For those in powerful economic positions, there’s nothing like a good recession as a means to increase wealth. The global economic crash ten years ago saw the number of billionaires increase. For example, in the immediate aftermath of the global recession there were 1,645 billionaires globally as of March 2014, according to CNBC data cited in the Oxfam report, up from 793 in March 2009.
Furthermore, within the last year a large increase in the so-termed ‘super-rich’ had occurred. According to The Guardian, the levels of the super-rich swelled by 30,000 new entrants for the end of 2017, based on recently released analysis.
Based on the definition supplied by research group Wealth-X, the super-rich are categorized as those who can boast more than $30 million in assets. Globally there are 255,810 people who currently fall within this narrow, but powerful, sector of the global population. Taken together this economic elite have an estimated combined wealth if $31.5 trillion, which is around double the GDP of the U.S.
This niche gas grown by 12.9 percent during the past twelve months. In the twelve-months before, the the growth rate of the super-rich was just 3.5 percent. The majority if the new entrants are located in China. A second area of growth is with India where there are 119 billionaires.
The expansion if the very wealthy us not in itself a sign that prosperity is growing for the global majority. This demonstrates again the neo-liberal economic fallacy of trickle-down economics: wages for most people shows no significant change in the real term.
