The global rich are disproportionately responsible for climate impacts that fall most heavily on the global poor.
But be careful before assigning your righteous anger, you may be among those most guilty.
To be among the global top 10 percent, you may not need as much money as you think. According to the 2018 Global Wealth Report from Credit Suisse Research Institute, you don’t even need six figures.
A net worth of $93,170 U.S. is enough to make you richer than 90 percent of people around the world, Credit Suisse reports. The institute defines net worth, or “wealth,” as “the value of financial assets plus real assets (principally housing) owned by households, minus their debts.”
More than 102 million people in America are in the 10 percent worldwide, Credit Suisse reports, far more than from any other country.
You need significantly less to be among the global 50 percent: If you have just $4,210 to your name, you’re still richer than half of the world’s residents. And it takes a net worth of $871,320 to join the global 1 percent. More than 19 million Americans qualify, Credit Suisse reports.
These numbers reflect the extreme level of persistent wealth inequality. As Credit Suisse puts it, “While the bottom half of adults collectively owns less than 1 percent of total wealth, the richest decile (top 10 percent of adults) owns 85 percent of global wealth, and the top percentile alone accounts for almost half of all household wealth (47 percent).”
Original “Wealth Inequality in America” from ~2013:
Follow-on “Global Wealth Inequality”
I am fairly sure Bill Gates’s yacht produces more CO2 than my Barina Spark. So I wonder how much of the top 10%’s emissions are actually by the top 1%.
Want to reduce your emissions, it can be very hard in the US. Being carless is not too hard in Europe, a bit difficult in Australia but damn near impossible in the US. Your cities are often so stupidly laid out that you need a car to travel a few hundred meters and public transit is the pits.
Walkable suburbs are against US planning laws in so many ways. There is almost no mid density in the US. There is high rise and then there is suburbia. There are shopping precincts, but not where the houses are. Corner stores just don’t exist in many places.
Austin is doing a good job retrofitting old neighborhoods (which were the outer suburbs 50-60 years ago) with sidewalks and somewhat protected bike paths. They’ve upgraded the bus stops, too, with digital signs displaying real-time wait information.
Sadly, Austin is too hot and hilly for people to thrive without cars for much of the year. What might make a nice walk at 80°F (~26°C) becomes a miserable slog as the temps regularly get above 90°F. Today at 4pm it was 104°F (not heat index, absolute temperature) while workers across the street were jackhammering and operating a beeping backhoe/loader.
People still go out walking their dogs with temps in the 90s or higher, but most wait until it drops to ~80°F around 6am.