Covid-19 worsens Asia’s staggering inequalities

Grim: People in a low-income area relax near railway tracks at Pintu Air Karet, Tanah Abang, Central Jakarta.

IN the decades before the pandemic, Asia was often celebrated as a shining example of policies resulting in economic growth. But to talk about economic growth and reduction in absolute poverty was to only tell half of the story.

Asia was also deeply unequal. Since the 1990s, neoliberal economic policies, a failing global tax system, and runaway income and profits at the top channelled income and wealth into the hands of an elite few.