A global inequality report published by the World Inequality Lab shows that the gap between the richest portion of humanity and the rest continued to widen this year, leaving the top 0.001% (fewer than sixty thousand billionaires) with three times more wealth than the combined wealth of the poorest half of the world's population. The global wealth gap has become so alarming, and its impact on economies and democratic institutions so corrosive, that policymakers should treat it as an emergency, argues the third World Inequality Report, an exhaustive analysis based on the work of hundreds of academics worldwide. 'The poorest have made modest progress, but this is eclipsed by extraordinary accumulation at the top.' 'The result — the report adds — is a world in which a small minority possesses unprecedented financial power, while billions of people remain excluded even from basic economic stability.' The report comes as the world's richest and most powerful nation, led by President Donald Trump, abandons international cooperation on climate and taxes and works to increase inequality by cutting domestic and foreign aid programs while delivering huge handouts to the richest Americans. Jayati Ghosh, a member of the G20's High-Level Expert Group on Global Inequality and a co-author of the new report's foreword, said in a statement that 'we live in a system where resources extracted from labor and nature in low-income countries continue to sustain the prosperity and unsustainable lifestyles of people in high-income economies and the rich elites in all countries.' 'These patterns are not accidents of the market,' Ghosh stated. 'They are the result of political and institutional decisions.' 'The decisions we make in the coming years — says the World Inequality Report 2026 — will determine whether the global economy continues on a path of extreme concentration or moves towards shared prosperity.' According to the latest data, the top 10% of the world's population owns three-quarters of the world's wealth and captures more income than the rest of humanity combined. 'Ricardo Gómez-Carrera, a researcher at the Lab, is the lead author of the report. 'Inequality has long been a hallmark of the world economy, but by 2025 it will have reached levels that demand urgent attention,' the new report notes. In most countries, it is rare for the poorest 50% to control more than five percent of national wealth. 'This concentration is not only persistent but is also accelerating,' the report observes. 'The benefits of globalization and economic growth have disproportionately benefited a small minority, while a large part of the world's population still struggles to achieve stable livelihoods.' 'They reflect the legacy of history and the functioning of institutions, regulations, and policies, all of which are linked to unequal power relations that have not yet been rebalanced.' To reverse the decades-long trend of the explosive rise in inequality, the political will will be needed to seek obvious solutions, including fair taxation for the mega-rich and bold investments in social programs and climate actions, which are disproportionately driven by the rich. Since the 1990s, the wealth of billionaires and centi-millionaires has grown by about eight percent annually, almost double the rate experienced by the poorest half of the population. These gaps are not inevitable.
