Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair

As a co-editor of Inequality.org, I get a lot of fan mail (and a few complaints). Greg B. recently wrote in, “None of my problems exist as a result of someone else being a billionaire.”

My response to Greg: “An economy rigged to funnel so much wealth and power to the billionaire class is bad for you and everyone else. It undermines your life in some major ways.”

I wrote my new book, Burned by Billionaires: How Concentrated Wealth and Power are Ruining Our Lives and Planet, for folks like Greg to talk about how extreme wealth inequality disrupts our daily lives. Here are ten ways you are being burned by billionaires, pulled from my book.

My analysis doesn’t focus on the behavior of individual billionaires — though some are gnarly ones (while a handful show signs of decency). The problem is the system of laws, rules and regulations tipped in favor of big asset owners at the expense of wage earners and working folks.

When I’m talking about billionaires, I’m thinking of more people than the 905 U.S. billionaires that together control about $7.8 trillion in wealth. I include the top one-tenth of 1 percent, the 0.1 percent of households that have over $40 million on up to the billionaire class. People with wealth north of $40 or $50 million have every need and desire met and easily accumulate power. They’re not just buying mansions and private jets but also lawmakers and media outlets. That’s when we need to sound the alarm about “the billionaires.”

Here are ten of the ways you are personally getting burned by billionaires:

1. The billionaires stick you with their tax bill. By opting out of their tax obligations, the billionaire class is shifting responsibility on to you to pay for everything from infrastructure to national defense to veterans services.

2. They rob you of your voice and vote. With........

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