Rich became richer in the COVID pandemic
A report released by Oxfam International, a UK-based charity, said the pandemic hurt people living in poverty more than the rich. The most severely affected are women, Black people, African-descendants, Indigenous peoples, and historically marginalised and oppressed communities around the world, the report said.
To put that income inequality in perspective, a report by Swiss Bank UBS, found that the world’s richest people got $3.9 trillion richer between March and December 2020. The 10 richest billionaires made $540bn during this time.
Many of the world’s richest men, including
1: Elon Musk (US),
2: Zhong Shanshan (China) and
3: Mukesh Ambani (India),
saw their wealth more than double since the pandemic was declared.
Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani (Before COVID : USD 37bn and After COVID USD 76bn)
Wikipedia: Mukesh Dhirubhai Ambani (born 19 April 1957) is an Indian billionaire businessman, and the chairman, managing director, and largest shareholder of Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL), a Fortune Global 500 company and India’s most valuable company by market value. According to Bloomberg Billionaires Index, he is the richest person in Asia with a net worth of US$ 73.0 billion and the 12nd richest person in the world, as of 17th April 2021.
The Covid virus drew a greater divide between the rich and the poor. Statistically, an unskilled worker would take a whopping 10,000 years to make as much money as Reliance Industries’ Mukesh Ambani made in an hour during the pandemic. Further, it would take the same person three years to make what one of Asia’s richest men Mukesh Ambani made in a second, according to Oxfam’s latest report ‘The Inequality Virus’. Moreover, Mukesh Ambani’s pandemic earnings would keep the 40 crore informal workers, who are at risk of falling into poverty due to Covid, above the poverty line for at least five months.
Along with Mukesh Ambani, the tribe of overall 100 billionaires in India saw nearly Rs 13 lakh crore jump in wealth since March 2020, which is “enough to give every one of the 138 million (nearly 14 crore) poorest Indian people a cheque for Rs 94,045 each,” Oxfam said in the statement citing the report. While the report usually focused on the growing inequality between the rich and the poor in its past editions, this year it was Covid-centric
Zhong Shanshan
Wikipedia: Zhong Shanshan (Chinese: 钟睒睒; pinyin: Zhōng Shǎnshǎn, born December 1954) is a Chinese billionaire businessman. He is the founder and chairperson of the Nongfu Spring beverage company, and the majority owner of Beijing Wantai Biological Pharmacy Enterprise.
He is also the chairman of Beijing Watai Biological Pharmcy Enterprise, the maker of vaccine and hepatitis test kits. A school dropout, zhong worked as a construction worker, a newspaper reporter and a beverage sale agent before starting his own business.
Elon Reeve Musk
Elon Reeve Musk is a business magnate, industrial designer, and engineer.[3] He is the founder, CEO, CTO, and chief designer of SpaceX; early stage investor,[b] CEO, and product architect of Tesla, Inc.; founder of The Boring Company; co-founder of Neuralink; and co-founder and initial co-chairman of OpenAI. A centibillionaire, Musk is one of the richest people in the world.
Filed in: Global News
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