The World's First Trillionaire

[August1991]

Are the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer?

Much of Protestant/Lutheran western Leftism (eg English Canada's NDP, the US Democrats) is based on "fairness". Fair? What's fair? Is it fair that the rich get richer and the poor get lesser?

Well, if you use wealth or income as a measure of fairness, from the viewpoint of the 7 billion people on this planet, the world in 2013 is much more fair than it was in 1973. Several hundred million children in China and India (among other places) live far better now than 40 years ago.

-------

I don't know who was the world's first millionaire, but I know that John D. Rockefeller was the world's first US dollar billionaire - in the late 1800s. (Rockefeller used a natural resource to invent a new way to organize a firm.) Nowadays, Bill Gates, Carlos Slim, Ingvar Kamprad are the world's richest guys. They are US $50 billionaires or so. Gates and Slim were involved in making it possible to connect people; Kamprad helped people furnish an apartment.

So, who will be the world's first trillionaire?

Here's my guess: Anyone who invents a new/better way to transfer knowledge.

Edited November 25, 2013 by August1991

[Michael Hardner]

The age of the so-called 'robber barons' was also an age where the common man did better, yet somehow people were moved to act against concentrated wealth and force them to 'share'.

Although the morality of it all does motivate people to act, it's not something you can count on to make the system work IMO. People think of themselves first, and once they're "ok" then they give a little thought to those who aren't as valorous (or lucky) as they are.

[GostHacked]

The currency is devalued compared to a couple decades ago. I make as much now as BOTH my parents did 40 years ago. But the cost of everything has gone up to match. The Trillionare is a sign that money no longer holds the value it once did. Can look back when the first millionares and billionares came about and see the progression.

The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer, that much seems to be quite evident. And I don't buy this poverty line thing that economists and others talk about saying that that more people are above the poverty line. I don't think that has been adjusted to today's wages and cost of living. IF your welfare check puts you in a bracket that is not below the poverty line, we still have a problem that these people are on welfare and that is paid by the government.

[Argus]

The currency is devalued compared to a couple decades ago. I make as much now as BOTH my parents did 40 years ago. But the cost of everything has gone up to match. The Trillionare is a sign that money no longer holds the value it once did. Can look back when the first millionares and billionares came about and see the progression.

You could buy a nice house for $500 in the nineteenth century. Even after WW2 you could get one for $5000. Now a modest condo in downtown Toronto can easily cost $500,000. There are a lot of millionaires around who aren't rich.

[Michael Hardner]

The currency is devalued compared to a couple decades ago. I make as much now as BOTH my parents did 40 years ago. But the cost of everything has gone up to match.

Hmmm ?

According to this calculator - if you're at the same income level, you should be earning 5X what somebody earned in 1973. If you're earning only twice what they earned then you're only making less than 1/2 of what they made - adjusted for inflation.

http://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/related/inflation-calculator/

The rich are getting richer, and the poor are getting poorer, that much seems to be quite evident.

No, that's not evident. Your earning power is generally better than it was in 1973 at minimum wage rates, leaving out the fact that certain things are much cheaper, such as basic technology (telephone services, electronic equipment)

And I don't buy this poverty line thing that economists and others talk about saying that that more people are above the poverty line. I don't think that has been adjusted to today's wages and cost of living.

Well, maybe you just don't believe math & statistics. Certainly there are more than a few on MLW that are like that.

[Michael Hardner]

You could buy a nice house for $500 in the nineteenth century. Even after WW2 you could get one for $5000. Now a modest condo in downtown Toronto can easily cost $500,000.

Toronto has exploded in growth since 1976, much of it at the expense of Montreal.

[bush_cheney2004]

Depends on what you mean by "rich" or "poor". The kind of grinding poverty that could easily be found in Canada or the U.S. has given way to cynical punchlines about First Nations and trailer parks with double-wides in the U.S. A Norman Lear television production like "Good Times" would struggle to find a relevant audience 40 - 50 years later. State funded health care is now a "human right", as are food and housing...even cell phone subsidies.

Methinks few people today in Canada or the U.S. really know what it means to be really poor.

