
Jeff Bezos Is Now the World's Second Richest Person - huangc10
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-29/bezos-rises-to-become-world-s-second-richest-with-amazon-surge
======
tabeth
Everytime I see these types of articles I wonder if we're still in feudalism.
Should we really be celebrating that a single individual is worth more than
hundreds of millions of people[1]? I dunno, it seems _dystopian_ , like we're
enslaved to the system.

[1]
[https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2017-01-16/...](https://www.oxfam.org/en/pressroom/pressreleases/2017-01-16/just-8-men-
own-same-wealth-half-world)

~~~
mjfl
I think that's a little hyperbolic. In feudalism the balance of power is
enforced by violence, whereas Jeff Bezos got rich because you gave him money
in exchange for products. Like,

"Hey, here's this cool electronic device called the Amazon Echo for $50."

is a markedly different from

"Farm here or I'll decapitate you."

The fact that you harbor a resentment as if the former is anything like the
latter is slightly terrifying.

~~~
habosa
This reminds me of Nozick's Wilt Chamberlain example, which I will quote here:

> Nozick's famous Wilt Chamberlain argument is an attempt to show that
> patterned principles of just distribution are incompatible with liberty. He
> asks us to assume that the original distribution in society, D1, is ordered
> by our choice of patterned principle, for instance Rawls's Difference
> Principle. Wilt Chamberlain is an extremely popular basketball player in
> this society, and Nozick further assumes 1 million people are willing to
> freely give Chamberlain 25 cents each to watch him play basketball over the
> course of a season (we assume no other transactions occur). Chamberlain now
> has $250,000, a much larger sum than any of the other people in the society.
> This new distribution in society, call it D2, obviously is no longer ordered
> by our favored pattern that ordered D1. However Nozick argues that D2 is
> just. For if each agent freely exchanges some of his D1 share with the
> basketball player and D1 was a just distribution (we know D1 was just,
> because it was ordered according to your favorite patterned principle of
> distribution), how can D2 fail to be a just distribution? Thus Nozick argues
> that what the Wilt Chamberlain example shows is that no patterned principle
> of just distribution will be compatible with liberty. In order to preserve
> the pattern, which arranged D1, the state will have to continually interfere
> with people's ability to freely exchange their D1 shares, for any exchange
> of D1 shares explicitly involves violating the pattern that originally
> ordered it.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchy,_State,_and_Utopia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchy,_State,_and_Utopia)

~~~
indeed_thetruth
This argument is trivially inconsistent. The state must protect liberty by
interfering with one's liberty?

State interfence is a direct transgression against an individual's liberty.
Thus far the majority has decided that such interfence is a greater evil than
the "inequality" that it _could_ reconcile.

~~~
dredmorbius
Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I
contain multitudes!

[https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/waltwhitma132584...](https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/waltwhitma132584.html)

~~~
carapace
(You dropped a clause.)

~~~
dredmorbius
I contradict myself _and_ mis-quote Whitman.

------
sudhirj
I just don't get this complaining about wealth concentration - for every
person capable of complaining on an online forum that some people have 100 to
1000x the wealth they do, there are also likely to be more people that exist
who have 1000x less than you. How exactly am I any more entitled to the wealth
of those richer than me, than are those poorer than me entitled to my
(relative) wealth?

It seems to me that the problem with the totem pole is that each level is
logarithmic, but always talked about in absolute terms. If my boss makes 10x
and her boss makes 10x of what she makes, aspiring to 100x my wealth looks
like a completely impossible goal in my lifetime - but it's really just two
promotions.

