ABSTRACT For over a decade, activists and scholars have sounded alarms over the extreme and growing economic inequalities in the world. In 2020, Forbes reported that there were 2095 billionaires in the world, while the World Bank recorded that 3.5 billion people lived on less than the poverty line of $5.50 per day. Such inequalities prevent the full realisation of human rights, undermine democracy and threaten peace. Economic inequalities are not inevitable however. They are the result of policy choices. As governments are obligated to respect, protect and fulfil human rights, they must take steps to ensure that their actions are consistent with their human rights obligations. Human rights impact assessment is an evidence-based method to aid governments in considering the potential human rights effects of policy options. The UN Independent Expert on Debt and Human Rights recently issued Guiding Principles on Human Rights Impact Assessment of Economic Reforms. This article reviews the Guiding Principles and argues for including a Guiding Principle on economic inequality in order to ensure that governments consider the impact of economic reforms on income and wealth inequality as critical causes of human rights violations.

中文翻译：

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经济改革的经济不平等和人权影响评估

摘要 十多年来，活动家和学者对世界上极端和日益严重的经济不平等发出了警告。2020 年，福布斯报道全球有 2095 位亿万富翁，而世界银行记录的则是 35 亿人的生活水平低于每天 5.50 美元的贫困线。这种不平等阻碍了人权的充分实现，破坏了民主并威胁到和平。然而，经济不平等并非不可避免。它们是政策选择的结果。由于政府有义务尊重、保护和实现人权，因此它们必须采取措施确保其行动符合其人权义务。人权影响评估是一种循证方法，可帮助政府考虑政策选择的潜在人权影响。联合国债务与人权问题独立专家最近发布了《经济改革人权影响评估指导原则》。本文回顾了《指导原则》并主张纳入关于经济不平等的指导原则，以确保政府将经济改革对收入和财富不平等的影响视为侵犯人权的关键原因。