At the moment the richest 62 people own as much as the poorest 50% of people, showcasing an enormous monetary inequality in the world. Much of the money owned by large corporations is siphoned away to offshore tax havens, making the rich richer and not producing income for the nations in which this money was originally spent. Money leaves the local and national economy and is not used to create employment locally. The tax that is dodged has to be raised by taxpayers and smaller businesses. This is stale money that doesn’t get invested into our economies to create employment and growth. Despite controlling two thirds of the global GDP, the top 500 corporations create less than 1% of all global employment.
Looking around in nearly any high street in the country you will find the same clone town of corporation shops. A lot of the money spent here is siphoned out to offshore tax havens and is not used to buy from local suppliers. It is increasingly hard to find local, independent shops that support the local economy.
A large side effect of the global economy is that products are purchased from far away, because of the low costs. These products might come at a low monetary cost, but have a real and destructive environmental cost, because they come with a large environmental footprint. These costs are not calculated into the price.
