Oxfam: The money earned during the pandemic by ten richest men is enough to cover vaccination for the entire population

Oxfam has recently released a report that clearly shows that the global pandemic has not been equally disastrous for everyone with some becoming incredibly rich thanks to the outbreak while others have been plunged into extreme poverty.

In its “The Inequality Virus” report, Oxfam argues that the 10 richest men have amassed enough money during the pandemic to address all the problems facing the world triggered by COVID-19. This mostly refers to technology giants whose incomes soared when the pandemic began mainly due to the reactions of stock markets on witnessing the rise in demand for digital services driven by the outbreak. Amazon’s CEO, Jeff Bezos, who heads the list of the 10 men who have earned the most, gained US$13 billion in just one day in July 2020, setting the absolute record for the largest ever single-day increase in an individual’s wealth. He was able to break this record as a result of the surge in Amazon’s stock price. The Oxfam report estimates that Bezos has earned so much during the pandemic that he could pay each of his 876,000 employees a US$105 000 bonus and he would still have the same amount of money that he had before the pandemic began.

Overall, the 10 richest men have gained an additional US$540 billion during the pandemic. In terms of increases in income, Bezos is followed by Elon Musk, Bernard Arnault, and family who own luxury clothing and cosmetics brands, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Ellison, Warren Buffet, Zhong Shanshan, Larry Page, and Mukesh Ambani. In December 2020 the total wealth of all the world’s billionaires reached US$1,195 billion which is equal to the amount that the governments of G20 (the wealthiest world economies) have earmarked to spend on curbing the impact of COVID-19.

Oxfam points out that the richest have made their fortune in an unfair way and as a result of rebounding stock markets and a rigged economy which only cause an increase in inequalities since many people have lost their jobs and the hope of any income while the poorest have become even poorer. While business giants saw a significant increase in their incomes, the rest of the world has been left to deal with the worst economic crisis since the Second World War which has resulted in a dramatic growth in hunger and poverty.

Oxfam assesses that in 2020 alone 200-500 million more people became poor which means that the pandemic has disrupted the period of steady decline in poverty rates that has been observed for the last 20 years. Furthermore, while 1,000 of the world’s billionaires will need only nine months to fully recover from the ongoing crisis, the world’s poorest will spend 10 years achieving the same result.

Oxfam argues that the global pandemic has served to reveal the huge inequalities between the richest and the poorest and that this issue must be addressed by world governments imposing higher taxes on the first group to make them contribute to international development. According to the authors of publication, they should pay their fair share through progressive tax systems.