NEW YORK, NY - "Davy and I were ready to settle into a comfortable retirement," says Charles, age 75. "But then the recession hit, our nest egg lost half its value, and the government was running out of money. So Davy and I had to go back to work."
Charles Koch (pronounced "coke") and his brother David, age 70, own the majority of Koch Industries, an oil conglomerate which is America's second largest privately held company with annual revenues of $110 billion.
David explains, "We had to fund libertarian and Tea Party campaigns anonymously by laundering our contributions through more than twenty institutes, foundations, and astroturf organizations. I thought it was tough work when I was 50! And let's face it, some of the Tea Party candidates we propped up were not statesmen of gravitas."
But the brothers consider their efforts to be successful. In fact, The US Congress is now in discussions about continuing tax breaks for the very wealthy and about abolishing the estate tax.
Nevertheless, Charles claims, "It's a full-time job getting the unemployed and poor to vote for the interests of the fantastically rich. It's back-breaking work, and I never dreamed I'd end up doing it at my age."
