Billionaires’ wealth grew three times faster last year than the year before, a top anti-poverty group reported yesterday, as some of the world’s political and financial elite prepared for an annual gathering in Davos, Switzerland.
Oxfam International, in its latest assessment of global inequality timed to the opening of the World Economic Forum meeting, also predicts at least five trillionaires would crop up over the next decade. A year ago, the group forecast that only 1 trillionaire would appear during that time.
Oxfam’s research adds weight to a warning by outgoing US President Joe Biden last week of a “dangerous concentration of power in the hands of very few ultra-wealthy people.”
Photo: AP
The group’s sharp-edged report, titled Takers Not Makers, also says the number of people in poverty has barely budged since 1990.
The World Economic Forum expects to host about 3,000 attendees, including business executives, academics, government officials and civic group leaders at its annual meeting in Davos.
US president-elect Donald Trump, who visited Davos twice during his first term and was set to take the oath of office yesterday, is expected to take part in the forum’s event by video on Thursday. He has long championed wealth accumulation — including his own — and counts multibillionaire Elon Musk as a top adviser.
“What you’re seeing at the moment is a billionaire president taking oaths today, backed by the richest man. So this is pretty much the jewel in the crown of the global oligarchies,” Oxfam International executive director Amitabh Behar said in an interview, referring to Trump and Musk.
“It’s not about one specific individual. It’s the economic system that we have created where the billionaires are now pretty much being able to shape economic policies, social policies, which eventually gives them more and more profit,” he added.
Like Biden’s call for making billionaires “begin to pay their fair share” through the US tax code, Oxfam — a global advocacy group — called on governments to tax the richest to reduce inequality and extreme wealth, and to “dismantle the new aristocracy.”
The group called for steps like the break-up of monopolies, capping CEO pay and regulation of corporations to ensure they pay “living wages” to workers.
Many investors racked up strong gains last year, with strong performances for top tech companies and stock market indices such as the S&P 500, as well as the price of gold and cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.
Oxfam said billionaire wealth grew by US$2 trillion last year, or about US$5.7 billion a day, three-times faster than in 2023. The number of billionaires rose by 204 to 2,769, and the 10 richest people saw their wealth rise nearly US$100 million a day on average, it said.
Citing World Bank data, the group pointed to lingering poverty, saying the number of people living on less than US$6.85 per day has “barely changed” since 1990. Oxfam used Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaire List” as of the end of November for data on the ultra-rich.
By contrast, at least four new billionaires were “minted” every week last year and three-fifths of billionaire wealth came from inheritance, monopoly power or “crony connections,” it said.
On average, low and middle-income countries are spending nearly half their national budgets on debt repayments, it said. Life expectancy in Africa is just under 64 years of age, compared with over 79 years in Europe, it said.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS