The share of wealth held by billionaires globally rose to record highs during the emergency Covid-19, at least according to what the World Inequality Lab founded by the French economist Thomas Picketty.
Circa 2750 ultra-rich they control the 3,5% of the wealth overall, a percentage that has had its significant growth (+ 1%) from 1995 to today in the period following the outbreak of the pandemic. With an increase in inequalities and difficulties, which proved to be even more marked in developing countries than in advanced ones. In many parts of the world, the richest 10% control 60 to 80% of total wealth.
However, the report makes some important distinctions geographic. Latin America and the Half East are the areas where 10% of the population holds over 75% of the total wealth. Not far away we find Russia and sub-Saharan Africa. A glimmer of hope comes from our Europe, which is affirming itself as the most equitable region on a global level: in fact, here the revenues of the less affluent segment of the population are higher than in any other part of the world.
Lucas Chancel, one of the authors of the study, pointed out that in 2020, pandemic year, the wealth of the richest has grown by 3600 billion euros, an amount equal to that spent by governments around the world to deal with the contagion. And all this while many ended up in extreme poverty precisely because of the ongoing health crisis.
What contained the increase in inequalities social in Old Continent, according to the research, it was the fiscal policies put in place to support the work. An indispensable weapon available to governments around the planet, to prevent the pandemic from turning into a greedy business for billionaires at the expense of the lower and middle social classes.