World's richest 10% responsible for two-thirds of global warming since 1990, study finds
The world's wealthiest 10 per cent have caused more than two-thirds of global warming since 1990, according to a major new study that directly links climate disasters to income-based emissions.
The study, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, found that emissions linked to consumption and investments of high-income individuals have been largely responsible for extreme weather events like heatwaves and droughts, especially in vulnerable regions that have contributed the least to the crisis.
'Our study shows that extreme climate impacts are not just the result of abstract global emissions,' Sarah Schöngart, lead author of the study and researcher at ETH Zurich, said. 'Instead, we can directly link them to our lifestyle and investment choices, which in turn are linked to wealth.'
Ms Schöngart said her study provided 'strong support for climate policies that target the reduction of their emissions'.
Using new modelling techniques, scientists traced emissions from different global income groups and assessed their contributions to specific climate extremes. They found the top 1 per cent of emitters contributed 26 times the global average to increases in deadly heat events and 17 times more to droughts in the Amazon.
'If everyone had emitted like the bottom 50 per cent of the global population, the world would have seen almost no additional warming since 1990,' said Carl-Friedrich Schleussner, head of the climate impacts group at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis and co-author of the study.
The findings add weight to growing calls for stronger taxes on the carbon footprint of the wealthy, especially through their investments.
The study emphasised that emissions embedded in financial portfolios – not just personal consumption – have driven global heating.
The study comes just days after the World Meteorological Organisation confirmed that global average temperatures were 1.5C higher than pre-industrial times in 2024, and the last 10 years have been the hottest on record.
Scientists warn that the world is now dangerously close to breaching the critical 1.5C limit of the Paris Agreement that countries have pledged to avoid.
The world has already seen a sharp rise in billion-dollar disasters, with stronger hurricanes in the US, floods in Europe and heatwaves in Asia all becoming more severe than before.
Studies estimate that if the world continues on this path, and global heating reaches 4C by the end of the century, the world economy could shrink by 40 per cent, four times more than previous estimates.
Before the latest study, a 2020 Oxfam report found the richest 1 per cent were responsible for more than twice the emissions of the poorest 50 per cent between 1990 and 2015. A follow-up report last year estimated that the average billionaire emitted over a million times more carbon than the average person in the bottom 99 per cent.
Fifty of the world's richest billionaires produce, on average, more carbon emissions in under three hours than the average British person does in their entire lifetime, the report said.
Campaigners have been calling for wealth taxes that target carbon-intensive assets, frequent flyers, private jet owners and high-emitting companies.
The authors of the study argued that targeting the financial flows and portfolios of high-income individuals could yield substantial climate benefits.
'This is not an academic discussion – it's about the real impacts of the climate crisis today,' Ms Schleussner said.
'Climate action that doesn't address the outsize responsibilities of the wealthiest members of society, risks missing one of the most powerful levers we have to reduce future harm.'
Researchers said making rich individual polluters pay could also help provide much-needed support for adaptation and loss in vulnerable countries.
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