Wealth Inequality

As the rich and powerful from across the world start filling snow-clad lanes here, a new study said billionaires are 4,000 times more likely to hold any political office than ordinary people, and their wealth jumped three times faster in 2025 than the past-five-year average to a record high of USD 18.3 trillion. In Indian currency, it translates to more than Rs 1,660 lakh crore. Hours before the 56th World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2026 begins in this Swiss ski resort town, rights group Oxfam International released its own annual inequality report to highlight that the ever-deepening wealth divide was also sparking dangerous political inequality. The meeting is being attended by over 3,000 global leaders, including more than 60 heads of state or government, as part of an over 400-strong political leadership presence in this small town in the Alps. Oxfam International said the billionaire wealth jumped by over 16 per cent in 2025, while it has increased by 81 per cent since ...

The study warns that global inequality has reached "emergency levels," putting democracy, economic stability, and climate progress at risk

A new report shows India's 2,000 richest individuals control ₹100 trillion in wealth, 93 per cent of which is tied to listed company stakes, led by top business houses

Many countries are bouncing back from the COVID-19 pandemic, but the poorest are not and a significant number are seeing conditions deteriorating, a report from the UN Development Progamme said on Wednesday. Achim Steiner, head of the agency, said that after two decades during which rich and poor countries were coming closer in terms of development, the finding is a very strong warning signal that nations are now drifting apart. The Human Development Index that the agency has produced since 1990 is projected to reach record highs in 2023 after steep declines during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021. But development in half of the world's poorest countries remains below 2019 pre-pandemic levels, the report said. It's a rich person's versus a poor person's world in which we are seeing development unfolding in very unequal, partially incomplete ways, Steiner said at a news conference. Why does this matter? Not only because it creates more vulnerability, it creates also more misery a

India on Thursday announced here a new alliance for global good, gender equity and equality, on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, with the WEF Founder and Chairman Klaus Schwab offering to partner this initiative with full support. The announcement was made at an India Reception on the sidelines of the WEF Annual Meeting, hosted by apex industry chamber CII and attended by union ministers Smriti Irani and Hardeep Singh Puri as well as WEF Founder and Executive Chairman Klaus Schwab, among others. The idea of this alliance emerged from the G20 Leaders' Declaration and India's abiding commitment to the cause of women-led development as propounded by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani said. As a follow-up to the activities of the Engagement Group and initiatives under the G20 framework, the Business 20, Women 20 and G20 EMPOWER, this alliance aims to take forward the commitments of the G20 leaders for the benefit of t

The weakness of lower-growth states in manufacturing and services needs to be corrected

India has emerged among top countries with high income and wealth inequality but the share of the population living in multidimensional poverty fell from 25 to 15 per cent between 2015-16 and 2019-21, the UNDP said in a new report. The 2024 Asia-Pacific Human Development Report, launched on Monday, paints a qualified picture of long-term progress but also persistent disparity and widespread disruption, foreseeing a turbulent development landscape and urgently calling for new directions to boost human development. In India, between 2000 and 2022, per capita income soared from USD 442 to USD 2,389. Whereas, between 2004 and 2019, poverty rates (based on the international poverty measure of USD 2.15 per day) plummeted from 40 to 10 per cent. Titled Making our Future: New Directions for Human Development in Asia and the Pacific', the new report argues that unmet aspirations, heightened human insecurity, and a potentially more turbulent future create an urgent need for change. Moreover,

Oxfam study points to sharpening inequality

As the world population grows, it is also getting wealthier. If the resources of our planet are limited, how is this possible?

4% tax on the wealth can fund mid-day meal for 17 years

Brazil's rich boosted their share by 2.7% last year to make up almost 50% of the nation's wealth

The 11 per cent growth in financial wealth was at par with the compounded annual growth rate for the five years to 2020, the report by BCG said

The affluent cities of Mumbai and Pune account for almost 30% of Maharashtra state's active cases while housing 14% of its population

Antonio Guterres calls out 'lies that free markets can deliver health care for all, fiction that unpaid care work is not work'

The classical liberal order is under threat from 'woke' progressives

The report flagged that global inequality is shockingly entrenched and vast and the number of billionaires has doubled in the last decade, despite their combined wealth having declined last year

In its "Time to Care" report, Oxfam said it estimated that unpaid care work by women added at least $10.8 trillion a year in value to the world economy - three times more than the tech industry

Inequality between the very richest and the rest correlates with greater innovation. But we mustn't let the top level become a closed shop

In Scotland and across southern England, the wealth gap has narrowed during the past decade

At present, two models to limit excessive inequality exist: The social democracies in Europe and the Chinese model of democracy within the ruling communist party but no adult franchise