In 2025, the wealth of billionaires worldwide grew three times faster than the average of the past five years, reaching a historic record of $18.3 trillion globally. Paradoxically, this growth coincides with a world in which nearly half of the population lives on less than $8.30 a day and more than a quarter faces food insecurity. Extreme wealth concentration is part of the troubling reality highlighted in Oxfam’s recent report, “Resisting the Rule of the Rich: Defending Freedom Against Billionaire Power,” published on the occasion of the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The report argues that the concentration of wealth recorded over the past decade has reached unimaginable levels: for the first time last year, the number of billionaires surpassed 3,000. This excessive accumulation portrays the past five years as the “decade of billionaires,” a situation in which economic power accumulates without limits while equality of rights becomes a fiction. The debate is no longer about how much inequality is morally acceptable, but whether democracies can survive when a small group of individuals with ever-growing fortunes use their economic power to buy elections, influence decisions, or finance political campaigns.
This connection between economic power and political power finds theoretical grounding in the reflections of philosopher and economist Ingrid Robeyns, who warns that political equality cannot survive in a world of unlimited economic power because, beyond a certain point, private wealth becomes morally unjustifiable and politically dangerous. In this sense, democracies take on a merely decorative character: political power is transferred to elites who are not held accountable, as wealth accumulation surpasses an ethical threshold beyond which it no longer contributes to individual well-being and instead begins to erode the well-being of the majority.
Latin America is not immune to this reality. According to Oxfam, the wealth of billionaires in the region grew 16 times faster than the regional economy over the past year. The region’s 109 billionaires now hold nearly $622 billion—an amount comparable to the combined GDP of Chile and Peru. Since 2000, that wealth has increased by 443%, revealing not only growth but a structural trend toward concentration. Why should this situation concern us?
One reason lies at the opposite extreme of this unjust concentration: the region’s persistent rates of poverty and inequality. Despite progress in this area, Latin America remains one of the most unequal regions in the world and still records high levels of poverty, with 162 million people living in this condition. Part of the explanation lies in insufficient public resources to finance health care, education, social protection, and care systems that guarantee gratuity, quality, and universality. Faced with recurring fiscal deficits, states opt for austerity and debt as though there were no alternative.
The reality is quite different. In most countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, tax systems operate by preserving the privileges of a few while tightening the belts of the majority: they collect less from those who have the most and more from those who have the least. The figures are clear: while the poorest 50% contribute 45% of their income in taxes, the richest 1% contribute less than 20%. The result is states with limited redistributive capacity.
Secondly, contrary to voices that praise meritocracy as the engine of progress, more than half of the region’s super-rich inherited their fortunes, in whole or in part—well above the global average. Inequality thus ceases to be a snapshot of the present and becomes a structure reproduced generation after generation. What mechanisms reinforce this situation?
The report highlights a fact that demands particular attention and returns to the central hypothesis of this article: the link between the excessive accumulation of elites and the deterioration of democracies is becoming increasingly evident. Globally, billionaires are 4,000 times more likely to hold political office than an ordinary citizen. In Latin America, at least 16 presidents in 11 countries came to power after leading large corporations. This is not an anecdote; it is a symptom. The revolving door between business and politics transforms democratic competition into a race with an unequal starting line. Sixty-five percent of Latin American billionaires’ wealth is concentrated in strategic sectors—finance, telecommunications, energy, and media—highly dependent on state regulation and proximity to political power. Where the market intertwines with the state, the boundary between public interest and private privilege becomes blurred.
Finally, extreme concentration of wealth and power is not exclusive to one region. The rise of oligarchies negatively impacts societies everywhere. The recent experience of the United States, with policies favorable to the super-rich and the weakening of antitrust regulations, shows the extent to which policymaking can be captured. When decisions that affect the majority respond to particular interests, democracy loses its meaning. It is therefore unsurprising that nearly half of respondents in the World Values Survey believe that the rich buy elections in their countries. It is clear that extreme wealth concentration is incompatible with robust democracies.
The outcome of this story can be different if decisive action is taken to change course: implementing measures such as taxing the wealth of the top 1% and inheritances, regulating the political and media influence of elites, strengthening citizen participation, and protecting democratic freedoms. The choice is clear: either democracies regain the capacity to regulate economic power, or they gradually transform into systems where key decisions respond to an ever-narrower elite.
Not only is the type of society being built at stake, but also who decides its direction. In that dilemma lies a significant part of the future of Latin America and the world in the years ahead.
Autor
Bolivian researcher and economist specializing in development and inequality. Currently focused on economic, fiscal, and social policy trends and solutions for a common agenda promoting equality in Latin America and the Caribbean. Works at Oxfam for LAC.
