The Pitchforks Are Coming Out

Ten years ago, self-described plutocrat, Nick Hanauer, published a memo in Politico to “My Fellow Zillionnaires” entitled, The Pitchforks Are Coming…For Us Plutocrats.”

In his memo, Hanauer, said he was neither the smartest nor hardest-working person, and admitted to being a mediocre student and unable to write a word of code. But what he did possess was intuition (as one of the first to invest in Amazon), and a tolerance for risk which, over the course of time, made him “one of those .01%ers and a proud and unapologetic capitalist.”

In that memo he asked, “And what do I see in our future now?”

When billionaires forecast anything, the world eagerly listens, but this time no one liked what he foresaw. “I see pitchforks,” he wrote, decrying the fast-growing divide between the haves and have-nots, noting it was “getting worse really, really fast.”

Making his case more specifically, he noted: “At the same time that people like you and me are thriving beyond the dreams of any plutocrats in history, the rest of the country—the 99.99—is lagging far behind.”

So, what did he mean by “pitchforks”?

According to a Ted Talk that followed, he was warning his cohorts about a surefire backlash: “Our country is rapidly becoming less of a capitalist society and more a feudal society. Unless our policies change dramatically, the middle class will disappear, and we will be back to late 18-century France. Before the revolution.”

With so many Trump voters having promised bloodshed had Trump not won, Nick Hanaeur’s vision was much more than a warning. It was an impassioned plea to other billionaires to wake up. “And so I have a message for my fellow filthy rich, for all of us who live in our gated bubble worlds: Wake up, people. It won’t last.”

The brazen gunman who killed United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Midtown Manhattan may reflect another sign of the type of backlash Hanaeur envisioned when he wrote, “There is no example in human history where wealth accumulated like this and the pitchforks didn’t eventually come out. You show me a highly unequal society, and I will show you a police state. Or an uprising. There are no counterexamples. None. It’s not if, it’s when.”

Although we don’t know yet if the assailant was a disgruntled healthcare policy holder, the murder triggered a rageful slapback against a callous healthcare industry that takes your money but often “delays, denies, and defends” when it comes to payouts.

Since his murder, the mob with pitchforks is loud and clear on social media, proclaiming the assassination itself was inevitable as insurers pull more plugs on the living—literally. One such example came to light immediately following the CEO’s tragic death: in November, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield issued a policy to limit the amount of time anesthesia could be administered during any surgery regardless of how long the surgery takes. The tumultuous outrage brought more pitchforks to the fore until the insurer rescinded its policy on Thursday.

“The system is rigged against Americans who need care,” said former CIGNA executive and whistleblower, Wendell Potter, “largely because of the role that Wall Street plays in our health care system." For instance, United Healthcare more than doubled its denial rate for post-acute care between 2020 and 2022.

Sadly, Brian Thompson’s death symbolizes the death of a once honorable capitalist system that previously set goals to expand and provide for the middle class, and measured its successes according to the wealth it could create for all Americans, not just the 1%. Will the CEO’s death change anything? It’s doubtful.

An economic system that ignores the welfare of all its people in its rush to profit is in need of fresh ideas and a lot more love from those at the top. It needs a fix before more people pick up a pitchfork. For now, health insurers are only willing to pull images of their executives off their websites, hoping more executives won’t be recognized and targeted.

Watch Nick Hanauer’s insightful Ted Talk.