An Oxfam report highlights the extent to which income inequality worsened during the pandemic. The number of India’s billionaires increased from 40 to 142 in 2021, with 98 of the richest Indians having the bottom 552 million of their estimated wealth. This, even as the income of 84% of the country’s households declined during the pandemic, notes the report.
These alarming figures should prompt our policymakers to address the problem of what many have described as a K-shaped economic recovery, in which the fortunes of the rich and the rest are vastly different. While the rich have gotten richer, the national minimum wage remains According to the report, 178 per day from 2020. Although the rich don’t get rich at the expense of others, and many can thank easy-money policies being run globally by central banks, the focus of policy should be on those whose lives have deteriorated over the past two years. It is done. Even if India’s monetary hedge is gradually withdrawn, the hard-hit may need to step up fiscal support. Credit costs for the government and businesses can go up this way, but economic imbalances can have worse consequences, and it’s best to pre-empt these.
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