An argument could be made that some people try to sabotage those attempting to
climb the totem pole, but once someone has reached the top and did not
illegally interact with anyone they passed on the climb, why all the hate?

~~~
efaref
The problem isn't that Bezos has 1,000x my net worth. He has 1,000,000x my
(approximate) net worth. One millionth of my net worth is seven cents, so
Bezos:me is me:$0.07.

The graph isn't logarithmic. It's shaped like this:

    
    
                    |
                    |
                    |
        ____________|

~~~
averagewall
Norway has a $900 billion sovereign wealth fund. Is that a problem too? If you
never heard about Bezos's wealth, would you suffer any troubles because of it?
I think it's fine.

~~~
metaphorm
Norway's sovereign wealth fund is managed on behalf of all the people of
Norway and there are political systems in place that grants those people some
influence over how that money is used, and who benefits from it.

Bezos' wealth (and all the massive political power it represents) is almost
totally unaccountable. This is the real problem of wealth inequality. It's not
that some people have more material goods than others. It's that levels of
wealth like that undermine the political systems that we have constructed to
seek fair, just, and peaceful resolution of disputes. It is a road to tyranny.

------
Keyframe
Kudos to him, hopefully he will go all in on some crazy idea eventually. I
still have this feeling amazon (as in online store) isn't all that big outside
of US/english-speaking world.

I do have a question though. When you have that much net worth and you get
plastered all over the press about how much you have... What do you do then?
What's your life then like? Seems like a nightmare, especially if you have
kids and family. Do you become a prisoner of your own wealth then, guarded by
people - never be able to just roam about, take a random tourist tour with
your spouse, a road trip or whatever? Money is nice to have, but there are
things you definitely lose, it seems. Is it worth it to be at that level?

~~~
blueside
until the competition is completely annihilated, jeff is not content.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
You say that like it's a bad thing.[0] If you had a business (assuming you
don't for the sake of argument), no competition would be amazing! People could
ONLY come to you for your product or service.

[0] The truth is in the middle.

~~~
ionised
Monopolies are only good fore the monopoly and bad for everyone else in
society.

Monopolies mean no choice, no competition, low innovation and high prices

------
mvpu
Thanks to you. And me. Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffet have our paychecks
covered. Warren's companies take most of what we spend offline, Jeff's
companies take most of what we spend online.

------
dkrich
I know that I'll get skewered for this, but here goes: recently I've convinced
myself we are on the verge of a very serious Amazon stock correction. Just
today I saw three separate articles (without seeking them out) giving umpteen
reasons Amazon is going to a trillion, or that Amazon is only getting started.
Then I turned on CNBC during lunch and what are they talking about? Amazon.

There's simply too much positive sentiment around this company and it makes me
very nervous. It reminds me of 2007 when everyone was making a killing on real
estate and the idea was laughable that the market would reverse. The stock is
way overbought and the only questions I have are "by how much?" And "when is
the reversal coming?"

There are other reasons I'm skeptical about Amazon remaining at its current
valuation. One major one is that the meteoric rise in the stock price has
coincided nicely with the economic recovery. Amazon's ecommerce business is
one that's built for good times. It remains to be seen how they fare in
downtimes. What I mean by that is that much of what I see people buy on Amazon
(myself included) are largely frivolous gadgets that one simply wouldn't buy
in a time of economic fear. Right now people largely feel wealthy and feel
comfortable shelling out for prime memberships and willing to pay a premium
for convenience. In a down economy that's the first thing to go.

Of course a down economy will weigh heavily on most companies, but I believe
especially so on Amazon because it is a stock that is already overbought and
relies on people buying shit they don't need for the sake of convenience.

Apart from that I believe they will face increasing competition from Alibaba,
Walmart, and others.

Finally, there are the numbers. Despite the $400+ billion valuation, Amazon
did less that a billion in profit from their ecommerce business last quarter!
The stock shot up because that was higher than analysts predicted!

I have serious doubts about the long term profitability of Amazon's ecommerce
business. Physical delivery of goods, particularly last mile delivery is just
too expensive. Sure, drones might come but I wouldn't base an investment on
that hope.

My prediction is that an economic downturn is going to send this stock into a
tailspin.

~~~
ricardo_piano
Amazon already went through 2 downturns. Dot com bubble and the last
recession. During the recession they faired extremely well.

they've been facing tough competition from Walmart since the late 90s. Alibaba
is still miles away from competing in the same areas as Amazon although that
will change with time. For now, if you're a consumer, aliexpress is only good
for buying cheap low quality items.

