I have found in a private collection at a jumble sale the secret writings of the Plutocracy. I know now what makes the patrician class so unhappy. This should be a great relief to everyone. I’ll share it with you if you have a minute.

Here, let me show you some of it.

"Trickle-down economics" is a despised phrase and concept to many, but it also embodies a harsh reality. The rich often play a pivotal role in U.S. economic growth, and if they are enfeebled, then the consequences are widespread. Consider:

Consumption spending, the economy’s main engine, is skewed toward the upper classes, because they have most of the income. In 2009, households with more than $200,000 in income account for 3.4 percent of the total but will generate almost 14 percent of consumer spending, estimates economist Sterne. Households with incomes between $100,000 and $200,000 represent about 14 percent of the population and 34 percent of spending. Together, these groups generate nearly half of U.S. consumption, although they’re only a sixth of the population.

Similarly, the rich pay most of the taxes. In 2006, the richest 1 percent paid 28 percent of all federal taxes, estimates the CBO. The richest 10 percent (including the top 1 percent) paid 55 percent. The system is progressive—that is, the richer people get, the more of their income they pay in taxes. In 2006, the effective rate for the top 1 percent was 31 percent, reflecting all federal taxes. By contrast, the poorest fifth paid an effective rate of 4 percent. (State and local taxes are less progressive, because they rely more heavily on regressive sales taxes.)

The wealthy dominate charitable giving. In 2004, families with a net worth exceeding $5 million made up about 1.5 percent of all U.S. families but accounted for 27 percent of contributions, according to the Center on Wealth and Philanthropy at Boston College. Those with a net worth between $1 million and $5 million, about 7 percent of all families, represented another 20 percent of contributions. So, a tenth of American families made nearly half of all gifts.

Wealthy individuals are an important source of money for venture capital—funds invested in startup companies. Individuals and families represent about 10 percent of VC money (most of the rest comes from pension funds, college endowments, and insurance companies).

When the affluent retrench, they drag a lot with them. For example, the financial crisis led to a 44 percent fall in year-end bonuses at Wall Street firms, to $18.4 billion in 2008 from $32.9 billion in 2007, according to the New York state comptroller. No doubt that struck many as overdue and insufficient. Bankers were overpaid, and huge year-end bonuses encouraged excessive risk-taking. The trouble is that the loss of taxes on the bonuses blew a $1 billion hole in the state’s budget and made it harder to pay for schools, health care, and prisons.

That’s from a secret journal hardly anybody knows of. Okay, so the riches pay too much. Robert Reich thinks they can afford it.

According to the most recent data (for 2007), the best-off 1 percent of American households take home about 20 percent of total income — the highest percentage since 1928.

Okay, here’s the question. Should the riches put their treasure into fancy digs in Barbados and a second Leer or pay your medical bills? That’s a puzzler. Why should they care if you ever see a doctor?

Now, this all presumes the Patriarchal Position that they alone are individually worthy of their fortunes won by silence, exile, and cunning. They invented Rearden Metal and have the sole right to sell it to whom they please, and requiring charity of them is highway robbery.

Set-aside are the usual suspects; those who were born into wealth or inherited or married it or acquired it through family connections. Accidents of birth are not merit factors, alas. So we have cut the field of worthy plutocrats considerably.

So we have Mr Gates. (I caught in passing a story on a neighbor of his spying him and his driver trying to prize open the front door of his estate and the cops busted him because well you know, all these gangly white guys wearing backpacks – but I’ll go back and read the story after I finish this.) No accident there, right? Right?

Well, it appears the story is not quite that simple. That’s always the way, innit? Seems Mr Gates was born into wealth in a lucky year for geeks and near a modern university in which he was allowed to study the new digital contraptions. And when IBM came looking for an operating system for their new PC project they contacted Mr Gates who was quite lackadaisical on the prospect. But he shrugged, agreed to go buy something called DOS to retail to the corporation, and kept the copyright to himself. From that point, his company owned almost every desktop in the world, which is a nice platform for your software company.

Amount of the billions won by Mr Gates owing to his own precision programming or that of his company – $0. Amount attributed to his being in the right place and time to catch the big wave – $lots.

But Mr Gates shares without hesitation. In fact, he says he will give it all away eventually. The question is, should the other riches be forced to contribute to the good of us all? Most of them seem to believe they already pay too much. Maybe we should just thank them all for what they do already?