Leon Cooperman Needs to Quit Complaining

PatrioticMillionaire
Nov 5 · 3 min read

This letter was written by Patriotic Millionaires Chair Morris Pearl in response to Leon Cooperman’s open letter to Elizabeth Warren.

I’m rich. I like being rich. I don’t want anyone to vilify the rich. But when rich people use their power and influence to fight against necessary change or rig the system even further in their favor, they deserve to be called out.

Mr. Cooperman, I don’t think that you’re a bad person, but to respond to a tweet asking you to “pitch in a bit more so everyone else has a chance at the American dream, too” with a five page letter detailing the value of billionaires in our society shows an incredible lack of perspective.

We applaud your success and your commitment to philanthropy, but frankly, it’s irrelevant to a conversation about taxes. This country needs broad systemic change, and that’s not going to come at the whim of a few billionaires.

To speak of three hospitals that you and a couple other billionaires fund that help a few thousand poor people each year is to ignore the reality that because we choose to not adequately fund our healthcare system, millions of Americans have no access to care whatsoever. So it’s great that that fraction of a fraction of a percent of Americans get care thanks to the largess of billionaires, but their care should not be used as an excuse to avoid making any real systemic changes. I know changing the tax system so all ultra rich people pay higher taxes won’t get your name on a hospital, but it would help more people.

Yes, many people get wealthy from providing a product or service that other people are willing to pay for (although 60% of wealth in America is actually inherited), and they shouldn’t be criticized for doing so. But they also should be expected to contribute more to the country and the system that allowed them to get rich in the first place. I don’t particularly care about soaking the rich as a punishment for success, I care about fixing an economic system that has created massive inequality, and we can’t do that unless we tax the rich.

I was surprised to read that you think people should focus on income opportunity rather than income inequality, because surely someone as familiar with markets and how economies work as you would recognize that argument as utter nonsense. Comparing the United States to Afghanistan rather than other developed countries obfuscates the clearly proven fact that economic inequality hurts economic growth, and that as inequality in the US has risen, economic mobility has decreased. Lower income Americans have less opportunity than ever because of inequality.

Finally, at the end of your letter we find some common ground in your support for a progressive tax system. Based on your extensive challenge to the premise that our current tax system is not very progressive, I’m skeptical about your commitment to this issue, but I’m eager to be proven wrong. Let’s talk about whether a wealth tax is the most effective way of raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy, but it is undeniable that the rich should be paying more than they are right now. Talking about closing loopholes, avoiding confiscatory rates, and cutting bureaucratic waste is just a distraction from this central issue. But you’re a smart guy, you already knew that.

I agree with your final point. We should find common ground. But you need to start coming to terms with the fact that finding common ground on the principles you say you support may mean you end up slightly less wealthy. I would argue it’s a great tradeoff.

If you actually care about the country where your grandchildren will grow up, quit complaining about being victimized and start doing something to make things better. Your wealth makes you one of the most powerful people in the world, start acting like it.

PatrioticMillionaire

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The Patriotic Millionaires is a group of high-net worth Americans who are committed to building a more prosperous, stable and inclusive nation.

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