Poverty and Inequality as the Features of New Economic Reality
The challenges and consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic are felt across many areas. The new economic reality with high levels of instability and uncertainty determines the specifics of such fundamental macroeconomic phenomena as poverty and inequality. The trends that have emerged in recent decades (global poverty reduction and convergence in the levels of development between countries) are turning on a dime. The number of the poor is growing all over the world, the degradation of the living standard and quality of life is felt in previously relatively prosperous segments of society, while inequality between and within countries increasingly threatens the stability of the global economy. The paper analyzes international measures of poverty and inequality before the pandemic and outlines the most striking trends of contemporary post-pandemic poverty and inequality.