As the US crosses the threshold of half a million deaths from the Covid pandemic, the nation’s billionaires continue to reap extraordinary financial gains. After 11 months of pandemic misery, where millions have lost their jobs, health and wealth, total US billionaire wealth increased $1.3 trillion since mid-March, 2020, an increase of 44 percent.

The country’s 664 billionaires now have combined wealth of $4.3 trillion, up from just under $3 trillion on March 18, 2020. These findings based on Forbes data compiled in this report by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF) and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS).

March 18 is used as the unofficial beginning of the crisis because by then most federal and state economic restrictions responding to the virus were in place. March 18 was also the date that Forbes picked to measure billionaire wealth for the 2020 edition of its annual billionaires report, which provided a baseline that ATF and IPS compare periodically with real-time data from the Forbes website. PolitiFact has favorably reviewed this methodology.

The billionaires’ $1.3 trillion pandemic wealth gain alone could pay for over two-thirds of President Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion COVID rescue package, which Congressional Republicans have attacked as too costly. At $4.2 trillion, the total wealth of America’s 664 billionaires is also more than two-thirds higher than the $2.4 trillion in total wealth held by the bottom half of the population, 165 million Americans.

The $1.3 trillion wealth gain by U.S. billionaires since March 2020 could pay for a stimulus check of more than $3,900 for every one of the roughly 331 million people in the United States. A family of four would receive over $15,000.

All of this guys have no place in modern society, none.