Capitalism isn’t doing as well as all of those people who read Ayn Rand would like you to believe.
Even the world’s richest people are taking some knocks due to weak stock markets and unpredictable economic forces.
According to Forbes, there are only 2 153 billionaires in the world now. That’s 55 fewer than a year ago – shame.
Of those, a record 994 are a bit “poorer” than they were last year.
Relatively speaking, of course.
So let’s take a look at the top 10. Spoiler alert, they’re all old, white, and male.
To give you a sense of the numbers on that list, Larry Page in 10th is worth a cool $50,8 billion.
Jeff Bezos is still holding the top spot – for now. His upcoming divorce could split his fortune in two, which would drop him to a lower ranking.
His wife, on the other hand, will become the richest woman in the world, unseating Francoise Bettencourt Meyers, who currently ranks 15 overall.
We’ll forgive Bill Gates his money because he actually uses it for good, unlike Zuckerberg, who won eighth position by running a morally suspect operation, and literally doesn’t care about anything.
Warren Buffett has come a long way since learning how to use email. He also has some suspect eating habits, but I guess you can do what you want when you’re that rich.
There are also some newcomers to the overall list who could potentially climb the ranks in the next few years.
195 newcomers joined the ranks. The richest newcomer is Colin Huang, the founder of Chinese discount web retailer Pinduoduo, which went public in the U.S. in July.
Other notable new entrants include Spotify’s Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon; Juul Labs’ James Monsees and Adam Bowen, Kind Bar’s Daniel Lubetzky and cosmetics wunderkind Kylie Jenner, who is the world’s youngest billionaire at age 21.
Kylie Jenner also likes to steal a lot, so we’ll see how long that lasts. Lawsuits are expensive.
All I have to say is bring on the revolution.
[source:forbes]
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