(16 Jan 2017) The gap between the super-rich and the poorest half of the global population is even more stark than previously thought with just eight men, from Bill Gates to Mike Bloomberg, owning as much wealth as 3.6 billion people, according to a new Oxfam analysis on Monday.
Presenting its findings on the dawn of the annual gathering of the global political and business elites in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, Oxfam says the gap between rich and poor is much greater than it thought just a year ago and is urging leaders to do more than pay lip-service to the problem.
If not, it is warning that the public anger against these types of inequality will ratchet even higher and lead to even more seismic political changes akin to last year's victory by Donald Trump to be the next US president and Britain's vote to leave the European Union.
"Inequality is definitely getting worse in a lot of countries and you're seeing the super rich in particular move away from the rest society and that's really harmful," said Max Lawson, Oxfam's policy adviser.
"We need to see that money is spent on schools and not on more super-yachts," he added.
Last year's equivalent report showed that the richest 62 people on the planet owned as much wealth as the bottom half of the population.
However, Oxfam has revised that figure down to eight following new information, particularly related to China and India, accumulated by Swiss bank Credit Suisse.
Oxfam used Forbes' billionaires list that was last published in March 2016 to make its headline claim.
According to the Forbes list, Microsoft founder Gates is the richest man on the planet with net worth of 75 billion US dollars.
The others, in order of ranking, are Amancio Ortega, the Spanish founder of fashion house Inditex; financier Warren Buffett, Mexican business magnate Carlos Slim; Amazon boss Jeff Bezos; Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg; Oracle's Larry Ellison, and Bloomberg, the former Mayor of New York.
Oxfam laid out a series of measures that it hopes will be enacted to help narrow the divide and reduce the raw public anger that many say lies behind the surprise successes of both Trump and those backing Brexit.
Measures that should be pursued include higher taxes on both wealth and income to ensure a more level playing field and to fund much-needed investments in public services and jobs, greater international cooperation by governments on ensuring workers are paid decent wages and the rich don't dodge their taxes.
And business leaders should commit to paying their fair share of taxes and to pay a living wage.
Max Lawson urged billionaires to "do the right thing," and to do "what Bill Gates has called on them to do, which is pay their taxes."
The ability of the rich to move their money around the world and avoid paying their fair share of taxes was further exposed last year in the leak of the so-called "Panama Papers," which revealed details of offshore accounts that helped rich foreigners shelter their wealth.
"We have a situation where billionaires are paying less tax often than their cleaner or their secretary," Lawson said. "That's crazy."

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