The emergence of the middle class at global level is redesigning local societies' values

The current global crisis started in 2008 brought policies of austerity, mainly to the detriment of the middle class, in most of the western economies. The BRIC countries, in particular, as well as other Latin American and Asian states with the economic growth are experiencing  the birth or reinforcement of  the middle class in their societies.

Various indicators are used by a number of organizations to measure this trend:

• The World Bank includes in the middle class people earning between  $2-$13 per day

• The Asian and the African Development Banks use a range between $2-$20 to identify middle class members.

However, the results of these studies are quite similar and show that the middle class is constantly growing, even if at different rates, among all countries in the world.
This phenomenon has both political and economic interpretations. From an economic point of view, various studies predict, in the global market, the appearance of a new class of potential consumers which will absorb the overproduction of companies in Europe and North America and help develop locally the internal markets.
The second consideration focuses in particular on the political consequences of this growth. Polling evidence demonstrates that middle-class values are very distinctive and members of this class pay a lot of attention to their political and civil rights rather than the poor classes more concerned with the freedom from poverty.  This tendency have been used to explain the recent uprisings in Arabic countries.


Poverty line is fixed by the UN at $1 per day. Updated statistical data are available on the Millennium Development Goals Indicators site

For more readings:
The middle of the pyramid: dynamics of the middle class in Africa - African Development Bank (AfDB)
The Global Middle Class - Report from the Pew Research Center

Who are the Middle Class and What Values do They Hold? Evidence from the World Values Survey - Asian Development Bank (ADB)
The emerging middle class in developing countries - Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
How democracy may come to China - CNN

15 September 2011 - International Day of Democracy

The UN General Assembly in 2007 with the general resolution A/62/7  encouraged Governments to strengthen national programmes devoted to the promotion and consolidation of democracy, and also decided that 15 September of each year should be observed as the International Day of Democracy.
The2011's theme will focus on the role of Parliaments in dealing with people's needs and requests and a number of events will be organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union.
The 2011 celebration is very important also in relation to the protests for democracy and more freedom which  united people in a number of Arabic countries.

United Nations - Page event

International Parliamentary Union (IPU) - Page event

IPU - Universal Declaration on Democracy

Wealthy tax payers in Germany and USA ask to pay more taxes to help their countries face the financial crisis

Robin Hood Memorial

Reading some articles on this issue immediately remind to me the legend of Robin Hood, the famous English character who stole from the rich to give to the poor. However, there are a number of reasons behind the choice of some tax payers to request to pay more taxes and reform the current tax systems in Western countries.

• Unfair re-distribution of wealth 

According to a 2006 study from the Federal Reserve System, in the United States,at the end of 2001, 10% of the population owned 71% of the wealth and the top 1% owned 38%. On the other hand, the bottom 40% owned less than 1% of the nation's wealth. Furthermore, the distribution in the United States had been changing with indications there was a greater concentration of wealth held by the top 10% and top 1% of the population. In Germany, "hardly anywhere else in the world has the number of millionaires increased as much as in this country," said Mr. Dieter Lehmkuhl pointed out, while the incomes of most Germans had stagnated or even decreased. Lehmkuhl warned and urged the government to reinstate the property tax that had been abolished 12 years ago.

• Impact and effectiveness of public spending

In many countries public resources are diverted from investments for collective purposes for lobbying and political interests usually in proximity of administrative and presidential polls. The situation is worsening also in conjunction with the heavy cut spending decided in various jurisdictions to face the global financial crisis.
For this reason, the initiative launched  in Germany by the  “Vermoegende für eine Vermoegensabgabe” (Wealthy people in favor of a wealth tax) demands that the new gains should be spent for specific projects in the areas of environmental protection, education and social services like health care and social welfare rather than be simply added to the general  budget.

• Fighting tax evasion

The mission of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is to promote policies that will improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world. The fight to  tax  avoidance and tax evasion, which threaten government revenues, is one of the main issues of concern for the organization. The OECD promotes the Tax Information Exchange Agreements among countries to prevent evasion in foreign tax havens. The US Senate estimates revenue losses from tax evasion by U.S.-based firms and individuals at around 100 billion dollars a year. In many other countries, the sums run into billions of euros. This means fewer resources for infrastructure and services such as education and health, lowering standards of living in both developed and developing economies.

In the USA, Warren Buffet in the days of downgrading U.S., had proposed more taxes for the super riches, In Spain, if the socialist candidate Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba will win the November election, he could reintroduce a tax on assets for three years. So as to give new life to the Iberian banks.

To read more
Tax justice network
How I learned to avoid the taxman in the British Virgin Islands
Wikipedia - Distribution of wealth
Watch Warren Buffett say raise my taxes
OECD - Section on Taxation
OECD - Tax treaties