Emissions by the richest people are accelerating climate breakdown

One hour of emissions from Australian billionaires’ super yachts and private jets equals what an average Australian emits in an entire year. 

For the first time a report titled Carbon Inequality Kills by Oxfam tracks the emissions from private jets, yachts and polluting investments and makes it very clear that the super-rich are fuelling inequality, hunger and death across the world.

Climate change is a leading cause of the steep rise in global hunger as it damages crop yields. The emissions of the richest one per cent have caused crop losses that could have provided enough calories to feed 14.5 million people a year between 1990 and 2023. This will rise to 46 million people annually between 2023 and 2050.

Seventy-eight per cent of excess deaths due to heat through 2120 will occur in low- and lower-middle-income countries.  The analysis shows that just four years (2015 to 2019) of the consumption emissions of the world’s richest one per cent will be enough to cause 1.5 million excess deaths between 2020 and 2120. That is higher than the current annual death toll due to natural disasters. 

The emissions of the richest one per cent have caused global economic output to drop by $2.9 trillion since 1990. The biggest impact will be in countries least responsible for climate breakdown.

It signals that climate breakdown cannot be avoided without urgent action being taken to dramatically change the consumption and investment habits of the richest people.

The super rich lifestyles emissions dwarf those of ordinary people. 

We ride our bikes, repair our clothes, use public transport, limit our car usage and air travel, grow our own food, buy second hand, invest ethically, donate to various hunger/climate charities – yet nothing of this makes any difference when the richest people in the country and the world travel around in their private jets, yachts and invest in polluting industries.

Are the super-wealthy willing to curb their polluting behaviour when they now know their impact?  

Governments must step up to play the role they were appointed for which is to care for the majority of citizens in the country and actively introduce measures and policy to reduce the emissions of the richest, make rich polluters pay and create, and reimagine our economies and societies to deliver wellbeing and planetary flourishing.  

The report suggests emission reductions for the super-rich and appropriate progressive taxes to curb their excessive consumption and investments emissions. This may go a small way to fix the damage they have caused.

Oxfam estimates that the Global North owes the Global South a climate debt of $5 trillion between 2025 and 2050 to compensate for their past exploitation of nature and people.

For more detail about the report visit Oxfam’s website. •