even killing the poorest 50% of people on earth would almost nothing to prevent the climate collapse because they have such a miniscule carbon footprint, the richest 1% however..

Yeah it's pretty clear the wealthy exploiters just decided about 4 billion of us were expendable about 15 years ago... if not longer ago than that.

You're giving them far too much credit. While these people like to think of themselves as super-geniuses, they can't think any farther than the tips of their noses. Their plan is to hole up on their private islands when shit hits the fan. They can't imagine that they'll be the first to be eaten when food runs low.

Unless they have a plan on how they will continue to extract wealth after the working class is gone, then they are short sighted and will be food for the ultra rich who plan on exploiting them.