olivesawl pointed that out in her - perfect - response to TSearcaigh.

"If you’re the kind of person who would do that, you never become Bezos in the first place," the Tumblr user wrote, using her own father as an example. "My dad owned a business my whole life. It was profitable, but it didn’t expand. I asked him once why he never grew it, and he said it’s nearly impossible without climbing on someone’s back – your vendors, your customers, your employees. Particularly that last one. You don’t wait until your business is big to be a good human being." Does the user mean to imply that Bezos made his billions off the backs of thousands of minimum wage workers? Heck yes.

They continued, "The very first time you have to choose between your own profit and your employees' health insurance, you choose the latter. You give maternity leave even though the government doesn’t make you. You dock your own salary to not lay people off during a recession. You have adequate staffing and reliable hours." These are important tips to remember as a recession looms before the United States economy. "Anybody who says you can’t run a retail business on a normal, reasonable, predictable schedule you know in advance is full of sh*t," Olivesawl concluded. "My dad did it for 35 years (always have one more person than you think you need, and 98 percent of your staffing problems vanish). It’s just not maximum profit. If you don’t prioritize extracting profit from every corner of your business, you never become rich enough to give billions away."

There you have it, folks. The lie about the American dream, all laid out in front of you. When complaints from workers at Amazon about having to pee in water bottles because they aren't allowed to take a break and being fired from their jobs for speaking up about terrible working conditions become the norm, you know that there's something wrong with the way billionaires make their money. Meanwhile, small business owners who play nice and actually care about their employees never seem to be able to maximize profit. That's some food for thought.