If there's something they've figured out, it's logistics and how to deliver a
product as fast and cheap as possible. Everything about their system is
optimized for this. Now with their venture into contract companies to deliver
goods they can bypass more expensive UPS delivery.

Now do I think they're stock is overvalued? Yes, but I don't see a doomsday
scenario happening.

~~~
dkrich
The difference to me is the valuation- during previous downturns they weren't
trading at a $400 billion market cap.

I think a lot of people assume that because they're amazon that they'll crack
the last mile delivery problem, a problem that FedEx and ups, two exceedingly
smart and successful and well run companies have not, not to mention the usps.
FedEx and UPS want no part of last mile delivery because there's no money in
it. The money is in flying it across the country with 300,000 other parcels.
I'm very skeptical that Amazon can warehouse and deliver goods to your door
with a significant margin, and a significant profit margin is what will
eventually be required to justify a $400 billion valuation.

To date, this has not been the case, and the fact is that while they've made
shopping an amazingly easy process, they haven't made a lot of money doing so,
certainly not compared to the few other companies trading at similar
valuations.

I'm not predicting a doomsday scenario in that amazon is going to go belly up.
I just think the stock is headed for a dive.

~~~
thinkling
Not having net profits does not mean that parts of your business are not
profitable.

You may want to take a closer look at Amazon's financials and see what kind of
free cash flow they're generating before they reinvest that cash in expansion
and new businesses. Net operating cash flow for 2016 was $16B and the trend is
strongly upwards.

[https://secure.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/AMZN/financia...](https://secure.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/AMZN/financials/cash-
flow)

~~~
dkrich
Right, but free cash flow is one of the most common areas of a balance sheet
to use deceptive accounting to show huge numbers. Amazon is notorious for
this, actually, particularly with their widespread use of capital leases. A
big reason that that number has jumped so much is because of their increased
investment in AWS hardware which they lease instead of purchasing.

~~~
thinkling
Why is leasing equipment considered deceptive rather than a cost-cutting
measure?

------
nier
Would it be possible for a guy like Jeff to sell all his stock and convert his
wealth to, let’s say, gold? The motivation for my question is my doubt that
the different sources of wealth are comparable. So this ranking is
hypothetical. Wouldn’t the stock price drop if someone was to sell so many
shares?

~~~
tucaz
I believe you are correct. In theory he would be able to turn all his assets
into money, but probably he would loose huges amount of it in the process due
to the effect you mentioned.

I guess these rankings are just rankings. It's an abstract way to value what
someone have (or could potentially have) with no relationship to absolute
truth.

~~~
badosu
I am sorry for sidetracking on this, but I need to understand why I am reading
so much 'loose' here on HN.

Is this error being used with intent? I have no interest in shaming grammar
errors, it's just that I am seeing this too often here, in the same place
where I read great arguments.

English is not my native language, so maybe this is a colloquial use of the
word?

~~~
houst0n_
Me too!!

Nah its an error.. I don't know why it's made so often..

Maybe it was happening all the time and we only started noticing it?

It irritates me far less than your/you're tho ;)

~~~
OJFord
Your write, its an error made all to often. Many people are loser with
spelling and grammer online than is you and me.

~~~
houst0n_
Argh, the pain! Have an upvote for making me cringe with just two sentences ;)

------
israrkhan
it is amazing how Bill Gates remain richest person in the world despite
donating billions to Melinda & Gates foundation.

~~~
legulere
You know what would have been even more amazing? If Microsoft had not landed
in its monopolistic position it had. Then all that money that landed at bill
gates which is even more, could have been spent earlier on philanthropic
means.

~~~
behrlich
Why do you think that money would have necessarily gone to philanthropy?

------
nojvek
World's two richest men from Seattle tech companies. I hope some of this money
translates to venture capital. Number of successful startups in Seattle pale
in comparison to SV

~~~
gitah
They're also neighbors who live in the same neighborhood:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medina,_Washington](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medina,_Washington)

