Metrics 2.0: Richest 2% Own Half World Wealth; Bottom 50% Own 1% - UN Report - http://www.metrics2.com/blog...
May 16, 2008
from
edythe,
Jay Collier,
gmarketer,
Brian Johns,
Thomas Brox Røst,
Richard Chen,
j1m,
Meryn Stol,
Nayan,
Jason Wehmhoener,
Mitchell Tsai,
Carla Thompson,
and
Atul Arora
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I was surprised that Africa only accounts for ~25% of the dirt poor. India's share is bigger, but they get a lot less press. Same deal with the poorer Asian countries.
- Sanjeev Singh
If you redistributed all the wealth of the richest 2% evenly, we would each get....$10,000. If you discount the people only millionaires due to their houses, we each get $6,000. Not a lot of money. A good reason why people have killed each other for wealth, and abused poor serfs. If you factor in environmental damage, I'm not sure that humankind has learned how to make wealth yet. See Cap Gemini's 2007 World Wealth Report http://www.capgemini.com/industr...
- Mitchell Tsai
If a hypothetical alien landed on Earth and was as wealthy as all humankind, the richest 1 creature would own half of world wealth. Would the rest of us be worse off? Is what matters the relative wealth (in which case we'd be better off after WW3, and everyone lives in poverty) or absolute wealth (which seems to be getting better for just about everyone)?
- Amit Patel
Fascinating, though it seems a bit manipulative to section 'Rich Asia-Pacific countries' as its own category. A little bit of selection bias there. I bet there are some other ways of making this data even more interesting, such as animating it over the last 200 years.
- Kevin Fox
Some people say that the first $10,000 of absolute wealth brings much happiness, but after that money isn't worth so much... When my mom grew up, she only ate chicken once a year on your birthday (and her family was considered a wealthy Taiwanese family). The US relative/absolute wealth debate is mostly a middle & upper-class problem. I just read a journalist's article from visiting rural China, where he made a girl unbelievably happy by buying ONE stuffed doll. She'd never had one before...
- Mitchell Tsai