Editing Plutocracy (section)

===United States<!--'Donor Class' redirects here-->===
{{Further|Income inequality in the United States#Effects on democracy and society}}
{{See also|American upper class|Wealth inequality in the United States}}
[[File:US federal minimum wage if it had kept pace with productivity. Also, the inflation-adjusted minimum wage.png|thumb|350px|[[US federal minimum wage]] if it had kept pace with productivity. Also, the real minimum wage.]]
Some modern historians, politicians, and economists argue that the U.S. was effectively plutocratic for at least part of the [[Gilded Age]] and [[Progressive Era]] periods between the end of the [[Civil War (United States)|Civil War]] until the beginning of the [[Great Depression]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Pettigrew|first=Richard Franklin|author-link=Richard F. Pettigrew|title=Triumphant Plutocracy: The Story of American Public Life from 1870 to 1920|year=2010|publisher=Nabu Press|isbn=978-1146542746}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Calvin Reed|first=John|title=The New Plutocracy|year=1903|publisher=Kessinger Publishing, LLC (2010 reprint)|isbn=978-1120909152}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last= Brinkmeyer|first=Robert H.|title=The fourth ghost: white Southern writers and European fascism, 1930-1950|year=2009|publisher=Louisiana State University Press|location=Baton Rouge|isbn=978-0807133835|pages=331}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Allitt|first=Patrick|title=The conservatives: ideas and personalities throughout American history|year=2009|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven|isbn=978-0300118940|pages=[https://archive.org/details/conservativeside00alli_0/page/143 143]|url=https://archive.org/details/conservativeside00alli_0/page/143}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|editor-last1=Ryan|editor-first1=James G.|editor-last2=Schlup|editor-first2=Leonard|title=Historical dictionary of the Gilded Age|year=2003|publisher=[[M.E. Sharpe]]|location=Armonk, N.Y.|isbn=978-0765603319|pages=145}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|first1=Peter|last1=Viereck|title=Conservative thinkers: from John Adams to Winston Churchill|year=2006|publisher=Transaction Publishers|location=New Brunswick, New Jersey|isbn=978-1412805261|pages=[https://archive.org/details/conservativethin00pete/page/103 103]|url=https://archive.org/details/conservativethin00pete/page/103}}</ref> President [[Theodore Roosevelt]] became known as the "trust-buster" for his aggressive use of [[United States antitrust law|antitrust law]], through which he managed to break up such major combinations as [[Northern Securities Company|the largest railroad]] and [[Standard Oil]], the largest oil company.<ref>{{cite book|title=American Entrepreneur: The Fascinating Stories of the People Who Defined Business in the United States| publisher=[[AMACOM]] Div American Mgmt Assn | year = 2009|first=Larry|last = Schweikart}}</ref> According to historian David Burton, "When it came to domestic political concerns, TR's [[wikt:bête noire|bête noire]] was the plutocracy."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zMdfna-aocwC&q=theodore+roosevelt+plutocracy&pg=PA104|title=Theodore Roosevelt, American Politician|access-date=28 August 2015|isbn=9780838637272|last1=Burton|first1=David Henry|year=1997|publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press }}</ref> In his autobiographical account of taking on monopolistic corporations as president, Roosevelt recounted:

{{blockquote|
...we had come to the stage where for our people what was needed was a real democracy; and of all forms of tyranny the least attractive and the most vulgar is the tyranny of mere wealth, the tyranny of a plutocracy.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bartleby.com/55/12.html|title=Roosevelt, Theodore. 1913. An Autobiography: XII. The Big Stick and the Square Deal|work=bartleby.com|access-date=28 August 2015}}</ref>
}}

The [[Sherman Antitrust Act]] had been enacted in 1890, when large industries reaching [[monopolistic]] or near-monopolistic levels of [[market concentration]] and [[financial capital]] increasingly integrating corporations and a handful of very wealthy heads of large corporations began to exert increasing influence over industry, public opinion and politics after the Civil War. Money, according to contemporary [[Progressive movement|progressive]] and journalist [[Walter Weyl]], was "the mortar of this edifice", with ideological differences among politicians fading and the political realm becoming "''a mere branch'' in a still larger, integrated business. The state, which through the party formally sold favors to the large corporations, became one of their departments."<ref>{{cite book|last=Bowman|first=Scott R.|title=The modern corporation and American political thought: law, power, and ideology|year=1996|publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press|location=University Park, Pa.|isbn=978-0271014739|pages=92–103}}</ref>

In "The Politics of Plutocracy" section of his book, ''[[The Conscience of a Liberal]]'', economist [[Paul Krugman]] says plutocracy took hold because of three factors: at that time, the poorest quarter of American residents (African-Americans and non-naturalized immigrants) were ineligible to vote, the wealthy funded the campaigns of politicians they preferred, and [[Electoral fraud#Vote buying|vote buying]] was "feasible, easy and widespread", as were other forms of [[electoral fraud]] such as [[Electoral fraud#Ballot stuffing|ballot-box stuffing]] and [[Electoral fraud#Intimidation|intimidation of the other party's voters]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Krugman|first=Paul|title=The conscience of a liberal|year=2009|publisher=Norton|location=New York|isbn=978-0393333138|pages=[https://archive.org/details/conscienceoflib00krug/page/21 21–26]|edition=[Pbk. ed.]|url=https://archive.org/details/conscienceoflib00krug/page/21}}</ref>