You can kinda see both of their mansions (covered by privacy hedges) when
driving across the SR-520.

~~~
nojvek
That's just nuts. Should have bought a property in Medina back in the day.
Would have seen great appreciation by today.

------
72deluxe
It is interesting to know that Bill Gates is still the world's richest.
Thinking about how little I have directly spent with Microsoft is interesting.

I bought Windows 3.11 from a computer fair. I got Windows 95 from school
(proper CD, not a pirate). I bought a computer that came with Windows 98 (and
a lame Cyrix processor), got an XP licence from a case someone was throwing
out, skipped Vista, bought Windows 7 Pro system builder from eBay (proper
version, no pirate copy, I don't like pirating software). I then got a free
upgrade to Windows 10.

Hardware, I think I bought an xbox 360 controller for the PC. I got given an
old generation 1 xbox (since retired) and a load of games. Bought Office 2003
from eBay (proper version, OEM with hardware to satisfy licence) when Office
2007 was all the rage (so it was cheap). I think my brother once bought a
Sidewinder joystick (had the footprint of a large dinosaur, such a big piece
of hardware).

Then I used the Express editions of SQL Server (MSDE before that), Express
editions of Visual Studio and now the Community as I am a Lone Ranger
developer at home.

Oh and I bought a laptop that had Windows 10 on it so I guess they had a cut
of its value.

So basically Microsoft have had very little direct money from me, despite
basically being responsible for my employment for the last 15 years (I write
apps under Windows).

I have spent more money with Parallels Inc as they force me to "upgrade" every
year (every other year if I can help it) despite Apple introducing a new
virtualisation layer a couple of releases ago.

So thanks Bill.

------
laughfactory
He would be wise to cash out now while the getting is good. Amazon has an
enormous problem with counterfeit goods in many categories. Unfortunately,
when the implosion happens it will likely be incredibly fast and catastrophic.
How might this happen? People get sketched out by their own, or other's
experiences with fraud on Amazon, and simply decide to buy from other sources.
I suspect this is a tipping point situation where it's not a slow decline, but
instead a very fast one. For instance, my wife and I used to do most of our
non-grocery shopping on Amazon. But recent horrific experiences (in spite of
Jeff and his team stepping in to rectify things) and questions about what we'd
actually get if we order something from Amazon means that now we don't buy
nearly as much--mostly just Kindle books now. I just think that at some point
most of their customers will stop shopping with them all at once because of
fraud concerns, they'll stop subscribing to Prime, and next thing we know the
company will be broken up and sold piecemeal.

I'm afraid Amazon thinks they have a lot more time than they actually do to
think about what, if anything, they want to do about the problem.

------
11thEarlOfMar
With a little math, we are not-too-many years from the world's first US$
trillionaire.

Using Mr. Bezos as the example:

US$ 72,000,000,000

Annualized gain of, say, 10% on AMZN stock

Over a period of 27.6 years

1.1^27.6 * US$72,000,000,000 = ~US$ 1,000,000,000,000

Just in time for his 80th birthday.

~~~
loeg
Assuming 27 years of 10% compounding is quite the leap.

~~~
11thEarlOfMar
Since 1990 (27 years ago) McDonald's has returned 10.87%, including the
Internet Bubble and Subprime Mortgage crashes.

March 30, 1990: $7.38

March 29, 2017: $128.84

I am not saying it'll be Bezos, but someone will get there within the next 2-3
decades.

[edit] And while I'm at it, AMZN has returned 36%, annualized, over the last
10 years, encompassing the Subprime Mortgage crash.

~~~
bpicolo
Inflation alone means eventually someone will. (Just like Rockefeller's
adjusted fortune is 300-400billlion)

~~~
adventured
Rockefeller's adjusted fortune is not $300-$400 billion. It's a lot closer to
$30 to $40 billion in fact.

That huge fake number - which has been thrown around the Web for more than a
decade - is derived from the GDP share.

It goes like this. Rockefeller in 1915 (pick the year), was worth the
equivalent of 1/37th of the US GDP. Therefore, adjusted to today, Rockefeller
would be worth $bazillion (1/37th of $19 trillion; which used to be more like
$12b-$14b when the fake premise originally started floating about).

If you dig into the calculation that was / is used on that $300-$400 billion,
that's where it's coming from in every instance.

In fact, Gates is objectively far richer than Rockefeller ever was, just not
in relation to the US economy size at present. Rockefeller was worth between
$1 and $2 billion at his peak, in his time. The inflation adjustment on $1
from 1910 to now, is _not_ 300x or 400x. It's closer to 20x to 30x. If it were
300x, Ford's famous $5 per day pay rate (from 1914), would be ... $1500 per
day. Laughable obviously; the 300x+ doesn't pass any challenge thrown at it.

