The rich are getting richer.

The combined wealth of the world’s most wealthy rose to $15 trillion from $13 trillion in just 12 months, according to Oxfam’s latest annual inequality report — notching the second largest annual increase in billionaire wealth since the global charity began tracking this data.

Last year alone, roughly 204 new billionaires were minted, bringing the total number of billionaires to 2,769, up from 2,565 in 2023, the global charity found.

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“Not only has the rate of billionaire wealth accumulation accelerated — by three times — but so too has their power,” Oxfam International’s Executive Director Amitabh Behar said in a statement Sunday. 

“We’ve reached a new era now, we are in the era of the billionaire,” said Jenny Ricks, general secretary of the human rights group Fight Inequality Alliance. “The challenge now is turning this around and making this the era of the 99%.”

Despite the fact that America ranks first as the richest nation in the world in terms of gross domestic product, 36.8 million Americans live in poverty, accounting for 11.1% of the total population, according to the latest report from the U.S. Census Bureau. 

“We need government serving people’s real needs and rights,” Ricks said, with increased funding for education and healthcare, among other social services.

After Oxfam’s report was released, some of the world’s wealthiest people called on elected representatives of the world’s leading economies to introduce higher taxes on the very richest in society.

In an open letter to political leaders attending the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, more than 370 billionaires and millionaires said that they wanted to “tackle the corrosive impact of extreme wealth.”

To that end, “start with the simplest solution: tax us, the super rich,” the letter said.

Oxfam found that 36% of billionaire wealth is now inherited. Much of that wealth will also get handed down. A separate report by UBS found that baby boomer billionaires’ heirs stand to inherit an estimated $6.3 trillion over the next 15 years.

“As the great wealth transition gains momentum … we expect the proportion of multigenerational billionaires to increase,” the report said.

According to Oxfam’s analysis, half of the world’s billionaires live in countries with no inheritance tax for direct descendants.

In the U.S., there is a federal estate tax up to 40%, depending on the amount of the estate over the current exclusion limit.

In 2025, the basic exclusion amount rose to $13.99 million per person, up from $13.61 million in 2024.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump has vowed to fully extend the trillions in tax breaks he enacted via the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2017, which also doubled the estate and gift tax exemption.

After 2025, the higher estate and gift tax exemption will sunset without action from Congress. If the provision expires, the exclusion will revert to 2017 levels, adjusted for inflation.

Some Democrats have pushed back on TCJA extensions, noting that they disproportionately benefit the wealthy, rather than middle-class families.

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There’s less than a week until tax season kicks off on Jan. 27 — and investors may have more options to file returns for free than in previous years.

Typically, investors need certain tax forms to file returns, including Form 1099-B for capital gains and losses and Form 1099-DIV for dividends and capital gains distributions. Form 1099-INT covers interest income from savings accounts, certificates of deposit, Series I bonds, Treasury bills and more.

Plus, retirees may receive Form 1099-R for withdrawals from 401(k) plans, individual retirement accounts, pensions and other distributions.

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Here are three free tax filing options to consider this season, depending on your situation.

This season, IRS Direct File, the agency’s free filing program, has expanded to 25 states. It covers more than 30 million taxpayers across eligible states, according to U.S. Department of the Treasury estimates.

“We’re excited about the improvements to Direct File and the millions more taxpayers who will be eligible to use the service this year,” former IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel said in a press release in October.

During the pilot in 2024, the program covered simple returns, including filings with interest of $1,500 or less. But for the 2025 filing season, the program supports interest above $1,500 and Alaska residents who receive the Alaska Permanent Fund dividend.  

The program doesn’t currently cover other investment income, including capital gains and dividends.

Starting in March, Direct File will also support distributions from most company retirement plans, such as 401(k) plans, pensions and more. But you can’t use the service if you withdrew funds from an IRA. 

Another option, IRS Free File, is a public-private partnership between the agency and the Free File Alliance, a nonprofit coalition of tax software companies.

This season, you can use IRS Free File if your adjusted gross income, or AGI, was $84,000 or less in 2024.

Eight software partners will accept the most commonly used tax forms and schedules, explained Tim Hugo, executive director of the Free File Alliance. Those include Schedule B for interest and ordinary dividends and Schedule D for capital gains and losses. These Schedules cover investing forms, such as 1099-INT over $1,500 and certain items from Forms 1099-B and 1099-DIV.

“It really is a great tool that can serve millions of Americans that just nobody knows about,” Hugo said.

If your want more guidance, you may also qualify for free tax prep from Volunteer Income Tax Assistance, or VITA, a program managed by the IRS. 

For the 2025 season, you’ll qualify for VITA with an adjusted gross income of $67,000 or less.