The U.S. instituted [[progressive taxation]] in 1913, but according to [[Shamus Khan]], in the 1970s, elites used their increasing political power to lower their taxes, and today successfully employ what political scientist Jeffrey Winters calls "the income defense industry" to greatly reduce their taxes.<ref>Kahn, Shamus (18 September 2012) [https://ideas.time.com/2012/09/18/the-rich-havent-always-hated-taxes/ "The Rich Haven't Always Hated Taxes"] ''Time Magazine''</ref>

In 1998, [[Bob Herbert]] of ''[[The New York Times]]'' referred to modern American plutocrats as "The '''Donor Class'''<!--boldface per WP:R#PLA-->"<ref name="NYT-19980719">{{cite news |last=Herbert |first=Bob |author-link=Bob Herbert |title=The Donor Class |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/19/opinion/in-america-the-donor-class.html |date=19 July 1998 |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=10 March 2016 }}</ref><ref name="NYT-20151010">{{cite news |last1=Confessore |first1=Nicholas |last2=Cohen |first2=Sarah |last3=Yourish |first3=Karen |title=The Families Funding the 2016 Presidential Election |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/11/us/politics/2016-presidential-election-super-pac-donors.html |date=10 October 2015 |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=10 March 2016 }}</ref> (list of top (political party) donors)<ref name="NYT-20151010-el">{{cite news |last1=Lichtblau |first1=Eric |last2=Confessore |first2=Nicholas |title=From Fracking to Finance, a Torrent of Campaign Cash - Top Donors List |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/11/us/politics/wealthy-families-presidential-candidates.html#donors-list |date=10 October 2015 |work=[[The New York Times]] |access-date=11 March 2016 }}</ref> and defined the class, for the first time,<ref name="CS-20141226">{{cite news |last=McCutcheon |first=Chuck |title=Why the 'donor class' matters, especially in the GOP presidential scrum |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/Politics-Voices/2014/1226/Why-the-donor-class-matters-especially-in-the-GOP-presidential-scrum |date=26 December 2014 |work="[[The Christian Science Monitor]] |access-date=10 March 2016 }}</ref> as "a tiny group – just one-quarter of 1 percent of the population – and it is not representative of the rest of the nation. But its money buys plenty of access."<ref name="NYT-19980719" />

==== Post-World War II ====
In modern times, the term is sometimes used pejoratively to refer to societies rooted in state-corporate capitalism or which prioritize the accumulation of wealth over other interests.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Barker|first=Derek|title=Oligarchy or Elite Democracy? Aristotle and Modern Representative Government|journal=New Political Science|date=2013|volume=35|issue=4|pages=547–566|doi=10.1080/07393148.2013.848701|s2cid=145063601}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Etzioni|first=Amitai|title=Political Corruption in the United States: A Design Draft|journal=Political Science & Politics|date=Jan 2014|volume=47|issue=1|pages=141–144|doi=10.1017/S1049096513001492|doi-broken-date=5 February 2025 |s2cid=155071383}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Westbrook|first=David|title=If Not a Commercial Republic - Political Economy in the United States after Citizens United|journal=Louisville Law Review|date=2011|volume=50|issue=1|pages=35–86|url=http://www.louisvillelawreview.org/sites/louisvillelawreview.org/files/pdfs/printcontent/50/1/Westbrook.pdf|access-date=30 April 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140502000423/http://www.louisvillelawreview.org/sites/louisvillelawreview.org/files/pdfs/printcontent/50/1/Westbrook.pdf|archive-date=2 May 2014|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}</ref><ref>[http://billmoyers.com/episode/full-show-long-dark-shadows-plutocracy/ Full Show: The Long, Dark Shadows of Plutocracy]. ''[[Moyers & Company]]'', 28 November 2014.</ref> According to [[Kevin Phillips (political commentator)|Kevin Phillips]], author and political strategist to [[Richard Nixon]], the United States is a plutocracy in which there is a "fusion of money and government."<ref>[https://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_phillips.html Transcript. Bill Moyers Interviews Kevin Phillips]. ''[[NOW with Bill Moyers]]'' 4.09.04 | PBS</ref>

