Former Tribune Company owner Sam Zell appeared on Bloomberg Television and stood up for controversial venture capitalist Tom Perkins, saying he agreed with a controversial op-ed he wrote in the Wall Street Journal that compared the criticism of the rich to the Nazi persecution of the Jews.
“I guess my feeling is that he’s right,” Zell said bluntly. “The quote ‘1 percent’ are being pummeled because it’s politically convenient to do so.”
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“The problem is that the world and this country should not talk about envy of the 1 percent, it should talk about emulating the 1 percent,” Zell explained. “The 1 percent work harder. The 1 percent are much bigger factors in all forms of our society.”
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“But Sam, tell that to the person who’s on minimum wage, who’s living below the poverty line, that they should try the emulate the 1%,” Liu interjected. “How are they going to get there?!”
“The stories are rampant of people who started with a candy store and took it from there,” Zell countered. “There are lots of people who have the ambition and have the motivation and have succeeded.”
Watch Zell’s comments defending the rich below via Bloomberg Television: