WARREN BUFFETT / THE SACKLERS, OR PABLO ESCOBAR: WHO PROFITED MORE FROM CAUSING DEATHS WITH ADDICTIVE WHITE POWDERS/PILLS?

Consumption of sugary beverages have been shown to kill more people (due to induced diabetes, heart diease, obesity and cancer) than both cocaine and organized crime. And some 'legal' drugs such as opioids have been trafficked to end up killing more people than all illegal drugs. Yet other than paying fines, or no fines at all, none of the business people exploiting these 'legal' drugs have gone to jail.

WARREN BUFFETT, COCA-COLA AND DEATHS/PROFITS DUE TO SUGAR

For decades, one of the biggest owners of shares of Coca-Cola has been Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway. As of March 2026, Buffett/Berkshire owned 400 million shares of Coca-Cola, out of 4.3 billion shares, or 9.3%. As of 2026, Coca-Cola pays a $2 dividend. So Buffett/Berkshire earn $800 million/year from Coca-Cola. Over the last twenty years, Buffett/Berkshire has earned over $10 billion from its investment in Coca-Cola.

In 2015, researchers from Tufts University, Harvard School of Public Health, Imperial School of Public Health, Univ. of Washington Institute for Health Metrics - who comprised the Global Burden of Diseases Nutrition and Chronic Diseases Expert Group - collectively published a paper in Circulation, Estimated Global, Regional, and National Disease Burdens Related to Sugar-Sweetened Beverage in 2010. The first statistic: "Worldwide, the model estimated 184,000 (95% uncertainty interval, 208000) deaths per year attributable to consumption of sugar sweetened beverages". That makes sugar sweetened beverages deadlier that cocaine.
Question 1: is it more moral to help people kill themselves less slowly (sugary beverages) than to help people kill themselves more quickly (cocaine)? If not more moral, than sugary beverages immorally kill more people per year than cocaine.
In the article, the medical reserarchers document that, at least in 2010, about 27,000 of these 184,000 deaths occurred in the USA. Let us roughly assume that the bulk of the sugary beverage business in the USA is split between Coca-Cola and Pepsico. 27,000/2/2 (the second /2 is a rough adjustment for other companies selling sugary beverages). Then a ballpark conclusion is that Coca-Cola's sugary beverages contributed to the deaths of at least 6,000 people in the USA. That means that Buffett's/Berkshire's share of these deaths is 6,000 * 9.3, or about 550 deaths. Assuming the same number of deaths since then (probably an undercount), that means that Berkshire's/Hathaway's share of deaths in the last 15 years or so is about 8,250 people in the USA.
Question 2: how immoral are companies whose products caused deaths, even if the deaths are caused slowly, and their products are completely legal?
This is not an argument about absolute morality. The SP500 is riddled with companies that profit from deaths (starting with the alcohol and tobacco industries, the defense industries, the fossil fuel industries, etc.). But here is the thing. Let's assume that in the last 20 years or so, Buffett/Berkshire earned over $10 billion in dividends from Coca-Cola, and have to take responsibility for about 8000 deaths. Whatever. But estimates are that Pablo Escobar earned less than $4 billion from trafficking cocaine, and was responible for less than 5000 deaths from trafficking cocaine. Absolutely horrible/evil? YES. Relatively horrible/evil? Go ask Warren Buffett.

THE RICHES OF THE OPIOID DRUG TRAFFICKING FAMILY - THE SACKLERS

The opioid drug trafficking Sackler family most likely made more money, caused more misery, and were more evil than cocaine drug trafficker ... Pablo Escobar (responsible for less than 5000 deaths, and earned less than a few billion dollars). None of the Sacklers are in jail, and they have been allowed to keep billions in opioid drug trafficking profits because they sheltered the profits offshore. In 1993, special military forces in Colombia assassinated Pablo Escobar. If he deserved it, well, .... it demonstrates Escobar's biggest failing - he didn't hire enough lawyers.



Contact KukaXoco via email or 415–981–0441 (WhatsApp)