Wealth of Australian billionaires grows $50k-a-minute in 2025
Oxfam analysis reveals the wealth of Australian billionaires will grow by almost $50,000 per minute by 2025.
Oxfam Australia analysis of the Australian Financial Review’s annual rich list, published last week, shows that the 20 richest Australians own more wealth than the bottom three million households.
“There is something fundamentally wrong with a system where extreme wealth is soaring as many people struggle to meet basic needs and governments claim there is not enough money for housing, health, climate action and essential services,” Oxfam Australia CEO Jennifer Tierney said.
Ms Tierney said the changes and negative adjustments to capital gains tax were “modest” but “important steps towards a fairer tax system”.
“While misinformation and misplaced fears about small business and aspirations continue to dominate the debate around these reforms, the reality is that poverty persists while the wealth of the super-rich continues to grow.
“Australia should not continue to reward wealth accumulation more generously than work, especially at a time when many households are under pressure.”
The AFR’s annual rich list shows the gap between Australia’s rich and poor continues to widen. The wealth of Australia’s 200 richest people that the AFR was able to identify or estimate now stands at $707.25 billion, up from $667.8 billion the previous year.
The collective wealth of billionaires in particular increased by the equivalent of $48,973 per minute over the course of the year.
Gina Rinehart topped the list for the seventh consecutive year. The mining giant’s wealth increased by an estimated 2 percent last year, reaching $39.01 billion, according to AFR estimates.
Real estate mogul Harry Triguboff’s empire saw his fortune rise 9 percent to $32.28 billion.
Packaging tycoon Anthony Pratt and his family lost 3 percent of their wealth and ranked third on the rich list.
While the wealth of Ivan Glasenberg, born in South Africa, residing in Switzerland and an Australian citizen, increased by 68 percent to 22.4 billion dollars, Clive Palmer’s fortune decreased by 3 percent and ranked fifth.
There are currently 178 Australian billionaires, according to the AFR list. Seventeen people joined this special group last year. Their collective wealth increased by $25.67 billion in that period.
According to Oxfam’s calculations, this one year of growth could cover the annual grocery bills of three million households, lift one million Australians out of poverty and pay the electricity bill of every home in the country for a year.
“Billionaires’ wealth continues to rise as ordinary Australians continue to feel pressure at the till, at the petrol pump and when paying rent or mortgages,” Ms Tierney said.
“A fairer approach to taxing extreme wealth will help ensure governments can invest appropriately in affordable housing, healthcare, climate action and support for struggling communities both here and abroad.”
