‘15 days of Economics’

Day 9: Why do we hate the rich

There is a huge disparity of wealth in the world with the richest 1% having the same wealth as the rest of the world. Billionaires make up 0.0001% of the population. In 1987 there were 140 billionaires, in 2019 there are 2,153 of them. These people influence so much of the world, in the Chinese parliament 100 members are billionaires.

The first wealthiest people would own empire’s and their wealth would be sourced through goods whilst exploiting workers. This evolved into the next group of tycoons who used continental-scale economies through major coroporations. Now, billionaires experience booms through global scale economies.

It is clear that on a global level, inequality is declining which is driven by the staggering development in poor countries, especially China. There is even inequality between the billionaires themselves. 94% of them own $10 billion or less, 5% own between $10–30billion and 1% are mega billions who own $30billion. The technology industry has made the most mega billionaires.

Many billionaires have not made their fortunes through labour but many through the capital they own. Stocks, patents, copyrights and even likeablility for sportsmen/famous people. However, of people that aren’t billionaires, over 99% make their money through their labour. This is another sign of inequality. The owners of corporations aim to make high profits with the lowest costs and most productivity. This creates inequality as labour workers may lose their jobs to machines. Due to the recent increase in offshore accounts, many of the world’s wealthiest people pay less tax than the less wealthy. This is a major problem for sociery