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SECTION 1 2 3<br />
EXTREME INEQUALITY<br />
investment in sectors like education and healthcare that could help to reduce<br />
inequality, and keeps the country dependent on international aid. This prevents<br />
the growth of a diverse and strong economy, while perpetuating economic<br />
and political inequalities. 279<br />
Many of today’s richest people made their fortunes thanks to the<br />
exclusive government concessions and privatization that came with<br />
market fundamentalism. Privatization in Russia and Ukraine, after the fall<br />
of communism, made billionaires of the political elite overnight. Mexico’s<br />
Carlos Slim – who rivals Bill Gates as the richest person in the world – made<br />
his many billions by securing exclusive rights to the country’s telecom<br />
sector when it was privatized in the 1990s. 280 Since his monopoly hinders any<br />
significant competition, Slim is able to charge his fellow Mexicans inflated<br />
prices, with the costs of telecommunications in the country being among the<br />
most expensive in the OECD. 281 He has subsequently used his wealth to fend<br />
off many legal challenges to his monopoly.<br />
Despite being a country ravaged by poverty, the number of billionaires in India<br />
has soared from two in the mid-1990s to more than 60 today. 282 A significant<br />
number of India’s billionaires made their fortunes in sectors highly dependent<br />
on exclusive government contracts and licenses, such as real estate,<br />
construction, mining, telecommunications and media. A 2012 study estimated<br />
that at least half of India’s billionaire wealth came from such ‘rent-thick’<br />
sectors of the economy. 283 The net worth of India’s billionaires would be enough<br />
to eliminate absolute poverty in the country twice over, 284 yet the government<br />
continues to underfund social spending for the most vulnerable. For instance,<br />
in 2011, public health expenditure per capita in India was just four percent of<br />
the OECD country average in per capita terms. 285 As a consequence, inequality<br />
in India has worsened.<br />
Corporate interests have also captured policy-making processes to their<br />
own advantage. Recent analysis of the influence of corporate interests on<br />
nearly 2,000 specific policy debates in the USA over 20 years concluded that<br />
‘economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have<br />
substantial independent impacts on US government policy, while mass-based<br />
interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence’. 286<br />
Financial institutions spend more than €120m per year influencing the<br />
European Union. 287<br />
60