Half of world's wealth now in hands of 1% of population – report

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

Half of world's wealth now in hands of 1% of population – report

Jill Treanor
Tuesday 13 October 2015 16.21 BST

Global inequality is growing, with half the world’s wealth now in the hands of just 1% of the population, according to a new report.

The middle classes have been squeezed at the expense of the very rich, according to research by Credit Suisse, which also finds for the first time that there are more individuals in the middle classes in China – 109m – than the 92m in the US.

“Middle class wealth has grown at a slower pace than wealth at the top end,” said Tidjane Thiam, the chief executive of Credit Suisse. “This has reversed the pre-crisis trend which saw the share of middle-class wealth remaining fairly stable over time.”

The report shows that a person needs only $3,210 (£2,100) to be in the wealthiest 50% of world citizens. Some $68,800 secures a place in the top 10%, while the top 1% have more than $759,900. The report defines wealth as the value of assets including property and stock market investments but excludes debt.

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Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/oct/13/half-world-wealth-in-hands-population-inequality-report

[6chars]

1. so average 1% er has a little under $2 million

by my calculations. link says total world wealth is $250T, 50% of that is 125T, 1% of around 7B people is 70M. And 70M x 2M = 140T, so pretty close. Link says there are 34M people over $1M, so it is even more concentrated than that.