[Shady]

Depends on what you mean by "rich" or "poor". The kind of grinding poverty that could easily be found in Canada or the U.S. has given way to cynical punchlines about First Nations and trailer parks with double-wides in the U.S. A Norman Lear television production like "Good Times" would struggle to find a relevant audience 40 - 50 years later. State funded health care is now a "human right", as are food and housing...even cell phone subsidies.

Methinks few people today in Canada or the U.S. really know what it means to be really poor.

Many of our poor have smart phones and cable television.

[Michael Hardner]

Many of our poor have smart phones and cable television.

Also, food and warmth. It's hard to garner anger for a revolution with a large group of overweight people who need to be home to watch their daytime television.

[Moonlight Graham]

Well, if you use wealth or income as a measure of fairness, from the viewpoint of the 7 billion people on this planet, the world in 2013 is much more fair than it was in 1973. Several hundred million children in China and India (among other places) live far better now than 40 years ago.

That's bullocks. The world isn't much more "fair" in terms of wealth. Yes, standard of living for most people in the world has gone up over the last 30-40 years...but whose standard of living has increased the most over that time, the top 1% wealth owners or the bottom 99% or so? Stats don't back up the claim that "the rich get richer and the poor get poorer", it's more accurate to say "the rich get much richer and the poor get only slightly more richer". Most on the planet have benefited in some way, but the wealthy have benefitted far more. And I'm not talking about rich vs poor countries (yes, poor countries have been growing in GDP faster than rich countries), i'm talking about rich vs poor (or non-rich) individuals within and between countries (in other words, I'm talking about people, not countries).

It's morally disgusting that a few individuals in this world have a net worth of about 70 billion dollars each (Carlos Slim, Bill Gates) while 1.3 billion people in the world live on a dollar per day or less (and therefore many of them are malnourished and have horrible healthcare, housing & sanitation etc). That kind of disparity cannot be morally justified.

[GostHacked]

Guys like Bill Gates can feed the whole world with the money they have. But the Gates Foundation is working on stuff to reduce population in growing countries under the guise of planned parenthood.

Innovating to Zero.

http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates.html

Using the CO2 meme as a base for population reduction. It's in the formula.

[Michael Hardner]

Guys like Bill Gates can feed the whole world with the money they have. But the Gates Foundation is working on stuff to reduce population in growing countries under the guise of planned parenthood.

I have a source that says about $4 Trillion to end poverty.

Zero population growth is a good idea, I'm not sure what harebrained new world order plot you're linking this to though...

[-1=e^ipi]

The USA and most developing countries have a much lower inflation rate now then they've had 30 years or earlier due to changes in monetary policy. Most central banks in developed countries have a target of low stable inflation. Both the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank have a 2% inflation target rate.

Furthermore, the USA is a developed country that has seen roughly consistent real GDP per capita growth of about 2% for the past 200 years.

Therefore, we should expect the Nominal GDP per capita of the USA to grow by approximately 4% per year.

Given that the current richest people on the planet have a networth of approximately $70 billion, we can expect that the networth of the richest person in the future to be approximately $70 billion * (1.04)^t, where t is the amount of time in years in the future from the present.

Setting this equal to $1 trillion and isolating for t gives:

t = ln(100/7)/ln(1.04) = 67.8 years.

Therefore, the first person who will be a trillionaire is either not born yet or probably a young infant. So your question is silly, we cannot even guess who the first trillionaire will be cause that event will happen in the distant future.

If I were to guess what the person who becomes the first trillionaire does, my guess is it will be someone who develops a business that creates new organs/bodies from people's stem cells, thereby greatly increasing people's life spans to near immortal levels.

[Bonam]

If I were to guess what the person who becomes the first trillionaire does, my guess is it will be someone who develops a business that creates new organs/bodies from people's stem cells, thereby greatly increasing people's life spans to near immortal levels.

Except that that (drastic life extension) is likely to happen within the next 10-20 years, rather than the 60-70 year timeframe you offered for the first trillionaire.

The other thing you didn't consider is wealth concentration (or deconcentration). The US economy may be growing 4%/year in nominal terms, but how is the ratio of the net worth of the richest person over the size of the US economy evolving?

[-1=e^ipi]

Except that that (drastic life extension) is likely to happen within the next 10-20 years, rather than the 60-70 year timeframe you offered for the first trillionaire.

I am not as optimistic as you about how soon such technology will become available.

