Oxfam tells Davos: Time to tax growing billionaire club

DAVOS, Switzerland - The Covid pandemic has created a new billionaire every 30 hours and now one million people could fall into extreme poverty at the same pace, Oxfam said Monday as the Davos summit returns.

The international charity said it was time to tax the rich to support the less fortunate as the global elite gathered at the Swiss mountain haven for the World Economic Forum after a two-year Covid-induced absence.

Oxfam said it expects 263 million people to sink into extreme poverty this year, at a rate of one million every 33 hours, as soaring inflation has added a cost-of-living crisis on top of Covid.

By comparison, 573 people became billionaires during the pandemic, or one every 30 hours.

"Billionaires are arriving in Davos to celebrate an incredible surge in their fortunes," Oxfam executive director Gabriela Bucher said in a statement.

"The pandemic and now the steep increases in food and energy prices have, simply put, been a bonanza for them," Bucher said.

"Meanwhile, decades of progress on extreme poverty are now in reverse and millions of people are facing impossible rises in the cost of simply staying alive," she said.

Oxfam called for a one-off "solidarity tax" on billionaires' pandemic windfall to support people facing soaring prices as well as fund a "fair and sustainable recovery" from the pandemic.

It also said it was time to "end crisis profiteering" by rolling out a "temporary excess profit tax" of 90 percent on windfall profits of big corporations.

Oxfam added that an annual wealth tax on millionaires of two percent, and five percent for billionaires, could generate $2.52 trillion a year.

Such a wealth tax would help lift 2.3 billion people out of poverty, make enough vaccines for the world and pay for universal health care for people in poorer countries, it said.

Oxfam based its calculations on the Forbes list of billionaires and World Bank data.

Agence France-Presse

More than 200 groups urge G20 to back IMF issuance to help poor countries in pandemic

WASHINGTON - Jubilee USA Network, Oxfam and 215 other civil society groups on Wednesday urged Group of 20 finance officials to back an issuance of $3 trillion of the IMF's own currency, or Special Drawing Rights, to help countries weather the COVID-19 pandemic.

In an open letter to the International Monetary Fund and G20 finance ministers, the groups said a new allocation of SDRs would boost the reserves of all countries and avoid pushing low- and middle-income countries further into debt distress.

G20 finance ministers and central bankers will discuss a possible SDR issuance - a move akin to a central bank printing money - when they meet by video conference on Friday. Proponents note that such a move will not add cost for the IMF members.

Italy, which leads the G20 this year, is pushing for a smaller $500 billion allocation of SDRs, which can be converted to hard currency by IMF members - a move backed by France, Germany and others, but still lacking support from Washington.

The United States had opposed such a move under former President Donald Trump, but has not yet communicated a firm position on a new SDR allocation under President Joe Biden.

Treasury has declined to comment on the issue.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva on Wednesday also called for the G20 to take strong policy action to reverse a "dangerous divergence" that she said threatened to leave most developing economies languishing for years.

In a blog ahead of Friday's meeting, Georgieva said a new SDR allocation would substantially boost countries' liquidity without increasing their debt burdens. It would also expand the capacity of donor countries to provide new resources, she said.

Religious groups have also weighed in. On Tuesday, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and Jubilee USA Network urged President Joe Biden to back a $3 trillion allocation to help poor countries bolster US trade with the developing world.

Anti-poverty group ONE on Wednesday backed an allocation of $650 billion.

-reuters