'Polluting elite': Study highlights massive carbon dioxide emissions gap between rich and poor

According to recent research, the top one per cent of earners in the United Kingdom produces the same amount of carbon dioxide emissions in a single year as the bottom 10 per cent do over the course of more than two decades.

The report findings show the stark differences in carbon footprints between the bulk of people, even in industrialised nations, and what has been dubbed "the polluting elite," whose high-carbon lifestyles apparently feed the climate problem.

Citing the Autonomy's analysis of income and greenhouse gas data from 1998 to 2018, The Guardian reported that those earning £170,000 or more in the UK in 2018 were responsible for far more greenhouse gas emissions than the 30% of people earning £21,500 or less in the same year.

It would take a low earner 26 years to produce as much carbon dioxide as the richest do in a year.

The media outlet mentioned that before the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and lockdowns, which halted high-carbon activities like flying, the period covered by the dataset ends in 2018.

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According to Autonomy, the UK could have earned roughly £126 billion by now by taxing carbon emissions from just the top one per cent of income categories, which could have been used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in an equitable manner, such as by insulating homes for lower-income people.

The huge gap needs to be closed, according to Peter Newell, who is a professor of international politics at the University of Sussex.

Newell told The Guardian: "This new report on the benefits of taxing extreme carbon emitters makes for shocking reading. On the eve of a critical climate summit [Cop27] in Egypt, and staring down an unprecedented cost of living crisis, it is clear we are not all in this together."

"Revenue raised from a carbon tax on the wealthiest top 1% of the population would have raised enough money to retrofit nearly 8m homes, keeping us warm this winter and bringing down fuel bills, while providing critical support for renewable energy and making us less dependent on Putin’s gas," added Newell, who was not part of the Autonomy report but has done considerable research on the "polluting elite."

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