World's eight richest people have same wealth as poorest 50% (sponsored by the Gates Foundation)

[muriel_volestrangler]

Ah, the irony! The Guardian's section on global development is sponsored by ...

Inequality and development

Global development is supported by

About this content

World's eight richest people have same wealth as poorest 50%

The world’s eight richest billionaires control the same wealth between them as the poorest half of the globe’s population, according to a charity warning of an ever-increasing and dangerous concentration of wealth.

In a report published to coincide with the start of the week-long World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Oxfam said it was “beyond grotesque” that a handful of rich men headed by the Microsoft founder Bill Gates are worth $426bn (£350bn), equivalent to the wealth of 3.6 billion people.

The development charity called for a new economic model to reverse an inequality trend that it said helped to explain Brexit and Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election.

Oxfam blamed rising inequality on aggressive wage restraint, tax dodging and the squeezing of producers by companies, adding that businesses were too focused on delivering ever-higher returns to wealthy owners and top executives.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/jan/16/worlds-eight-richest-people-have-same-wealth-as-poorest-50

[raccoon]

1. Jesus wept. This is obscene. nt

[Sherman A1]

2. Gee

The are just figuring this out?

Not the brightest crayons in the box.....

[Cryptoad]

3. We are leading the way right here in the USA

Corporate Socialism, Oligarchy

Who Rules America
Wealth, Income, and Power
by G. William Domhoff

This document presents details on the wealth and income distributions in the United States, and explains how we use these two distributions as power indicators. The most striking numbers on income inequality will come last, showing the dramatic change in the ratio of the average CEO's paycheck to that of the average factory worker over the past 40 years.

read more at: http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html

[procon]

4. We're so far past the tipping point of economic equality we might as well

just call ourselves serfs.

[democratisphere]

5. The wealthiest and Wall Street have taken over our government.

Imagine what the weathiest have planned.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

6. It's insane and disgusting.

Peter Turchin has been analyzing civilizations throughout history in a mathematical way, assigning values to all kinds of variables, in an attempt to explain past events objectively.

The best explanations for the downfall of civilizations?
1. Conquered by outside forces.
2. Collapsed from within due to INEQUALITY of resources.

Return of the oppressed
From the Roman Empire to our own Gilded Age, inequality moves in cycles. The future looks like a rough ride
https://aeon.co/essays/history-tells-us-where-the-wealth-gap-leads