Humanity can raise living standards, reduce inequality and keep global heating within a 2C rise, according to a sweeping vision for planetary survival.<\/p>\n
The report by the World Inequality<\/a> Lab (WIL) aims to be the most comprehensive attempt yet to navigate the polycrisis that is pushing the world toward climate breakdown, political extremism and ever greater economic and social tension.<\/p>\n A drone view shows the stark inequality between neighbourhoods in Santa Fe, Mexico City Photograph: Raquel Cunha\/Reuters<\/p>\n It offers a set of bold policy proposals, including hefty wealth taxes on billionaires, sharp reductions in working hours, a change in diets and a shift of investment from materially intense sectors, such as industry and mining, to education and health.<\/p>\n If these and other measures are taken, the report says, the incomes of 89% of the world\u2019s population would double by 2100 and global heating would be kept below 2C above the preindustrial average.<\/p>\n The authors say their vision provides a positive alternative to the grim projections from far-right techno extractivists, nationalists and billionaires who claim the future will inevitably bring more fossil fuels, climate disruption and inequality.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a huge cultural, intellectual, political battle that is going on. And we all have a role to play,\u201d said Thomas Piketty, a co-director of the WIL and a professor at the Paris School of Economics.<\/p>\n Economics professor Thomas Piketty says Trump-style policies will end in disaster. Photograph: Ed Alcock<\/p>\n \u201cThe ideology which we see with [Donald] Trump and all the little Trumps that we have all across Europe and all across the world is simply not going to deliver. At the end of the day we\u2019ll have to come to this kind of cooperative redistribution of resources and power because the alternative will simply lead to disastrous outcomes both on the environment, on the climate, but also on social grounds.<\/p>\n The Global Justice Report<\/a>, published on Thursday, tries to overcome the shortcomings of mainstream approaches to the polycrisis<\/a>, including the overly materialistic emphasis of traditional leftist parties, the questionable efficacy of the economic degrowth proposed by many ecologists and the lack of social impact studies by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change<\/a>.<\/p>\n The report aims to rectify those limitations by incorporating inequality studies, climate science and proposals for creating a political coalition capable of reforming the world\u2019s financial architecture.<\/p>\n This \u201cplan for equality and prosperity within planetary boundaries\u201d is the product of 45 authors based on databases compiled by more than 200 researchers from around the world.<\/p>\n A wildfire in California. The report addresses the climate crisis as well as social justice. Photograph: Justin Sullivan\/Getty Images<\/p>\n At its core is the concept of sufficiency \u2013 the idea that people can enjoy a prosperous, healthy life without constantly striving to consume or accumulate more material possessions that degrade the natural world on which all life depends.<\/p>\n To achieve this, the authors envisage three steps: more than halving average working time from 2,100 hours a year to 1,000 hours, roughly equivalent to a two-and-a-half-day working week; encouraging people to eat less red meat, which is the main driver of deforestation and ecological destruction; and refocusing the economy toward low-consumption activities by more than doubling education spending to \u20ac8,400 (\u00a37,250) a person and healthcare spending to \u20ac14,400.<\/p>\n Piketty said: \u201cOne extra euro of GDP in education and health has three to four times less material footprint and energy consumption than one extra euro of GDP in the manufacturing sector. So that\u2019s why the sectoral shifts are hugely important.\u201d<\/p>\n Chart<\/a><\/p>\n Tackling inequality is a central goal. Under the plan, the average per capita gross national income across the world would be \u20ac5,000 a month by the end of the century \u2013 an increase for almost everyone, with the greatest gains in the global south. The exception would be the mega-rich, who would be highly taxed because they are most responsible<\/a> for the climate crisis. The share of global wealth held by billionaires, who make up only 0.001% of the world population, would fall from 6% to 0.05%, while the bottom 50% would see their share of wealth increase from 2% to 30%.<\/p>\n Chart<\/a><\/p>\n The other priority is reducing climate risks by cutting emissions as close to zero as possible. The report takes three mid-century scenarios for decarbonisation outlined by the International Energy Agency and projects them to 2100. Under its most ambitious plan, capital would be redirected from the world\u2019s wealthiest individuals and invested in wind, solar and other renewable technologies to accelerate the complete decarbonisation and electrification of energy supplies by 2050. Further emissions savings would come from a reduction in working hours and the shift in diets and economic activity.<\/p>\n Chart<\/a><\/p>\n This is projected to keep global temperature rises to 1.8C by the end of the century \u2013 considerably lower than the catastrophic 4C to 4.5C estimates under scenarios of slow decarbonisation and ever-increasing demand for material goods. It is also better than the 1.9C projected under a scenario of across-the-board economic degrowth.<\/p>\n Chart comparing projected warming by 2100 under sufficiency v degrowth<\/a><\/p>\n Key among the practical steps needed to achieve the report\u2019s goals would be the creation of a global justice fund to finance the energy transition and oversee an increase in education and healthcare spending to 38% of world GDP, up from 13% today. This work would be supported by a world sovereign fund, which would rebalance global holdings of public and private wealth closer to proportions last seen in 1970.<\/p>\n \u201cA habitable, equal 21st century is materially possible,\u201d the report concludes. \u201cWhat stands in the way is not technical impossibility but political choice and the hard but crucial work of building a coalition behind it.\u201d<\/p>\n Cornelia Mohren, a co-author and environmental coordinator at the WIL, acknowledged the report was \u201cvisionary and maybe utopian<\/a>\u201d but said this was necessary to show other paths were possible.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is good to know we can combine an equal world with staying within carbon budgets,\u201d she said. \u201cThat is a very helpful result. It makes me feel hopeful. We saw what\u2019s possible and we also see how hard it is with this political reality, which can be depressing.\u201d<\/p>\n Greenpeace activists protest on a boat with a model of a giant Donald Trump baby, tearing up a climate protection document in Hamburg, Germany. Photograph: DPA\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Piketty said recent history showed the goals of the report were plausible. Countries such as Sweden and Norway were once extremely divided economically but had made rapid progress in reducing inequality because of government policies and a refocusing of investment toward education and health, while working hours in Europe have halved since the 19th century, which is in line with the goal envisaged in the report.<\/p>\n The key, Piketty added, was to address inequality and planetary habitability together. Without that twin approach, he said, governments would risk repeating the mistakes that caused the gilets jaunes (yellow vest) protests<\/a> in France against a carbon tax that would have hit working and middle-class people more than the rich.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you don\u2019t put this at the centre of your analysis and if you talk about green policies, environment, in the abstract, this is simply not going to work,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n