Did you know that Truthout is a nonprofit and independently funded by readers like you? If you value what we do, please support our work with a donation.
The collective fortune of the world’s billionaires grew by roughly $10 billion per day during the first month of 2025 as billionaire Donald Trump took office in the United States, ushering in an administration that includes the world’s richest man and other elites hellbent on eviscerating government and delivering fresh tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy.
The new analysis of billionaire wealth was published Monday by the global #TaxTheSuperRich Movement, an alliance that is pressuring G20 nations to tax the mega-rich in order to stem destructive inequality and fund critical priorities, including badly needed climate action.
According to the analysis, global billionaire wealth surged by $314 billion total in January, which is “more than the combined wealth of the 2.8 billion people who make up the poorest third of humanity.”
The research, based on Forbes data, estimates that it would take a combined 15 million workers earning the average global income a full year to earn the same amount of money that around 2,800 billionaires added to their collective net worth last month alone.
“Extreme wealth isn’t just growing — it’s accelerating at breakneck speed, putting more and more power into the hands of a tiny few,” said economist Jayati Ghosh, a member of the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation. “Failure to act enables more unchecked greed and deepening disparities, allowing oligarchs to expand their vast fortunes and further extend their power over the rest of the world.”
The #TaxTheSuperRich Movement includes dozens of advocacy organizations — from Oxfam to Amnesty International to the U.S.-based Patriotic Millionaires — that are calling on governments around the world to reach a global agreement to “tax the super-rich at rates high enough to reduce inequality, as well as mechanisms to end tax avoidance.”
The new analysis was released as G20 finance ministers gathered for a round of meetings in South Africa, which currently holds the G20 presidency.
Shortly after taking office, Trump moved to withdraw the U.S. — home to more billionaires than any other nation — from global tax deals and negotiations, including an OECD agreement calling for a minimum effective tax rate of 15% on the profits of multinational corporations.
Morris Pearl, chair of the Patriotic Millionaires, said Monday that “rising and extreme inequality threatens everything we hold dear: our democracies, our economies, our planet, and our broader society.”
“In our increasingly connected world, it is a global problem that requires global solutions,” Pearl added. “That’s why my group, Patriotic Millionaires, is proud to partner with over 50 international organizations in calling on G20 leaders to follow through with their commitment to cooperate in taxing the super-rich more effectively.”
A terrifying moment. We appeal for your support.
In the last weeks, we have witnessed an authoritarian assault on communities in Minnesota and across the nation.
The need for truthful, grassroots reporting is urgent at this cataclysmic historical moment. Yet, Trump-aligned billionaires and other allies have taken over many legacy media outlets — the culmination of a decades-long campaign to place control of the narrative into the hands of the political right.
We refuse to let Trump’s blatant propaganda machine go unchecked. Untethered to corporate ownership or advertisers, Truthout remains fearless in our reporting and our determination to use journalism as a tool for justice.
But we need your help just to fund our basic expenses. Over 80 percent of Truthout’s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors.
Truthout has launched a fundraiser to add 500 new monthly donors in the next 10 days. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger one-time gift, Truthout only works with your support.