Billionaires triple their wealth and their power “threatens democracies,” according to Oxfam

The organization's report, released to coincide with the World Economic Forum in Davos, warns about the extreme concentration of capital.

Representació visual de la desigualtat econòmica global i la concentració de riquesa en poques mans.

Representació visual de la desigualtat econòmica global i la concentració de riquesa en poques mans.

The Oxfam Intermón organization published a report this Monday, coinciding with the Davos Forum, warning that billionaires' wealth has tripled since 2020, jeopardizing global democracy.

The investigation, titled Against the Empire of the Richest. Defending Democracy Against the Power of Billionaires, analyzes how the “extreme” concentration of wealth leads to “growing” political power, allowing these elites to “shape the rules” of the economy for their own benefit. Last year, growth exceeded 16%, three times faster than the annual average of the last five years.
Since 2020, the combined wealth of these billionaires has increased by 81%. In Spain, last year 33 billionaires accumulated more wealth than 39% of the country's population. Meanwhile, almost half of the world's population lives in poverty, with less than 8.3 dollars per day.

"The extreme concentration of wealth and the use of economic power as political power is no longer invisible or a public secret: it happens with total impunity, before our eyes and live."

Franc Cortada · Director of Oxfam Intermón
The report notes that the intensification of billionaire wealth concentration “coincides” with the mandate of United States President Donald Trump. The entity stresses that Trump has “cut taxes for the super-rich,” blocked advances in international taxation, and boosted the stock value of sectors like Artificial Intelligence, generating profits almost exclusively for the ultra-wealthy.
In 2025, for the first time, the number of billionaires exceeds 3,000, while the richest, Elon Musk, became the first person to surpass the 500 billion dollar threshold. The combined wealth of billionaires increased by 2.5 trillion dollars last year, a figure that practically equals the wealth owned by the poorest half of the planet.
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