12 Leaders The EconomistNovember 9th 2019
12 About a fifth of America’s billionaires made their money in in-
dustries in which government capture or market failure is com-
monplace (see Finance section).
Yet many others operate in competitive markets. The retailers
owned by Mike Ashley, one of Mr Corbyn’s targets, are known for
low prices and ruthless competition (as well as questionable
working conditions), not rent-seeking. For every Mark Zucker-
berg, the boss of Facebook, there are several technology entre-
preneurs with lots of rivals. Think of Anthony Wood, who
created Roku, a video-streaming platform; or Tim Sweeney, co-
founder of the firm behind “Fortnite”, a video game. Nobody can
seriously accuse these innovators of having sewn up their mar-
kets or of depending on state favours. The same goes for sports-
men such as Michael Jordan or musicians like Jay-Z, billionaires
both. Even hedge funds face ferocious competition for investors’
funds, which is why so many are throwing in the towel.
When capitalism functions well, competition whittles pro-
fits away for some but also produces them for others as entrepre-
neurs seize markets from sleepy incumbents. Their success will
eventually set off another cycle of disruption, but in the mean-
time fortunes can be made. The founders of MySpace, a social-
media website, got rich when they sold it to News Corp; Facebook
subsequently ate its lunch. Blockbuster, a video-rental store,
helped make Wayne Huizenga a billionaire; then Netflix arrived.
This process creates vast benefits for society. According to esti-
mates by William Nordhaus, an economist, between 1948 and
2001 innovators captured only 2% of the value they created. Per-
haps that is why billionaires are tolerated even by countries with
impeccable social-democratic credentials: Sweden and Norway
have more billionaires per person than America does.Taxes should be levied progressively. But that does not justify
limitless redistribution or punitive levies. Ms Warren’s proposed
wealth tax has already doubled once during her campaign.
Thomas Piketty, an economist behind many of the most-cited
inequality statistics, wants a wealth tax of up to 90% on the rich-
est billionaires. Such expropriation would surely chill incen-
tives to innovate and to allocate capital efficiently. An economy
with fewer entrepreneurs might have fewer billionaires but
would ultimately be less dynamic, leaving everyone worse off.
Wealth is worrying when it becomes entrenched or shielded
from disruptive forces. Where that decay has set in, govern-
ments should tackle it directly. Whatever Mr Corbyn says, Britain
is hardly corrupt by global standards—bribery is rare, for exam-
ple. But it does have a problem with inherited wealth, the source
of one-fifth of billionaires’ fortunes. Higher inheritance taxes
would be welcome there and in America, where it is too easy to
pass wealth between the generations.
A broader agenda of attacking rents while maintaining dyna-
mism would weaken excessive intellectual-property and copy-
right protections, which often last too long. (Selling Lucasfilm
more than three decades after the first “Star Wars” film should
not have netted George Lucas $4bn.) It would shake up antitrust
enforcement to promote competition in old and new industries
alike. Most important, it would fix America’s campaign-finance
laws to rid its political system of corporate capture at both state
and federal level.
Doing all this would achieve much more than an indiscrimi-
nate attack on the rich—and without the associated damage. By
all means, correct policy failures. But billionaires are usually the
wrong target. 7A
dulterer, pervert, traitor, murderer. In France in 1793, no
woman was more relentlessly slandered than Marie Antoin-
ette. Political pamphlets spread baseless rumours of her deprav-
ity. Some drawings showed her with multiple lovers, male and
female. Others portrayed her as a harpy, a notoriously disagree-
able mythical beast that was half bird-of-prey, half woman. Such
mudslinging served a political purpose. The revolutionaries
who had overthrown the monarchy wanted to
tarnish the former queen’s reputation before
they cut off her head.
She was a victim of something ancient and
nasty that is becoming worryingly common:
sexualised disinformation to undercut women
in public life (see Europe section). People have
always invented rumours about such women.
But three things have changed. Digital technol-
ogy makes it easy to disseminate libel widely and anonymously.
“Deepfake” techniques (manipulating images and video using
artificial intelligence) make it cheap and simple to create con-
vincing visual evidence that people have done or said things
which they have not. And powerful actors, including govern-
ments and ruling parties, have gleefully exploited these new op-
portunities. A report by researchers at Oxford this year foundwell-organised disinformation campaigns in 70 countries, up
from 48 in 2018 and 28 in 2017.
Consider the case of Rana Ayyub, an Indian journalist who
tirelessly reports on corruption, and who wrote a book about the
massacre of Muslims in the state of Gujarat when Narendra
Modi, now India’s prime minister, was in charge there. For years,
critics muttered that she was unpatriotic (because she is a Mus-
lim who criticises the ruling party) and a prosti-
tute (because she is a woman). In April 2018 the
abuse intensified. A deepfake sex video, which
grafted her face over that of another woman, was
published and went viral. Digital mobs threat-
ened to rape or kill her. She was “doxxed”: some-
one published her home address and phone
number online. It is hard to prove who was be-
hind this campaign of intimidation, but its pur-
pose is obvious: to silence her, and any other woman thinking of
criticising the mighty.
Similar tactics are used to deter women from running for
public office. In the run-up to elections in Iraq last year, two fe-
male candidates were humiliated with explicit videos, which
they say were faked. One pulled out of the race. The types of im-
age used to degrade women vary from place to place. In Myan-Sex, lies and politics
As deepfake technology spreads, expect more bogus sex tapes of female politiciansFake nudes