Oxfam: Super-rich profit from both causing and adapting to climate crisis
Study finds wealthiest 0.1% benefit from polluting industries and disaster recovery investments, creating perverse incentives.
What to know
- Oxfam identified 217 corporations where super-rich are invested in both climate-polluting industries and disaster recovery/adaptation services, creating conflicting incentives.
- The richest 0.1% emit 125 times more carbon than average and are responsible for more emissions than 3.5 billion of the poorest, yet profit when crises raise commodity prices.
- Major asset managers BlackRock and Vanguard control over $1 trillion in shares across these companies, concentrating wealth extraction among the wealthiest.
- The adaptation and disaster recovery market is projected to grow from $70bn to $92bn annually by 2029, expanding the financial incentive for delaying climate action.
“This gives the planet's wealthiest and most powerful people a 'double dividend' from the climate crisis and, more alarmingly, an incentive to delay or disrupt action to solve the problem.”
Oxfam, Global equality organization · The Guardian ↗
Oxfam Global equality organizationJean McLean Oxfam chief influencing officerBlackRock and Vanguard Major asset management firms
How it unfolded 1 development · click the chart to see its coverage articlesposts
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Oxfam finds richest 0.1% responsible for 125x average emissions, cashing in on crises
The report states the richest 0.1% are responsible for more carbon emissions than the poorest 3.5 billion combined and have contributed 125 times more than average to extreme heat events. Oxfam cites examples including private jets emitting more CO2 in two seconds than most people do in a year, and billionaire-dominated food companies profiting when climate crises drive commodity prices up—such as a 231% cocoa price surge after 2024 West African extreme weather.
“The populations who contributed least to the climate crisis are absorbing its worst consequences, while those who caused it are best equipped to protect themselves.”
— Jean McLean -
first by Anadolu Agency, 12d ago · also Common Dreams, CGTN, Down To Earth, HN Frontpage, Fortune
5 more headlines
- 'A Crime of Extreme Inequality': Richest 0.1% Generate More Carbon Pollution Than Half of Humanity Common Dreams · 12d ago
- Oxfam: Richest 0.1% produce more carbon than poorest 3.5 billion CGTN · 11d ago
- Richest 1% emit more carbon than the world’s poorest, says Oxfam Down To Earth · 11d ago
- Richest 0.1% (8M) produce more carbon pollution than 3.5B HN Frontpage · 10d ago
- ‘Setting the planet on fire’: Richest 0.1% emit more carbon than poorest 3.5 billion, Oxfam says Fortune · 8d ago
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#ResistanceEarth The top 0.1% aren't just profiting from the pollution that's accelerating climate change. They're also making money off of disaster preparedness, recovery and the surging prices caused by extreme weather. I call it the asshole feedback loop.
2 more of the top 3 · 58 posts in this stretch
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Oxfam has found that the richest 0.1% of the world’s population are heavily invested in disaster preparedness, recovery and reconstruction – a market that is projected to grow from $70bn to $92bn a year by 2029. This gives the planet’s wealthiest and most powerful people a “double dividend” from the climate crisis and an incentive to delay or…
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Their methodology is extremely suspect in my opinion, as they attribute "shareholder emissions" to anyone that owns 10% or more of a company. Direct quote from their doc:> a person with a 20% share in a company has 20% of its emissions allocated to their shareholder emissionsWhile shareholders obviously hold a greater degree of control over a…
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background
Oxfam releases 'destroy and rebuild' index on super-rich climate profits — Oxfam published research showing the richest 0.1% (8 million people) are heavily invested in both pollution-causing industries and disaster preparedness/recovery markets. The organization identified 217 corporations in these sectors, with major asset managers BlackRock and Vanguard holding shares in 92% of them worth over $1 trillion combined.
Also covered reported alongside — the timeline has no entry for these yet
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first by The Guardian, 12d ago · also Euronews, Education International, Guardian Business, Guardian Environment
3 more headlines
- Are the super-rich cashing in on climate chaos? Mastodon · 12d ago
- ‘Profiteering from pain’: Investments of super-rich fuel climate crisis and capitalise on recovery Euronews · 12d ago
- New Oxfam report: The world's super-rich are driving climate breakdown and cashing in on the crisis Education International · 11d ago
What people are saying 21 voices from 4 sites · best of 59 · verbatim
- Nov 1
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🧐 Oxfam: Super-rich get ‘double dividend’ from causes and costs of climate crisis, report finds “The super-rich benefit at both ends of the crisis: first, through continued investment in polluting industries, and second, through investment in the booming ‘adaptation economy’ – recovery and rebuilding services are sold back to a warming world,”…
- Oct 30
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Not nearly as them, but acting like we're blameless is dumb, oil companies still make money from us and continue to destroy the world
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Hm. I'll admit, I probably fall into some of those traps. I'm accustomed to living in NYC or Boston but circumstances have forced me into the suburbs and I definitely don't walk/bike as much as I used to. In fairness to me, though, the fuckin' Cerberus up the street hopped a fence and tried to eat me, so, y'know. I'd rather not have to shoot…
- Oct 29
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It's not completely different, it's exactly the same. A private charter is a private charter flight regardless of where it's going. Like some of these flights to remote areas even depart from major airports like Toronto Pearson Airport. I'm sure you can craft some type of legislation to try to stop "private jets" but how you do that without…
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The comparison to the poorest 3.5b is also not as useful as comparing the top 0.1% to the top 10%, which I would imagine pollute orders of magnitude more than the top 0.1%. I'm sure they're both shocking numbers compared to humans living sedentary agrarian lifestyles.
