The writer is co-president of the Club of Rome and executive chair of Earth4All
This year’s World Economic Forum at Davos is focused on the theme of “rebuilding trust”. The topic could not be more timely, with public trust in governments still low in many countries. Yet if those gathered in Switzerland are serious about tackling declining trust, they must also raise tough questions about growing inequality.
We are living in a time of phenomenal extremes. Between 2019 and 2020, global inequality grew more rapidly than at any time since the second world war. When it comes to income inequality, the most compelling example is the exorbitant pay divide between chief executives and workers. In 2022, CEOs in the US were paid 344 times as much as a typical worker, compared with 21 times back in 1965.