The United States had 565 billionaires in 2016 and also the richest man on the planet, Bill Gates. His fortune was $86 billion last year, and it increased to $89.9 billion on August 6th, 2017. That same day the Spanish Amancio Ortega, the founder of Zara, had the second place with $84.9 billion. The next position was for Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, with a fortune of $84.1 billion. Even more, for a short time, Jeff Bezos became richer than Bill Gates. The wealth of the founder of Amazon increased to more than $90 billion a few days ago, but he was surpassed by the founder of Microsoft again.
Many Americans have become wealthy because of technology, among them we can mention Sergei Brin, Michael Dell, Larry Ellison and others.
China, Germany, India, and Russia among the first ones
China forgot the ideas of Marx and Mao a long time ago, the most populated country on the planet has 319 billionaires. Even more, China has 387 billionaires if we include Hong Kong and Macau. Germany has the third place with 114 super rich. The population of billionaires grows fast in India; they are already 101. Russia has 96 super wealthy people, and Moscow is a city with one of the biggest populations of billionaires on the planet. The Russian economy has had many changes the last decades.
The US has many billionaires because its economy is the biggest
There are many billionaires in the US because the American economy is more than $19 trillion, the US is stronger than many people believe. The next biggest economy is China with more than $11 trillion. Japan is third; its Gross Domestic Product is almost $5 trillion.
Germany, the economic engine of Europe, has a GDP of almost $3.5 trillion. The GDP of India is almost $2.5 trillion, and the Russian economy is more than $1.5 trillion.
There is a huge disparity between rich and poor in some countries
The American per capita income was more than $56,000 in 2016; the German one surpassed $41,000 that year.
On the other hand, India had a per capita of just $1,850. Mukesh Ambani, the richest man in India, lives in a house that is worth more than $1 billion. Antilia is the most expensive house in the world; it's located in Mumbai which is the financial capital of India. Russia has a big number of rich people, but its minimum wage is less than $130 per month, this is incredibly low for a country with a skilled workforce. The transition from Socialism to Capitalism was painful, and the economy fell for many years.