~~~
hyperpallium
Yes, not in terms of buying power, but success in terms of proportion of GDP
seems a reasonable measure. It must be harder to make the same amount of money
in a smaller market. It also shows how well you did relative to others, and
may be a better measure of how much actual power you have over others.

Just use the proportion 1/37 instead of converting to dollars, or I agree it's
misleading.

Also: perhaps, $1500 per day today _is_ reflective of our buying power in a
way, if we consider new inventions like TV, smartphones, internet, air-travel,
when the closest equivalents back then were much more expensive.

~~~
loeg
> Also: perhaps, $1500 per day today is reflective of our buying power in a
> way

(A little sarcastic, sorry:) Yes, if we ignore all of the things we buy that
have gotten more expensive, it's like prices have deflated.</s>

Overall inflation measures a collection of consumer prices, the average of
which has trended up since that time. It is a general reflection of buying
power, dollar for dollar.

~~~
hyperpallium
Of course you're right that the accepted measures of inflation would have
already considered and addressed the issue. And I would guess that
fundamentals like food and land/housing have indeed gotten more expensive.

I'm a little intrigued though: shouldn't technological progress and
"accelerating returns" have made things cheaper? I do see for land, that
location is a monopoly ("they aren't making any more" \- at least, in that
spot, in that community, with that access). I wonder how much similar market
effects have "artificially" kept other prices high? An oligopoly or silent
collusion/combination between sellers (e.g. as happened for flat TVs).

Also, I wonder if a different lifestyle is possible, leaning more heavily on
those aspects that _have_ gotten cheaper (one e.g. living remotely and working
remotely or independently).

Anyway, I'm glad you agreed with my other points, I'm assuming.

~~~
loeg
> And I would guess that fundamentals like food and land/housing have indeed
> gotten more expensive. > > I'm a little intrigued though: shouldn't
> technological progress and "accelerating returns" have made things cheaper?
> I do see for land, that location is a monopoly ("they aren't making any
> more" \- at least, in that spot, in that community, with that access).

Healthcare and education costs have increased hugely, housing costs moderately
(moreso in the big cities). Overall inflation is somewhat offset by food and
electronics getting much cheaper.

> I wonder how much similar market effects have "artificially" kept other
> prices high? An oligopoly or silent collusion/combination between sellers
> (e.g. as happened for flat TVs).

The healthcare marketplace is pretty terrible. Perverse incentives, no pricing
transparency, etc is at least part of rapidly increasing costs. Oddly
education has gotten much more expensive as well, including K-12, and there
doesn't seem to be an obvious reason there.

> Also, I wonder if a different lifestyle is possible, leaning more heavily on
> those aspects that have gotten cheaper (one e.g. living remotely and working
> remotely or independently).

Yeah. If you can swing a remote tech job living in a low or moderate cost of
living area, you can save enough to retire (in that LCOL location) in a couple
years. It can really be single digit years if you can keep your saving rate
above 90%.

~~~
hyperpallium
Interesting, it's a bit different here in Australia, we have free healthcare,
free education and incredibly high house prices (eg ordinary house in suburbs
> $1 million; 2br unit almost $0.5 million). Of course, those first two aren't
actually "free" and eg drug prices can be very high.

Patented drugs are at least something new - you're getting better tech,
enhancing or even saving your life, to an extent previously impossible. The
"standard" cost of drugs increases with our expectations, but also their true
value. Inflation measures mightn't account for this. eg basics like aspirin
and ibuprofen are dirt cheap these days.