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There is little utility in blaming consumers for the crimes of capital. Consumers are going to consume. Capital is the entity with directable responsibility (if only via state violence). Why not just shake your fist at the tide coming in for all the good this "blame" does?
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> large portions of companies are held by the general public in much smaller quantities via 401ks, pensions, etc.Considering everyone is in index (or mutual) funds these days, do they actually own any shares in the underlying companies? I’m not sure they do? The fund surely owns shares of various companies, but the holders of the fund aren’t…
- Oct 28
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This is mostly a distraction because so much Carbon pollution is within supply chains, and therefore not wise to ascribe to individual consumers.The exceptions are driving and flying. 8M is more than the private jet users, I assume. Getting rid of ICE driving is going very well (outside fossil-Luddite America).Getting rid of flying is harder, but…
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Inequality breaks capitalism. Spending so much money as the 0.1% spends in luxury makes no sense. To let millions die of preventable diseases, or even hunger makes no sense. The fact that as a society we let them do that is a failure that needs to be corrected.It is not their money. It is our resources that they are wasting. We need to better…
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I suspect 343 million Americans use way more carbon than twice that number of subsistence farmers.
- Oct 27
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“Billionaires and the ultra-rich are burning more carbon than than most of the world. The world’s richest 1%—just 8 million people who make, on average, $442,000 a year—produce far more emissions than the poorest 3.5 billion, states the report. Someone in the richest 0.1% emits 48 times more CO2 than the average person in the U.S. over the course…
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Euro News: ‘Profiteering from pain’: Investments of super-rich fuel climate crisis and capitalise on recovery "...Emissions of the super-rich linked to millions of deaths Oxfam says the wealthiest also contribute disproportionately to the emissions driving the crisis. The richest 0.1 per cent – around eight million people – emit more than the…
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Well, who'd have thought? "the [world's] richest 0.1%...... are heavily invested in disaster preparedness, recovery and reconstruction – a market that is projected to grow from $70bn to $92bn a year by 2029" Another win - win for the parasitic super-rich
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RE: https:// wandering.shop/@cstross/117512 568357435117 If you think that's a bit bloodchillingly draconian of me, here, have a reason why: https:// time.com/article/2026/10/27/ca rbon-emissions-ultra-rich-oxfam-report/
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Pourquoi n'agit-on pas plus vite, plus fort contre le changement climatique ? Parce qu'en haut de la pyramide économique, il y en a qui tirent directement profit du chaos grandissant.
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World’s wealthiest people are not just profiting from the polluting causes of #climate breakdown, they are also increasingly cashing in on the catastrophic consequences, according to a study by Oxfam.
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Oxfam report: The super-rich profit from the pollution driving climate breakdown, and then cash in again on the disasters it causes. No profit without accountability.
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“Everyone likes to think climate change a shared problem, but it’s not. Addressing the climate crisis is really easy. Control the richest, curb their power, curb their emissions, and also tax their wealth.” - Nafkote Dabi, Oxfam International climate change policy lead.
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Super-rich get ‘double dividend’ from causes and costs of climate crisis. They profit from polluting industries, and through the ‘adaptation economy’. Super-rich buy govts, control means of production and think tanks. Victims pay higher prices for food, homes, relocations. Who governs?
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To be honest this just suggests to me that Oxfam's investment emissions calculation methodology is even more broken than I thought? I mean, if you're blaming the super-rich for investing in the causes of the problem, but also for investing in disaster preparedness, recovery and reconstruction, then you just hate investment - the logic is circular…
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A damning new report shows that the super-rich get a double dividend, profiting from both the causes and costs of the climate crisis. The super-rich are causing the climate crisis AND investing in disaster recovery which both widens inequality AND incentivises them to delay climate action. https://www. theguardian.com/environment/20…