[[Chrystia Freeland]], author of ''[[Plutocrats (book)|Plutocrats]]'',<ref>{{cite book|first=Chrystia|last=Freeland|author-link=Chrystia Freeland|title=Plutocrats: the rise of the new global super-rich and the fall of everyone else|date=2012|publisher=Penguin|location=New York|isbn=9781594204098|oclc=780480424|url=https://archive.org/details/plutocratsriseof00free}}</ref> says that the present trend towards plutocracy occurs because the rich feel that their interests are shared by society:<ref>{{cite interview |first=Chrystia|last=Freeland |date=15 October 2012 |url=https://www.npr.org/2012/10/15/162799512/a-startling-gap-between-us-and-them-in-plutocrats |title=A Startling Gap Between Us And Them In 'Plutocrats' |publisher=[[National Public Radio]] |access-date=12 April 2023}}</ref><ref>See also the Chrystia Freeland interview for the Moyers Book Club (12 October 2012) [http://billmoyers.com/episode/full-show-plutocracy-rising/ ''Moyers & Company'' Full Show: Plutocracy Rising]</ref>

{{blockquote
|You don't do this in a kind of chortling, smoking your cigar, conspiratorial thinking way. You do it by persuading yourself that what is in your own personal self-interest is in the interests of everybody else. So you persuade yourself that, actually, government services, things like spending on education, which is what created that social mobility in the first place, need to be cut so that the deficit will shrink, so that your tax bill doesn't go up. And what I really worry about is, there is so much money and so much power at the very top, and the gap between those people at the very top and everybody else is so great, that we are going to see social mobility choked off and society transformed.
}}

When the Nobel Prize–winning economist [[Joseph Stiglitz]] wrote the 2011 ''[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'' magazine article entitled "Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%", the title and content supported Stiglitz's claim that the U.S. is increasingly ruled by the wealthiest 1%.<ref>Stiglitz Joseph E. [http://www.vanityfair.com/society/features/2011/05/top-one-percent-201105# "Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%"]. ''[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'', May 2011; see also the ''[[Democracy Now!]]'' interview with Joseph Stiglitz: [http://www.democracynow.org/2011/4/7/nobel_economist_joseph_stiglitz_assault_on "Assault on Social Spending, Pro-Rich Tax Cuts Turning U.S. into Nation 'Of the 1 Percent, by the 1 Percent, for the 1 Percent{{'"}}], ''[[Democracy Now!]]'' Archive, Thursday, 7 April 2011</ref> Some researchers have said [[Oligarchy#United States|the U.S. may be drifting towards a form of oligarchy]], as individual citizens have less impact than economic elites and organized interest groups upon public policy.<ref>[[Thomas Piketty|Piketty, Thomas]] (2014). ''[[Capital in the Twenty-First Century]]''. Belknap Press. {{ISBN|067443000X}} p. 514: "the risk of a drift towards oligarchy is real and gives little reason for optimism about where the United States is headed."</ref> In the [[United States Congress|U.S. Congress]] itself, more than half of all members are millionaires.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Evers-Hillstrom |first=Karl |date=2020-04-23 |title=Majority of lawmakers in 116th Congress are millionaires |url=https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/04/majority-of-lawmakers-millionaires/ |access-date=2024-07-10 |website=OpenSecrets}}</ref>

A study conducted by political scientists Martin Gilens of [[Princeton University]] and Benjamin Page of [[Northwestern University]], which was released in April 2014,<ref>{{cite journal |title=Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens |author1=Martin Gilens |author2=Benjamin I. Page |name-list-style=amp |journal=[[Perspectives on Politics]] |date=2014 |volume=12 |issue=3 |pages=564–581 |doi=10.1017/S1537592714001595 |url=http://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf|doi-access=free }}</ref> stated that their "analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts". Gilens and Page do not characterize the U.S. as an "oligarchy" or "plutocracy" per se; however, they do apply the concept of "civil oligarchy" as used by [[Jeffrey A. Winters]]<ref>Winters, Jeffrey A. "[https://archive.org/details/oligarchy0000wint Oligarchy]" Cambridge University Press, 2011, pp. 208-254</ref> with respect to the U.S.

The investor, [[billionaire]], and [[philanthropist]] [[Warren Buffett]], one of the wealthiest people in the world,<ref>{{cite web |title=The World's Billionaires |url=https://www.forbes.com/billionaires/list/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130403013841/http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/list/ |archive-date=3 April 2013 |access-date=1 May 2018 |website=forbes.com}}</ref> voiced in 2005 and once more in 2006 his view that his class, the "rich class", is waging class warfare on the rest of society. In 2005 Buffet said to CNN: "It's class warfare, my class is winning, but they shouldn't be."<ref>[http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/05/10/buffett/index.html Buffett: 'There are lots of loose nukes around the world'] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160430104340/http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/05/10/buffett/index.html|date=30 April 2016}} CNN.com</ref> In a November 2006 interview in ''[[The New York Times]]'', Buffett stated that "[t]here's class warfare all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning."<ref name="Buffett_warfare">{{cite news |last=Buffett |first=Warren |date=26 November 2006 |title=In Class Warfare, Guess Which Class is Winning |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/business/yourmoney/26every.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170103165340/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/business/yourmoney/26every.html |archive-date=3 January 2017 |newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref>