The Bloomberg Robin Hood Index decided to calculate how much of the world's largest fortunes would be needed to pay for all carbon credits required to offset all domestic emissions of greenhouse gases.
If most of the richest people in the world decided to give up their fortunes, would they have a real impact on climate change?
The study calculated each part of the fortunes of the largest billionaires that would be required to buy all the carbon credits required to offset all domestic emissions of greenhouse gases in their countries over just one year.
We can imagine what the richest people in 44 countries, with a fortune estimated at 786 billion, or 1% of the world's gross domestic product, can do with their money to save our world.
Only China and Brazil the biggest fortunes are too small to "clean the air" for a year. The 29 billion, investor Jorge Paulo Lemann would almost pay the cleaning bill in Brazil, while Jack Ma of the Alibaba Group would have to double his $ 37 billion to compensate for the damage caused by the world's biggest polluter.
Rapidly developing countries are also among the worst offenders. But what they found in their analysis is that, in Russia and India, gas tycoon Leonid Mikhelson and oil businessman Mukesh Ambani, would continue to hold a lot of money even after offsetting emissions in their respective countries.
Carbon taxes do not eliminate pollutants. With carbon trading, national governments set a cap on emissions and may grant rights to pollute or auction off some allowances, within the limit. Companies can then buy these credits, which allow them to pollute, or sell them, making a profit if they are cleaned. Emissions fall as governments periodically reduce their limits.
The European Union has debated a proposal to renew its 12-year limit and trade system, which has hitherto been unable to exacerbate pollution penalties. Even if the richest in the EU were to meet for the greater good, the 28-nation region would still need to find ways to get agreements to improve its energy efficiency, moving away from fossil fuels and turning to renewable energy.
President Donald Trump, who has withdrawn the US from the Paris agreement on climate change, which provides guidelines for pollution levels, has "only" a 2.9 billion fortune, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, would theoretically be enough for only 8 percent of the country's claims.
Fortunately, for this Robin Hood fantasy, 85 billion from Bill Gates would pay more than two years of carbon offsets - leaving enough money to pay the bills of neighbors countries like Canada and Mexico.
Sweden, which has a highly energy-efficient economy and emits one of the lowest levels of pollution to run the economy, would be one of the easiest cleanup jobs
Maybe the beginning question isn't the right one because planet earth survived for 4,5 Billion years without billionaires, maybe the right question is: how many billionaires can co-exist without the planet being destroyed?
BlueDemon.
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