House and education prices are above their actual utility; a bubble, an
insidious monopoly, or something else.

Isn;t educatiin high because it's a false ticket to a "good job"? i.e. people
get it for that reason (not for the education itself, or for a market demand
for that specific skillset/knowledge), but the jobs aren't there, so they
double down. Demand for education exceeds supply so the price goes up. Yes,
more places are made available to meet demand, but they lack the prestige (and
network effects) of the top institutions... On it goes. Mightn't apply to K12
though (that's highschool I guess?).

LCOL is it. BTW I used to want to retire, now I want to be able to work on
projects. That's a subset, I guess.

------
aabajian
Worth noting that Gates leads by a _$10 billion_ margin.

~~~
adventured
And that's after Bloomberg weirdly adjusted his net worth down by about
$12-$15 billion recently, right before he was about to cross $100 billion
again for the first time since the dotcom bubble.

They left a note on his profile in the billionaires list that says:

"The net worth history for Bill Gates was changed to reflect a revised
approach to the valuation that was applied on Jan. 27, 2017."

Which is probably another way of saying, that he put in a favor with Michael
Bloomberg to not show him crossing $100 billion, as he doesn't want the
headlines.

------
timothycrosley
For all the hype Silicon Valley gets, the companies of the world's 2 richest
people are in the Seattle area.

~~~
seizethecheese
Seattle has one of the lowest amounts of sun per year of all metros in the
USA. It selects for those who are serious about work, more than weather.

~~~
drewrv
The weather isn't that bad here. It's overcast a lot and there are a lot of
"rainy" days but it's usually a light mist or sprinkle. It rarely drops below
freezing in the winter and the summers, while short, have long days and are
quite dry. Maybe the bay area has better weather but I'd take Seattle weather
over most of the US (Chicago, Austin, NY, DC, etc)

~~~
rifung
Perhaps this is because I am from California, but having lived in Seattle for
the last 3 years, the hardest part isn't the rain or cold but the lack of sun.

My previous manager at Amazon told me he recommended everyone who came from
California to take a vacation back during the winter lest they get too
depressed.

------
nodesocket
Buffett should just buy a bunch of $AMZN so he keeps on par with Bezos.
Buffett is not greedy, but he is ultra competitive. I look forward to going to
my first annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting this May.

------
bluedino
I am failing to see how someone who founded a company that hasn't made > $1B
in profit over each of the last twenty years can have a fortune of $75B

~~~
adventured
It's pretty simple. The market has been valuing Amazon - from day one since
its IPO - with an eye on the _future_ value of its cash flow / net income.
Certainly many investors and competitors have regarded that constant pushing
off of the profitability expectations (for two decades), as unfair.

Since Amazon began showing off AWS financial figures, the stock has more than
doubled. The market has priced in AWS as being worth perhaps $150 billion or
more. AWS is making a lot of money, and it's going to make a lot more over the
next five years.

Investors likely expect that given the immense scale of the business and the
fact that it's still growing at 20%+ (remarkably), the future prospect of
Amazon generating, say, $16+ billion in net income, is reasonable to expect.
One can then debate whether it's rational to be granting that valuation to
Amazon today, if it'll take another ten years to produce the $16 billion
annually (pulling future returns forward, the cause of Microsoft's 15 years of
stagnation in regards to its stock).

------
alnitak
How is Bezos making money? Amazon doesn't seem to generate enough dividends to
reach this amount of wealth, or does it?

~~~
eloisant
It's only by choice that Amazon doesn't generate dividends.

~~~
jondubois
That's speculation. Maybe the low prices are the real reason why Amazon is
doing so well.

