According to the Institute for Policy Studies, the combined wealth of the top 12 US billionaires recently exploded to more than a trillion dollars (yes, 13 figures).
This is undoubtedly a staggering figure, and it is even more so in light of the recent economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
"Too much economic and political power in the hands of twelve people"
"This represents a disturbing milestone in US history of concentrated wealth and power," said Chuck Collins, director of the Washington DC-based progressive think tank.
“This is simply too much economic and political power in the hands of twelve people. From the point of view of a self-governing democratic society, this condition represents an oligarchy of 12 people ”.
Since the pandemic exploded in the United States in March, the total wealth of the "12 oligarchs" group has soared by 40%, an increase of $ 283 billion.
Le Tesla shares by Elon Musk was the largest beneficiary, seeing its capitalization tripled to $ 73 billion. And that huge figure doesn't even include the ferocious Tesla stock rally earlier this week, which propelled Musk to fourth place on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
"The total wealth of the 12 oligarchs is greater than the GDP of Belgium and Austria combined," said Omar Ocampo, researcher with the IPS program on inequality and the common good. "Meanwhile, tens of millions of Americans are unemployed or living for the day, and 170.000 people have died from COVID-19 in the United States."
The rich are getting richer
Even the top twelve billionaires in the United States have faced a bad start this year, like anyone, with the group's collective wealth dropping nearly $ 100 billion from January 1 to March 18.
But it didn't take long for their net worth to pick up and exceed their September 2019 levels, with the exception of billionaire Warren Buffett BRK.A who is still a couple billion below a year ago. But luck hasn't just smiled at Bezos and the others lately.
According to a study by the Economic Policy Institute cited by the Washington Post, pay for the role of CEO, overall, has risen to the highest level in seven years in 2019, and is set to rise again in 2020.
In fact, analysts found that the CEO-to-worker wage ratio of America's 350 largest companies increased by 320: 1.
Meanwhile, many on the "Oligarch" list continue to be on an unstoppable upward trend, with Amazon AMZN, Alphabet GOOG, Tesla and Microsoft MSFT all in green.