The other thing you didn't consider is wealth concentration (or deconcentration). The US economy may be growing 4%/year in nominal terms, but how is the ratio of the net worth of the richest person over the size of the US economy evolving?

Changes in income distribution are more difficult to evaluate. But I think that my 67.8 year estimate remains decent.

[Bonam]

I am not as optimistic as you about how soon such technology will become available.

Changes in income distribution are more difficult to evaluate. But I think that my 67.8 year estimate remains decent.

It works as a first order estimate, yes. In regards to life extension technology, that's obviously it's own thread, but I have followed the field with some interest and the understanding of aging mechanisms and how to address them is progressing very rapidly. I think the first person who will live to be a thousand years old is alive today.

[ReeferMadness]

The age of the so-called 'robber barons' was also an age where the common man did better, yet somehow people were moved to act against concentrated wealth and force them to 'share'.

Although the morality of it all does motivate people to act, it's not something you can count on to make the system work IMO. People think of themselves first, and once they're "ok" then they give a little thought to those who aren't as valorous (or lucky) as they are.

The common man did better than what??

[ReeferMadness]

Are the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer?

Much of Protestant/Lutheran western Leftism (eg English Canada's NDP, the US Democrats) is based on "fairness". Fair? What's fair? Is it fair that the rich get richer and the poor get lesser?

Well, if you use wealth or income as a measure of fairness, from the viewpoint of the 7 billion people on this planet, the world in 2013 is much more fair than it was in 1973. Several hundred million children in China and India (among other places) live far better now than 40 years ago.

Well, it's true that the average standard of living in the poor masses in India and China have approved but at what cost?

1. Their countries have been terribly polluted
2. The low wages have killed middle class jobs in developed countries
3. Even worse, the low wages retard development of labour-saving equipment

[Topaz]

I went surfing and asked the question..is there any trillionaires and one of the answers was the following article. After reading this, do you think there's ANY truth to it??? http://rense.com/general79/tril.htm

[Michael Hardner]

The common man did better than what??

Did better than, say, the pre-industrial age... which was better than the age before that and so on.

Prosperity benefits all of human kind over the long term...

[Bonam]

I went surfing and asked the question..is there any trillionaires and one of the answers was the following article. After reading this, do you think there's ANY truth to it???

Nope.

[dre]

No, that's not evident. Your earning power is generally better than it was in 1973 at minimum wage rates, leaving out the fact that certain things are much cheaper, such as basic technology (telephone services, electronic equipment)

Inflation is a personal phenomenon. If you make enough to buy a lot of non-durables after paying for your non discretional spending, then inflation might be flat for you or you might even be able to afford more stuff.

But if you are a low income earner that spends all your money on shelter, food, electricity, gas, etc... then your purchasing power has decreased dramatically. Gas costs about twice what it did ten years ago. Fresh produce and meat cost a lot more. Electricity costs about twice what it did ten years ago in most places.

[dre]

It's morally disgusting that a few individuals in this world have a net worth of about 70 billion dollars each (Carlos Slim, Bill Gates) while 1.3 billion people in the world live on a dollar per day or less

The really brutal thing is that all that wealth concentration could not happen without massive monetary expansion, and virtually all monetary expansion happens through the extension of debt/credit. In other words for every single dollar that has been concentrated into the hands of the wealthy, the general public now OWES a dollar. We will be working for generations in order to fund the incredible wealth marshaled by a small group of people.

[Michael Hardner]

The really brutal thing is that all that wealth concentration could not happen without massive monetary expansion,

Here's a question - wasn't there concentration of wealth before we had reserve banking even ? From what I can tell, this has happened way back to Sumeria and the invention of money.

[dre]

Here's a question - wasn't there concentration of wealth before we had reserve banking even ? From what I can tell, this has happened way back to Sumeria and the invention of money.

Yes wealth has concentrated then deconcentrated for thousands of years. The difference is that one person having a bunch of money did not mean that everyone else had a corresponding public or private debt. And in systems where people had political representation, concentration of wealth would actually decrease simply because the money required for a small ammount of people accumulate that much did not physically exist.

And the debt that is accumulating to allow this concentration eats away at government revenue which decreases spending that benefits everyone, like infrastructure and social programs. Eventually it will lead to austerity measures and youll start to see a lot of people really suffering.