The program’s scope includes coverage for investors, including Forms 1099-INT, 1099-B and 1099-DIV, with certain limitations. VITA also covers Form 1099-R for retirement income with some exclusions. The program won’t cover cryptocurrency transactions for 2024 filings.   

Insurance premiums were surging well before this year’s massive wildfires in the Los Angeles area.

Now, they are set to rise even higher as the L.A. wildfires could become the costliest blaze in U.S. history, analysts say.

The insured losses may cost more than $20 billion, according to estimates by JPMorgan and Wells Fargo.

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For California residents, the increased frequency and severity of natural disasters has had a direct impact on homeowners insurance costs, a trend that is now even more likely to accelerate. 

“In the short term, insurance regulators need to allow for risk-based pricing,” Patrick Douville, vice president of global insurance and pension ratings at Morningstar, said in a statement. “This means that premiums are likely to increase, and affordability issues will continue, potentially affecting property values and leaving some homeowners without insurance.”

California’s Department of Insurance also recently passed regulations that pave the way for rate increases in exchange for increased coverage in wildfire-prone regions. In 2024, some insurance companies in the state hiked rates as much as 34%, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

While it’s too early to predict how the fires in Southern California will directly impact the bottom line, filing one fire claim can increase premiums by 29%, on average, and two claims could boost premiums by 60%, according to a 2024 analysis by Insure.com.

Going forward, premiums are almost guaranteed to go up as insurers attempt to cover their costs, according to Janet Ruiz, a director at the Insurance Information Institute and the organization’s California representative.

“We have to take in enough money in premiums to pay out the claims,” she said.

But even for homeowners outside of California, worsening extreme weather means higher insurance rates are on the way.

And yet, even though insurance premiums are subject to extensive regulations at the state level, when insurers cannot adjust rates in highly regulated states, they do compensate by raising rates in less-regulated states — despite protections in place — leading to “a growing disconnect between insurance rates and risk,” according to a 2021 paper by economists at Harvard Business School, Columbia Business School and Federal Reserve Board. 

“Our findings call into question the sustainability of the current regulatory system, especially if natural disasters become more frequent or severe,” the authors wrote.

“Many insurance companies operate nationwide, or at least in multiple states,” said Holden Lewis, mortgage and real estate expert at NerdWallet.

“They are going to make up for their losses somewhere,” Lewis said.

In the wake of the wildfires, Michael Barrett, co-principal at Barrett Insurance Agency in St Johnsbury Vermont, where state insurance regulations are looser, said he has fielded lots of calls from clients asking about whether their premium will rise — “and the real true answer is it could,” he said.

“From an insurance perspective, an increase in natural disasters will impact insurance going forward,” Barrett said.

Vermont is not immune from its own extreme weather lately.

“We had incredible rains with severe flooding,” Barrett said. “It’s something that’s very concerning as we see the reliance on insurance elevated through these events.”

What has happened in California underscores what could happen in other parts of the country as well, partly due to increased climate concerns.

Last year, 27 different natural disasters, from wildfires to winter storms, cost $1 billion each, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found.

Nearly half of all homes in the U.S. are now at risk of severe or extreme damage from environmental threats, according to a separate Realtor.com report.

In part because of escalating weather-related risks, home insurance rates jumped 33.8% between 2018 and 2023, rising 11.3% in 2023 alone, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

A working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found an even sharper 33% increase in average premiums just between 2020 and 2023 and that climate-exposed households will face $700 higher annual premiums by 2053.

The national average cost of home insurance is now $2,181 a year, on average, for a policy with a $300,000 dwelling limit, or about $182 per month, according to Bankrate.

What each homeowner pays depends on the home as well as the city, state and proximity to areas prone to floods, earthquakes or wildfires, among other factors, experts say.

But generally, all of those factors have caused costs to go up across the board, including the impact of extreme weather and the rising costs of repairing or rebuilding.

For example, a recent report by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau found that hundreds of thousands of homeowners are likely underinsured against the risk of flooding. Since homeowners and renters insurance policies don’t cover flood damage, that requires a separate flood insurance policy.

According to the consumer watchdog, the flood risk exposure of the mortgage market “is more extensive and more geographically dispersed than previously understood.”

Homeowners near inland streams and rivers, specifically, were less likely to have flood insurance or other financial resources to draw on to recover from a flood and “are most at risk of suffering catastrophic loss.” The report was based on a sample of mortgage applications from 2018-2022.

“I encourage people every year, when you get your renewal notice, look at that rebuilding amount and ask a contractor the average cost per square foot to rebuild,” Ruiz said. “People didn’t to pay much attention to their insurance but it’s important to understand if you need more or less — most people need more.”

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