A new report says that the world’s richest billionaires have doubled their wealth during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since the pandemic began in early 2020, billionaires have more than doubled their wealth. This has made inequality a reality. “outrageous”Levels, according to anti poverty charity Oxfam.
“The gap between the rich and the poor was increasing even before the pandemic started,”Irit Tamir is director of Oxfam’s private sector development. CBS News.. “But the pandemic supercharged this in a whole host of ways.”
The world’s 10 richest people are Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bernard Arnault, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Ballmer and Warren Buffet, according to Forbes.
“This year, what’s happening is off the scale,”Danny Sriskandarajah is Oxfam Great Britain’s chief Executive. He made the statement in a statement to The Guardian.BBC.
“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 said.
The billionaires saw their wealth double, from $700 billion to $1.5 trillion, during the pandemic, CBS News reported. They earned about $15,000 per second, Oxfam said.
“Sriskandarajah said to BBC, “Something is deeply flawed in our economic system.”
Oxfam’s report generally comes before the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, however, for the second year in a row, the meeting will be held online due to the pandemic, the BBC reported.