05 Jul Reasonable…
Oxfam: The wealth of half the planet belongs to the 62 richest people in the world.
The wealth of 62 has increased by 44% since 2010 as the organization mentions.
The 62 richest people in the world today have such wealth as half the world’s population – about 3.5 billion people – and while they are increasing their wealth, the poor are becoming poorer according to the report of MKO Oxfam.
According to the report, the wealth of the 62 richest people in the world has risen by 44% since 2010, while the wealth of the poorest 3.5 billion people has decreased by 41%.
Almost half the super-rich are from the United States, 17 from Europe, and the rest from countries including China, Brazil, Mexico, Japan and Saudi Arabia.
“We cannot continue to allow hundreds of million people to starve when the resources which could be used to help are absorbed by those who are at the top,” claimed the director of Oxfam International, Winnie Bianima.
It is estimated that approximately $ 7.6 trillion of personal wealth are in offshore tax havens and if the tax was paid on the income produced by this wealth, an amount of $ 190 billion would be available to governments on an annual basis, says Gabriel Zackman, lecturer at the University of California Berkeley.
Referring to the professor’s project, Oxfam said that 30% of all financial wealth of Africa is in offshore accounts, bringing losses of $ 14 billion per year in lost “tax-collections.”
This money would suffice for the health and the care of four million children per year, and to recruit enough teachers to ensure that every African child can go to school, as mentioned in the report of the organization.
“Multinational corporations and the wealthy elite play with different terms the game, refusing to pay taxes that society needs to function. The fact that 188 of the 201 top companies have a presence in at least one tax haven shows that the time has come to act,” said Bianima.
The number of people living in extreme poverty has fallen by 650 million since 1981, despite the fact that the population of the world has increased by 2 million in the same period, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.
The highest percentage of change is due to the rise of China, when half a billion people came out from the extreme poverty.
(This translation is based on the Greek text)
