Reversing wealth concentration
Oxfam, among others, has called for an international movement to end extreme wealth concentration arguing that the concentration of resources in the hands of the top 1% depresses economic activity and makes life harder for everyone else—particularly those at the bottom of the economic ladder. And they say that the gains of the worlds billionaires in 2017, which amounted to $762 billion, were enough to end extreme global poverty seven times over. Perspectives
Economic theories
The cause of poverty is a highly ideologically charged subject, as different causes point to different remedies. Very broadly speaking, the socialist tradition locates the roots of poverty in problems of distribution and the use of the means of production as capital benefiting individuals, and calls for redistribution of wealth as the solution, whereas the neoliberal school of thought holds that creating conditions for profitable private investment is the solution. Neoliberal think tanks have received extensive funding, and the ability to apply many of their ideas in highly indebted countries in the global South as a condition for receiving emergency loans from the International Monetary Fund. The existence of inequality is in part due to a set of self-reinforcing behaviors that all together constitute one aspect of the cycle of poverty. These behaviors, in addition to unfavorable, external circumstances, also explain the existence of the Matthew effect, which not only exacerbates existing inequality, but is more likely to make it multigenerational. Widespread, multigenerational poverty is an important contributor to civil unrest and political instability.
Road infrastructure has a direct impact on poverty. Additionally, migration from poorer countries resulted in $328 billion sent from richer to poorer countries in 2010, more than double the $120 billion in official aid flows from OECD members. In 2011, India got $52 billion from its diaspora, more than it took in foreign direct investment. Financial services
Microloans, made famous by the Grameen Bank, is where small amounts of money are loaned to farmers or villages, mostly women, who can then obtain physical capital to increase their economic rewards. However, microlending has been criticized for making hyperprofits off the poor even from its founder, Muhammad Yunus, and in India, Arundhati Roy asserts that some 250,000 debt-ridden farmers have been driven to suicide.Those in poverty place overwhelming importance on having a safe place to save money, much more so than receiving loans. Additionally, a large part of microfinance loans are spent not on investments but on products that would usually be paid by a checking or savings account. Microsavings are designs to make savings products available for the poor, who make small deposits. Mobile banking uses the wide availability of mobile phones to address the problem of the heavy regulation and costly maintenance of saving accounts. This usually involves a network of agents of mostly shopkeepers, instead of bank branches, would take deposits in cash and translate these onto a virtual account on customers phones. Cash transfers can be done between phones and issued back in cash with a small commission, making remittances safer.