World's Richest 1% Own Almost Half Of Global Wealth Says Credit Suisse Report

The 1% Are Absurdly Rich And YOU May Well Be One Of Them

The richest one percent of the world's population own 48% of global wealth.

BUT, before you get too angry at those damned entitled folk in their mega-yachts, this figure may well include you.

According to the Credit Suisse global wealth report, to join the hallowed ranks of the top one per cent would require £500,000 of wealth including home equity.

Being rich may well have lost its meaning slightly in the West

To make the top 10% needs a much more modest £48,280 pounds.

According to figures compiled by the Office for National Statistics in 2012, around 20% of UK households have wealth above £600,000 - more than enough to firmly place themselves in the top one percent.

Further, 79% percent of UK households have wealth totalling more than £40,000 enough to be at the very least nudging into the top 10% of the richest people in the world.

But on a global level, outside of our relatively affluent isles, the inequality gap is staggering, so even if you don't feel particularly rich, count yourself lucky.

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Since 2000 global wealth has doubled to a staggering £163 trillion yet the bottom half of the world's population own less than one percent of it.

Anti-poverty campaigners, Oxfam, said the figures were "more evidence that inequality is extreme and growing, and that economic recovery following the financial crisis has been skewed in favour of the wealthiest".

The charity's head of inequality, Emma Seery, told the Guardian: "In poor countries, rising inequality means the difference between children getting the chance to go to school and sick people getting life saving medicines.

"In the UK, successive governments have failed to get to grips with rising inequality. This report shows that those least able to afford it have paid the price of the financial crisis whilst more wealth has flooded into the coffers of the very richest."

And lets not forget those at the top of the one per cent who actually are obscenely rich.

Earlier this year Oxfam found the richest 85 people in the world - as many people as could fit on a double-decker bus - own as much wealth as the 3.5 billion poorest.

Oxfam executive director Winnie Byanyima said: "It is staggering that in the 21st Century, half of the world’s population – that’s three and a half billion people – own no more than a tiny elite whose numbers could all fit comfortably on a double-decker bus..

“We cannot hope to win the fight against poverty without tackling inequality. Widening inequality is creating a vicious circle where wealth and power are increasingly concentrated in the hands of a few, leaving the rest of us to fight over crumbs from the top table.

“In developed and developing countries alike we are increasingly living in a world where the lowest tax rates, the best health and education and the opportunity to influence are being given not just to the rich but also to their children.

“Without a concerted effort to tackle inequality, the cascade of privilege and of disadvantage will continue down the generations. We will soon live in a world where equality of opportunity is just a dream. In too many countries economic growth already amounts to little more than a ‘winner takes all’ windfall for the richest.”

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