Born on Third Base Post

In the book, Born on Third Base, Chuck Collins makes the unusual decision of donating most of his wealth to make the case of tackling inequality. The book presents an anomaly of someone who realized their privileged place in society and decided that the money can be used in a more meaningful way that has a more beneficial impact. At a very young age Collins saw the disparity of some low-income individuals and saw the opportunity that his money could make in the lives of struggling households, this led to him finding “his own way” by donating most of his fortune of the Oscar Mayer empire.

            America today experiences a serious problem with income inequality, the top 20 richest Americans own more wealth than the bottom 50%. This huge disparity in income places a significant strain on lower classes as they end up dealing with higher levels of poverty and

also a higher tax burden as many ultra-rich have been able to get away by paying lower taxes. Most working Americans today are making a tiny fraction of what high-level executives and CEOs are being paid at the expense of the exuberant salaries many executives demand. Greed has become a common characteristic of the corporate world as most companies seek more and more ways of trying to cut salaries of the hardest working people.

Collins however showed that by giving away his fortune, that money is not everything that is most important to an individual. He showed that by giving it away to someone more in need the money ultimately will serve a better purpose and generate more well-being for society as a whole. This idea can be brought within the corporate world as many companies hide money overseas to avoid paying their fair share of taxes, and also pay employees very disproportionally. If corporations adopted a fairer policy, we would see a positive change reflected in blue collar salaries across multiple industries.