It is no secret that the world is an unequal place when it comes to the distribution of wealth and the free exercise of political power.
This
paper pointed out that new estimates show that just eight men own
the same wealth as the poorest half of the world.
That’s
eight men in a global population of over 7 billion people.
The briefing paper went on to say:
By any measure, we are
living in the age of the super-rich, a second "gilded age" in which a
glittering surface masks social problems and corruption. Oxfam's analysis of
the super-rich includes all those individuals with a net worth of at least
$1bn. The 1,810 dollar billionaires on the 2016 Forbes list, 89% of whom are
men, own $6.5 trillion – as much wealth as the bottom 70% of humanity. While
some billionaires owe their fortunes predominantly to hard work and talent,
Oxfam's analysis of this group finds that one-third of the world’s billionaire
wealth is derived from inherited wealth, while 43% can be linked to cronyism.
On
16 January 2017 BizNews
reported that:
The
world’s 8 richest people are, in order of net worth:
1. Bill Gates: America founder of
Microsoft (net worth $75 billion)
2. Amancio
Ortega: Spanish founder of Inditex which owns the Zara fashion chain (net
worth $67 billion)
3. Warren Buffett: American CEO and
largest shareholder in Berkshire Hathaway (net worth $60.8 billion)
5. Jeff Bezos: American founder, chairman
and chief executive of Amazon (net worth: $45.2 billion)
6. Mark Zuckerberg: American chairman,
chief executive officer, and co-founder of Facebook (net worth $44.6 billion)
7. Larry
Ellison: American co-founder and CEO of Oracle (net worth $43.6
billion)
8. Michael
Bloomberg: American founder, owner and CEO of Bloomberg LP (net worth: $40
billion)
According to the
Credit Suisse Research Institute in
November 2016:
For
financial wealth at least, direct estimates for the first quarter of 2016 were
available for 27 countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Czech
Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy,
Japan, Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Singapore,
Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States. These
countries account for 76% of global wealth in 2016.
Australia’s
percentage share of global wealth was 2.5% in First quarter 2016, with 1.06 million
individuals in a population of almost 23 million holding most of that wealth.
The
wealth spread in Australia last year was calculated as:
§ 20 individuals holding over US$1 billion
each
§ 39 individuals holding US$500 million-1 billion
each
§ 685 individuals holding US$100-500
million each
§ 1,476 individuals holding US$50-100
million each
§ 25,924 individuals holding US$10-50 million
each
§ 55,812 individuals holding US$5-10
million each
§ 976,193 individuals holding US$1-5
million each
In
Australia household gross wealth was estimated to be composed of 60.6% non-financial
wealth and 39.4% financial wealth.
No comments:
Post a Comment