Oxfam said that the wealth of the poorest 50% dropped by 41% between 2010 and 2015, despite an increase in the global population of 400m. In the same period, the wealth of the richest 62 people increased by $500bn (£350bn) to $1.76tn.
Further, Goldring said: “We need to end the era of tax havens which has allowed rich individuals and multinational companies to avoid their responsibilities to society by hiding ever increasing amounts of money offshore.”
I really think this dangerous development. We are now beyond 1929 wealth gaps. We are developing two economies: “There are two economies: one for the rich, and the other for everyone else.” Just like Thomas Pikkety’s “Capital in the Twentieth Century” confirms it.
In “Wealth, War and Wisdom,” former Morgan Stanley global strategist Barton Biggs saw the “possibility of a breakdown of the civilized infrastructure.” He warned the super rich to get prepared for a post-apocalypse era: “Your safe haven must be self-sufficient and capable of growing some kind of food … well-stocked with seed, fertilizer, canned food, wine, medicine, clothes, etc. Think Swiss Family Robinson.”
Are we heading towards a second storm on the Bastille? We are certainly experience a storm on fortress Europe. People are flooding into Europe as the conditions in other countries must be unbearable. I can not blame them, but the signs are out there that we will enter a new age soon if we do not distribte wealth more equally and start making sure that every human on this planet has access to education, shelter, clean water and enough food.
If we keep ignoring the signs, a second French revolution is in my opinion, inevitable. The storming of the Bastille in 1789 is around the corner.
Just a reminder of the Pentagon’s famous 2003 prediction: “As the planet’s carrying capacity shrinks, an ancient pattern of desperate, all-out wars over food, water, and energy supplies will emerge … warfare will define human life on the planet by 2020.”