The eight richest men on the planet own as much wealth as the poorest half of the global population, 3,6 billion people. Not only that: the 1% of the wealthiest in the world own as much as the remaining 99%. This is what emerges from the latest report by Oxfam, the British NGO that deals with the social economy, which updates the data on inequality on the occasion of the meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
According to the analysis, continuing at this pace in 25 years the first "trillionaire" will appear on the planet, that is, an individual capable of having more than a trillion dollars.
All this in the face of a global context in which even today one in nine people suffers from hunger and one in 10 lives on less than two dollars a day. To date, seven out of 10 citizens in the world live in a country where inequality has increased significantly in the last 30 years.
On the basis of these data, Oxfam has launched a petition addressed to governments to ask for a series of interventions in favor of a more humane economy. Eight points are solicited: policies to curb the concentration of wealth; stop the downward tax competition; support for business models not only oriented towards maximizing profit; encouragement of technological innovations for the benefit of all; a transition to the use of renewable energy; the promotion of development also on the basis of indicators relating to the well-being of citizens and not only the GDP.
