Monday, January 17, 2022

Capitalism, an unequal society

 


The pandemic has made the world's wealthiest richer but has led to more people living in poverty, according to the charity Oxfam. The world's 10 richest men have more than doubled their collective fortunes since March 2020

However, lower incomes for the world's poorest contributed to the death of 21,000 people each day. Oxfam's report, which was also based on data from the World Bank, said a lack of access to healthcare, hunger, gender-based violence and climate breakdown contributed to one death every four seconds.


"This year, what's happening is off the scale," Danny Sriskandarajah, Oxfam GB's chief executive, said. "There's been a new billionaire created almost every day during this pandemic, meanwhile 99% of the world's population are worse off because of lockdowns, lower international trade, less international tourism, and as a result of that, 160 million more people have been pushed into poverty."

He added, "Something is deeply flawed with our economic system," he added. "Even during a global crisis our unfair economic systems manage to deliver eye-watering windfalls for the wealthiest but fail to protect the poorest,"


 The world's 10 richest men are Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bernard Arnault and family, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Ballmer and Warren Buffet.

While collectively their wealth grew from $700bn to $1.5tn, there is significant variation between them, with Musk's fortune growing by more than 1,000%, while Gates' rose by a more modest 30%.


Wealth of world's 10 richest men doubled in pandemic, Oxfam says - BBC News

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