Chennai: Indian billionaires’ riches grew by Rs 2,200 crore, every day, while the poor continued to become poorer.
The growing divide between the rich and poor was supplemented with statistics in India’s expenditure on public health can improve by 50 per cent if the rich increase their tax by 0.5 per cent, a report has said.
Released by Oxfam, the report titled ‘Public Good or Private Wealth’, said, “If only one per cent of the richest people in India increased their tax by just 0.5 per cent then they could raise enough money to increase government spending on health by 50 per cent.”
“It reveals how governments are exacerbating inequality by under-funding public services, such as healthcare and education, on the one hand, while under taxing corporations and the wealthy, and failing to clamp down on tax dodging, on the other,” it noted.
The report said while the wealth of top one per cent in India increased by 39 per cent, the wealth of bottom 50 per cent increased at only three per cent.
It stated that billionaires have enjoyed a tax cut dramatically and stated that the top rate of personal income tax in rich countries fell from 62 per cent in 1970 to just 38 per cent in 2013. The average rate in poor countries is just 28 per cent.
Most importantly, India’s combined revenue and capital expenditure of the Centre and State for Medical and Public Health, Sanitation and Water Supply is Rs 2,08,166 crore, less than the wealth of India’s richest billionaire, it stated.
Oxfam said that it compiled its report after gathering data from various sources. While the share of wealth owned by the poorest half of humanity come from Credit Suisse Wealth Databook and relate to the period June 2017-June 2018.
Figures on the very richest in society are based on more detailed data from the Annual Forbes ‘Billionaires List’ and relates to the period March 2017-March 2018.