{
  "id": 6248660,
  "title": "Extreme inequality is not a given. It is a political choice.",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/08/extreme-inequality-is-not-a-given-it-is-a-political-choice",
  "topic": "finance",
  "section": "Finance & Markets",
  "published": "2026-09-08T07:03:34.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Africa Business",
    "slug": "africa-business",
    "url": "https://african.business/2026/09/long-reads/extreme-inequality-is-not-a-given-it-is-a-political-choice"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Extreme inequality is not an inevitable outcome of modern economies, nor is it a necessary compromise for economic performance. Instead, it stems directly from political decisions concerning taxation, labor markets, public investment, and economic rules. For decades, many of these choices have eroded workers' power, enabled corporations and the ultra-rich to exploit tax loopholes, and diminished public investment. As the chair of the G20 Extraordinary Committee of Independent Experts on Global Inequality, I have spent the past year collaborating with leading economists and experts to analyze the state of global inequality. Our research reveals a crisis of both significant scale and alarming trajectory. A global panel dedicated to studying inequality, similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is the committee's formal proposal. This panel would produce regular, scientifically robust assessments of inequality's magnitude, changes, origins, impacts, and successes and failures worldwide. This information would be invaluable to policymakers, governments, and multilateral agencies working to reduce inequality. Statistics illustrate the extent of the problem: since 2000, 41% of all wealth created has gone to the top 1%, while the poorest half of humanity received only 1%. Consequently, some individuals control vast fortunes, while others, two billion people, regularly go hungry. Inequality not only harms economic performance but also poses a direct threat to democracy. Wealthy individuals can afford luxurious possessions, but more significantly, they can disproportionately influence decisions and shape political agendas. Across the globe, corporations and wealthy elites wield excessive influence, shaping laws, regulations, and economic policies to their advantage. Furthermore, wealth inequality controls access to information and shapes public opinion. Six ultra-wealthy individuals control nine of the world's ten largest social media platforms, while half of the global media landscape is owned by billionaires. This strips societies of their public squares and corrodes our political systems. Extreme inequality is a deliberate choice made by governments, and it can be reversed through policy changes. The first step is to accurately track the inequality crisis with scientific precision, and the proposed International Panel on Inequality (IPI) would accomplish this. Despite extensive research, there remains a lack of consensus on how inequality varies within and between countries, what causes it, and its consequences. Moreover, there is a lack of consensus on how inequality affects race, class, and gender, and which policies can help mitigate it. Different policies can have varying distributional effects, so governments need to understand these consequences before making decisions. Africa plays a crucial role in this fight against inequality. In 2024, the African Union set a goal to reduce continental inequality by 15% over the next decade. Nearly half of the world's 50 most unequal countries are in Africa, and just four men hold more wealth than half the continent's population combined. However, this challenge also reflects a collective commitment to building a fairer, more prosperous future for all Africans. The African Union has unanimously supported the IPI proposal, and the founding governments will convene world leaders at the UN General Assembly in February to discuss the proposal. African leaders have a crucial opportunity to lead the global fight against extreme inequality by championing the rapid establishment of an IPI.",
  "summary": "An International Panel on Inequality would produce rigorous assessments of the magnitudes and changes in inequality, writes Joseph Stiglitz.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": "Establishing an international panel to track inequality with scientific precision would equip policymakers with critical information to make informed decisions and reverse extreme inequality, a problem that harms economic performance and democracy.",
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}