“It seems like we are living in a dystopian movie, like we are at the dawn of a decade of great divides, with billions of people bearing the weight of epidemics, inflation, wars, and a handful of super-rich multiplying their fortunes at paroxysmal rates ”. This was said by Amitabh Behar, executive director of Oxfam, commenting on the results of the recent report drawn up by the NGO on the topic of inequalities, a document which already from its title – Power at the service of a few – suggests the gravity of the situation.
“We are at a crossroads: between an era of uncontrolled oligarchic supremacy or an era in which public power regains centrality by promoting fairer and more cohesive societies and a more just and inclusive economy,” writes Oxfam.
The relationship contains a long list of data on increasing inequalities in the world and in Italy. For example, in the last three years the assets of the five richest men on the planet have doubled (from 405 to 869 billion dollars), growing at a rate of 14 million dollars per hour. Over the same period of time, there was no increase for the 5 billion poorest people.
At this rate, according to the NGO, it would take over two centuries (230 years) to bring the incidence of global poverty below 1%. On the other hand, within a decade we could have the first trillionaire man in the history of humanity.
Inequalities are also sharply increasing in Italy. As emerged from a recent paper by the Bank of Italy, in our country the 5% of the richest families own 46% of the wealth, while the poorest 50% of families hold only 8%.
According to Oxfam, from the beginning of the pandemic until November 2023 the number of Italian billionaires increased by 27 units (going from 36 to 63) and the value of billionaire assets (equal to 217.6 billion dollars at the end of November 2023 ) grew in real terms by over 68 billion dollars (+46%).
On the other hand, poverty has an increasingly high incidence. Istat calculates that at the end of 2022 almost 2.2 million families, for a total of 5.6 million individuals, were in conditions of absolute poverty, i.e. they did not have sufficient monthly resources to purchase a basket of essential goods and services to live in dignified conditions.
The incidence of poverty at the family level went from 7.7% to 8.3% between 2021 and 2022, while individual poverty grew from 9.1% to 9.7%.
“The reduction of inequalities represents a theme to which no government, rhetoric aside, has so far given centrality for action,” we read in the Oxfam report.
“The Meloni Government is no exception and its first year was characterized by labor policies incapable of reducing the phenomenon of working poverty, by a tax reform that reduces the fairness and efficiency of the Italian tax system and by the abandonment of 'universalistic approach to the fight against poverty in the name of a categorical vision and in favor of interventions which, far from correcting the well-known critical issues of citizenship income, dry up the minimum income scheme, denying dignity and hope to too many.'
To combat the growing inequalities in Italy, the NGO suggests some interventions, including the introduction of the legal minimum wage and a progressive tax on large assets and a vigorous fight against tax evasion.
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