I'll have to agree with Neo-Logic on this on. That the rich get richer may increase the gap between the richest and the pooest but these are only statistics. How does this hurt the poor unless they get poorer?
And as long as you are looking at statistics if a poor person increases their income 1,000% but that amounts to only an increase of, say, $1,000/ year while a rich person increases their earnings 5% but this amounts to $100,000 the gap has increases but the poor person has increased their wealth more dramatically.
The question will be, as Neo kept pointing out, has the standard of living increased because of an increasing global economy.
I find it very interesting when ever I have this conversation with a person who is rich. ( By world standards that is making over 10 dollars a day top 20% of incomes ) The either throw out facts to defend themselves or there eyes glaze over. Very few seem to show care for the poor.
Here are some more facts about this world system that you seem to defend so vigorously:
-Around 1/2 the worlds population makes around $2.50 a day or under.
-Almost 2 billion people make under $1.45 a day.
-Unicef says Nearly a billion people will enter the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names.
-Total debts of the developing world in 2006: $2.7 trillion
World Bank data March 3, 2008
-Total official development assistance in 2006: $106 billion
World Bank data March 3, 2008
-Less than one per cent of what the world spent every year on weapons was needed to put every child into school by the year 2000 and yet it didn’t happen. State of the World, Issue 287 - Feb 1997, New Internationalist
-the developing world outside China and India has seen little or no sustained progress in reducing the number of poor.
I find all of the above statistics to be completely unexceptable. It makes me sad that so many people seemed unmoved and feel the need to defend the rights of the rich to get richer. If there is progress its much to slow and at the cost of billions lives. I will not execpt this as just.