The world could have its first trillionaire within 10 years if current inequality trends continue, antipoverty group Oxfam International said in a report published Monday, reflecting the increasing gap between the world’s wealthy and poor.
The report’s authors say the world is living through a “decade of division,” pointing out that since 2019, the world’s five wealthiest people have almost doubled their wealth, while nearly 5 billion people have become poorer.
Using data from Forbes, the report’s authors calculated that the combined wealth of those five men - Tesla CEO Elon Musk; Bernard Arnault and his family, who own luxury goods group LVMH; Amazon founder Jeff Bezos; Oracle founder Larry Ellison; and investor Warren Buffett - increased from $453 billion in 2019 to $869 billion as of November 2023. (Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
In their methodology, the authors wrote that if that growth trajectory continues, Musk - the world’s richest person, according to Forbes - is projected to become a trillionaire in fewer than nine years, though they noted that the estimate is subject to uncertainty.
24 янв 2024
