Surprise, surprise - The rich get richer

The truism that the rich get richer — well most of the time anyway — was not confounded in 2014.

The Bloomberg Billionaires’ Index, a daily ranking of the world’s richest people, recorded yesterday that the world’s 400 richest people got richer in the last 12 months adding $92bn to their collective worth. Bill Gates, 59, co-founder of Microsoft, remains the richest person with a $87.6bn nest egg at his disposal.

By any yardstick these figures are fantastic but they do illustrate the ever-widening gap between the world’s mega-rich and the world’s ground-down poor. They also underline the urgent need to try to rebalance how people’s lives are defined by opportunity or the availability of basic, life-sustaining resources. But is was ever thus.

The changes in our world order mean that many once comfortable people, those described as the middle classes, will also look at these figures with a mixture of bemusement and frustration. The hollowing out of the middle classes, the people who no longer have private health insurance and dread their children’s college fees, is one of the legacies of our economic collapse. This change may not be universally regretted but as history shows a secure, well-educated middle class, one with honourable ambitions and determination, has been behind nearly every great advance enjoyed by humanity. Unless this reality is recognised and supported the consequences may go beyond anything we might imagine.