~~~
adenadel
The reason Amazon doesn't issue dividends is not because their prices/margins
are too low. It's because they are constantly reinvesting in the business.

~~~
Scuds
AWS is their real cash cow, but it gets stupid amounts of R&D funds put back
into it. Azure is right behind them.

------
blisterpeanuts
Some fun facts: Jeff Bezos owns 80.9 million shares of AMZN (or did in
September), which is about 17% of the company. Over 60% of the company is held
by institutional shareholders, led by Vanguard. His annual salary is $100K. He
appeared in Star Trek Beyond as a Star Fleet official. In his spare time, he
runs a spaceship company.[1]

I've always admired Amazon and have been a customer of theirs since the late
90s when it was mainly a bookseller. For a while I owned a few hundred shares,
but sold them for a slight profit. Had I held onto them... sigh...

Jeff Bezos is one of America's great entrepreneurs, along with Gates, Musk,
Ellison, and a handful of others. This is America at its best. We could do
worse than to produce such amazing and successful technology innovators.

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Bezos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Bezos)

~~~
aanm1988
> His annual salary is $100K

I would have guessed 160.

------
frgtpsswrdlame
So is Bezos our modern day Carnegie or Rockefeller?

~~~
zdean
As a reference example, Rockefeller was worth over $300 billion in 2007
dollars:

[https://www.google.com/search?q=Rockefeller&oq=Rockefeller&a...](https://www.google.com/search?q=Rockefeller&oq=Rockefeller&aqs=chrome..69i57&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#q=Rockefeller+wealth&*)

~~~
nroets
The $300 billion was estimated by assuming that his assets expand with US
economic output. That makes no sense because the US population grew
substantially (and the US economy has diversified into many new fields).

------
webkike
Unless Putin is on this list I doubt its veracity.

~~~
samstave
maybe they dont count corruption?

~~~
zzzeek
maybe they should.

~~~
astrodust
When you're embezzling money the last thing you want is to reveal enough
information about your stash to show up on these lists.

Saddam Hussein obviously had tons of liquid assets but the totality of them
was never truly known. It was all squirreled away, and likely stolen by the
caretakers when his regime imploded and the threat of retribution was removed.

How much did Pablo Esbobar have at his peak? We can only guess, but given the
staggering cash-flow rate of an estimated $500 million _per week_ , perhaps as
much as $30 billion. This is 1980s dollars, too. Adjusted for inflation that's
absolutely nuts.

~~~
samstave
in the /r/conspiracy realm - it is widely believed that the reason for
Gaddafi's execution was to go after the billions he had - and to take him
down. The idea is that the Benghazi fiasco was let loose by the state dept so
that HRC could loot Libya... its not provable - but the fact is that Gaddafi
was one of the worlds richest ppl - and the rumor is that HRC and cabal stole
all his loot.

He was worth a reportable 70 billion.... and unknown amount off-books...

He was murdered for his money. And anyone who says that is not true is fucking
clueless about what the fuck is actually happening in this world at that
level.

[http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/573aeac75632a39...](http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/573aeac75632a39742ed39a0/)

~~~
openasocket
OK, I know I shouldn't feed the trolls, but this is just crazy.

So, in your scenario, HRC wants Gaddafi's money. So she orchestrates an attack
on a US embassy nearly a year after he died, as a false flag operation. And
then we sent people in get the money. Of course, officially we didn't send
anyone in Libya in response to the attacks except some more marines to guard
the embassy, so this group that went in to get the money did so secretly. But
then why did they need to orchestrate the attack on the embassy? Why not just
send spies in under cover? Also, where is the money in scenario? Is there some
big fucking safe filled with gold bars in his palace that none of the
militants have touched in that last year?

Oh, also you don't think Gaddafi's execution had anything to do with a
prolonged civil war and numerous human rights violations? Or did Clinton also
invent the Arab Spring and force Gaddafi to be a brutal dictator for decades?

~~~
samstave
OK, first, I am not trolling - and I didn't state that this was my belief per-
se...

I do find all the Benghazi BS to be super weird - but thats just me without
all the facts...

However, it is a documentable fact that Gaddafi may have been the richest
documentable person (clearly we are ignoring the Rothschilds etc...) in the
world...

He had vast assets and liquid cash all over the place. This is known - so do
not accuse me of trolling on facts...

