Oxfam report highlights extreme global economic inequality

(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has, yet again, called on leaders and policymakers to tackle rising global economic inequality.

His appeal, that came last week during his visit to the Philippines, to “break the bonds of injustice and oppression which give rise to glaring and indeed scandalous social inequalities” may resonate  in the minds of politicians and businessmen gathering at the World Economic Forum in Davos,  Switzerland, this week. 

It is also flanked by a just-released report by the anti-poverty charity Oxfam, demanding urgent action to narrow the gap between rich and poor.

The report, entitled “Wealth: Having it all and wanting more”  says that - based  on current trends – by next year, 1% of the world’s population will own more wealth than the other 99%.

Deborah Hardoon, the author of the report, told Vatican Radio’s Linda Bordoni that her research shows that the richest people in the world own almost half of the world’s wealth and the trend is growing; she also pointed out that Oxfam’s Executive Director, Winnie Byanyima, is co-chairing the Davos event and will use her role at the Forum to demand changes to the system, to make it more inclusive, more equitable and more sustainable.

Listen to the interview:

Deborah Hardoon explains that last year the Oxfam team came up with data showing that the gap between the world’s richest people and the rest of the world is extreme and that it is widening fast.

She says they looked at the trends around  wealth inequality and found that  “particularly since 2010 the trend shows it is getting much worse. When we looked at the number of billionaires it took to have the same amount of wealth as the bottom of the planet in 2010, we found it took 388 billionaires – already a very small number. You look at that same statistic in 2014,  and you find that it takes just 80 billionaires to have the same wealth as the bottom half of the planet”. 

The top 1% of billionaires – she says – in 2014 has just over 48% of the share of total global wealth, increasing their share over the period of 4 years “and if you project that forward, you find that by 2016 the wealth of that group will be higher than the wealth of everyone else put together” she says, highlighting the fact that the scale of global inequality is staggering.

Hardoon speaks with hope of the fact that Oxfam’s Executive Director is, this year, co-chairing the Davos Forum, and says the organization is going to “take this opportunity to raise the issue to the forefront of the debate and let no one ignore these very stark facts and important figures we are presenting”.  

She also speaks of a precedent, recent report, that spelled out “some really important solutions to the rising of global inequality including things like more progressive taxation, and making sure that those with the income and the wealth pay their fair share”.

Hardoon comments on Pope Francis’ call to tackle inequality which she says is “part of a strong momentum from a lot of voices throughout the world from different societies and different backgrounds; it really shows that this is a universal issue that resonates” with diverse people showing how important this issue is for everybody, something you can also see from the media pick-up today!