The richest 1% of the population in Ireland holds more than a third of the entire Irish financial wealth of the country.
That’s according to Oxfam which also claims that the two richest Irish billionaires possess more wealth than the bottom half of the State’s population.
The organisation is once again repeating its call for the Government to impose taxes on extreme wealth of over €5m.
It says a progressive permanent wealth tax placed on millionaires and billionaires in Ireland could raise €9.2 billion in funding each year.
The closing of tax loopholes could also raise €7.1 billion, it says, referencing a report by the Oireachtas Budget Oversight Committee in 2022.
While it says if the recommendations of the Commission on Taxation and Welfare were implemented, €15 billion could be yielded.
It is also wants the Government to empower regulators, workers and the State to take on businesses that “over reach”.
“It’s time for states to reassert themselves, including the Irish State”, said Bríd McGrath, Director of Public Affairs at Oxfam Ireland.
“We are calling on the Irish Government to properly tax wealth and close the loopholes for tax avoidance.”
“We believe that not one cent of taxpayers´ money should go to errant corporations that don´t take their corporate citizenship seriously – those who abuse their dominant position, don´t pay their workers a living wage, who refuse to reduce carbon emissions – those companies should be outside the fold when it comes to grant aid, tax breaks and any other reliefs at budget time.”
The demands are being made as Oxfam publishes a new report, “Inequality Inc”, timed to coincide with the start of the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, which is attended by the world’s top business and political leaders.
The report, which probes global inequality, finds that since 2020 almost five billion people have been made poorer, while at the same time the five richest men has seen their wealth double.
It also claims that if the current trend continues, the first trillionaire ever will have been created within a decade, but it will be another 229 years before poverty has been eradicated.
“We’re witnessing the beginnings of a decade of division, with billions of people shouldering the economic shockwaves of pandemic, inflation and war, while billionaires’ fortunes boom,” said Oxfam International interim Executive Director Amitabh Behar.
“This inequality is no accident; the billionaire class is ensuring corporations deliver more wealth to them at the expense of everyone else.”
The report also finds that seven out of ten of the world’s biggest corporations have a billionaire as CEO or principal shareholder.
Collectively these firms are worth $10.2 trillion, which is equivalent to more than the combined GDPs of all countries in Africa and Latin America, Oxfam states.
