By Roberto Morejón

In a world where billions of people are facing the effects of war, climate change crises, inflation, and other fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic, the details of economic and social disparity are bitter.
 
The five wealthiest men on the planet doubled their fortunes since 2020 while the poorest 60 percent lost money, in the midst of a sharp concentration of power.
 
According to the non-governmental organization Oxfam, the combined wealth of the wealthiest quintet increased 114 percent since 2020.
 
In the same period, the 4.77 billion poorest people lost 0.2 percent of their resources in real terms.
 
And in the face of the omnipresent inflation, the wealthiest do not even feel it because their financial holdings grew faster.
 
On this path of increasing disparities, poverty in all latitudes will not be eradicated before 230 years, stated the NGO report, which, with regret, refers to how many powerful people refuse to redistribute wealth among workers and society.
 
Of course, the wealthiest men are not far removed from the concentration of power and authority in big business.
 
The wealth of data on inequality made its way to the Davos Economic Forum in the Swiss Alps, where a large part of those gathered belong to the business and banking elites.
 
Not a few of them squeeze workers with meager wages, evade taxes, applaud privatizing state governments and contribute their share to global warming.
 
So, as Oxfam's statistics reflect, the pandemic not only brought death and ill health but also put an end to insufficient progress against poverty.
 
As the NGO, experts and countries of the global South point out, in the face of the pronounced inequalities, renovating actions are needed, where public services gain oxygen instead of being crushed by the ultra-liberals.
 
The excessive expansion of large companies must be regulated and the most ostentatious must increase the payment of taxes on wealth and excessive profits.  
 
The value of labor must not be neutralized in the face of the increase of capital in a few hands and the unbridled power of corporations and monopolies.
 
Growing global economic inequality perpetuates poverty, hunger and social exclusion.