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Extreme income inequality has become an "explosive issue" in most contemporary societies.
The New Zealand company Buy Shares on Tuesday published a study holding that the world's five richest families control an accumulated fortune of US$735 billion.
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The study placed the Walton family, which owns Walmart, at the top of its list with a fortune of US$215 billion. They are followed by the Mars family, which owns US$120 billion thanks to its food empire, and the Koch family which reaches third place with US$110 billion.
Behind them are the Al Saud family, whose large oil reserves have generated a fortune of USD95 billion, and India's Ambani, from the Reliance conglomerate, with US$81 billion.
Buy Shares recalled that when the focus is placed on the world's richest, "the growing inequalities" suffered by most of the "great global economies" are also detected.
The #IMF projects that the pandemic “will reverse the progress made since the 1990s in reducing global poverty and will increase inequality.” The pandemic is accelerating processes that were already underway. https://t.co/IplBsMra4s
— Erik Schreiber (@ErikSchreiber5) October 14, 2020
"Inequalities exist because there are regimes that allow market domination and low taxation of capital, especially in the United States," Buy Shares recalled, commenting that extreme income inequality shows that it is necessary to fix capitalism since, in "some jurisdictions", this issue has become an "explosive political issue".
This analysis also confirmed Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, as the richest person in the world, with a fortune of US$189 billion, followed by the Frenchman Bernard Arnault, who is the president of the conglomerate of luxury brands LVMH, with US$119 billion.
On the list of the richest people are also Bill Gates (US$115 billion), Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (US$102 billion), and Tesla adviser Elon Musk (US$93 billion).
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