The combined fortune of 26 of the world's richest people is to the total of the 3.8 billion poorest people. This startling disparity in wealth is according to a from the charity Oxfam. It reported that the global financial in 2008, the number of billionaires in the world has doubled. They are also getting $2.5 billion richer every day. This is in stark to the world's less fortunate - the poorest of the planet is seeing its wealth slowly shrink as prices of increase, wages are squeezed and land and rents rise. Oxfam's report highlights the growing gap between the world's rich and poor and the -widening gap in wealth inequality.
The report says that of the world's mega-wealthy have made their huge from technology companies like Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook. The world's person is Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. His amassed $100 billion fortune is 100 times greater than the health budget of Ethiopia. Oxfam said it was to try and redress the imbalance in wealth. It recommended taxing at fairer levels, increasing tax on personal earnings and profits, and eliminating tax schemes commonly used by companies and the super-rich. It said: "In many countries, a education or quality healthcare has become a only the rich can afford."
