The world’s eight richest billionaires control the same wealth between them as the poorest half of the globe’s population, according to a charity warning of an ever-increasing and dangerous concentration of wealth.
In a report published to coincide with the start of the week-long World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Oxfam said it was “beyond grotesque” that a handful of rich men headed by the Microsoft founder Bill Gates are worth $426bn (£350bn), equivalent to the wealth of 3.6 billion people.
Oxfam blamed rising inequality on aggressive wage restraint, tax dodging and the squeezing of producers by companies, adding that businesses were too focused on delivering ever-higher returns to wealthy owners and top executives.
The World Economic Forum (WEF) said last week that rising inequality and social polarisation posed two of the biggest risks to the global economy in 2017 and could result in the rolling back of globalisation.
Mark Goldring, chief executive of Oxfam GB, said: “This year’s snapshot of inequality is clearer, more accurate and more shocking than ever before. It is beyond grotesque that a group of men who could easily fit in a single golf buggy own more than the poorest half of humanity.
“While one in nine people on the planet will go to bed hungry tonight, a small handful of billionaires have so much wealth they would need several lifetimes to spend it. The fact that a super-rich elite are able to prosper at the expense of the rest of us at home and overseas shows how warped our economy has become.”
Oxfam called for fundamental change to ensure that economies worked for everyone, not just “a privileged few”.
Source - Guardian/NY Times
This is the important part. They aren't advocating for taking away from the rich and passing it around to the more needy. They are saying that we need to change the way our economy works so that everyone gets a chance to prosper.
Not all of us are created equal in terms of brain power, talents, strengths, desires, goals, dreams, opportunity.... It's not that people are lazy. Most people take pride in what they do. But most of us aren't geared toward being Bill Gates or Warren Buffet types. Everyone has something valuable to contribute and deserves a chance to operate on a more level playing field.