Further, it is known that HRC is a corrupt person (proven via her emails and
many many other resources -- if you are unaware of this, then you're simply
unaware and I am not trolling)

I said that it is RUMORED to have been financial motivation to go after
Gaddafi... did you ever see the list of countries that Clark said the .gov was
going to go after? Libya was on that list...

now, I shall admit my ignorance - as I am not entirely familiar with the
libyan civil war, but I know my CIA history a fair bit... arab spring was an
op. to foment a varied amount of things... civil wars here, uprisings there,
extremests wherever... and change all over.

I never said Gaddafi was some benevolent anything -- I said he was sought for
his money and executed CIA fashion.

so.. let me ask you: What happened to all the 70+++ billion dollars Gaddafi
had? He was killed - what happened to his wealth?

I know that you have no fucking clue. So... what is your speculation?

Where did his funds go?

[http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/573aeac75632a39...](http://panamapapers.sueddeutsche.de/articles/573aeac75632a39742ed39a0/)

~~~
openasocket
I'd imagine a lot of his liquid assets were seized by militants. From some
googling, it seems some portion of his wealth was in a bunch of real estate he
owned. I imagine those have also been seized, those that weren't destroyed.
But the most part his wealth was invested in several western countries. Per
[http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/21/world/la-fg-
kadafi-m...](http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/21/world/la-fg-kadafi-
money-20111022) that money has been seized by the governments in question. But
before you go "see, HRC took the money!" those assets were seized over a year
before the war in Libya, so it's unrelated. That which hasn't been seized has
probably been taken by his various money managers.

~~~
astrodust
People that are very good at hiding money for the ludicrously and criminally
rich are also, not surprisingly, very good at making money disappear.

If your biggest client just got killed in a coup do you really think you'd go
through a lot of trouble to track down his various relatives as they're being
systematically captured and/or executed by the uprising? No, you'd quietly
wrap up all those trusts and funnel the money to safer places, like the bank
accounts of yourself and people you trust.

~~~
samstave
You're just a hypocritical person...

You denigrate my comments yet you just state a reinforcement of my speculation
___" criminally rich are also, not surprisingly, very good at making money
disappear._ __

this was the premise of my post!

Money went someplace, and we dont know where it went - did HRC profit off it
or not....

~~~
astrodust
You can't just speculate. Maybe it was the Pope! Trump! Elvis! Fucking aliens!

Come back with a shred of proof, okay?

------
cies
Any reason why the Rothchilds never show up in these lists? My best guess
there is some sort of "who's the richest game" for some new money players
(who's fortune can be tracked), where old money prefers obscurity.

~~~
conception
[http://www.snopes.com/rothschild-family-
wealth/](http://www.snopes.com/rothschild-family-wealth/)

Basically, after three generations a single persons wealth is distributed out
enough to get dropped from these sorts of lists. Jeff might be the 2nd richest
in the world - it's highly unlikely his grandchildren will be ranked as such.

~~~
alex_young
Good point. One family that is directly measurable however: offspring of Sam
Walton. Bill G is a distant second by that yard stick:
[https://www.forbes.com/profile/walton-1/](https://www.forbes.com/profile/walton-1/)

~~~
jjeaff
And that's why the individual Walton's are usually on the list. They usually
occupy around 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th places.

~~~
astrodust
When those fortunes split 3-5 ways again they'll be diluted down to 80th or
so.

------
flippyhead
Woot! Go go Seattle billionaire club!

------
uw777
funny thing is.. announcement to be made later

------
huangc10
> Amazon’s founder has added $10.2 billion this year to his wealth...

It's not even April yet...

~~~
jwdunne
End of financial year tomorrow.

~~~
huangc10
eh is it? I thought it's end of Q2 tomorrow only. The $10 billion is probably
the addition of Q1 and Q2 so far this fiscal year.

~~~
jwdunne
Sorry I'm mistaken. The end of the fiscal year is the 5th of April in the UK.

In the US, I think this is different. So this is a more dramatic result
considering.

~~~
bdcravens
The US fiscal year ends on September 30, but companies can set their own
fiscal year. (Many C corps do end it at specific quarters)

------
known
aka legalized
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_scheme)

