Wednesday, October 16, 2013

"World likely to have 11 trillionaires within two generations: Credit Suisse"

Come on experimental gerontology.
From MarketWatch:
In the past year, aggregate global household wealth increased by 4.9% to reach $241 trillion, a sign that even as the tepid economic recovery plays out, households are still accumulating wealth.  And that number is poised to grow over the next five years by 40%, reaching $334 trillion, according to Credit Suisse’s annual Global Wealth Report, out Wednesday.

Here’s what the distribution of that wealth looks like in pyramid form:
Credit Suisse
It’s pretty disconcerting to see over two-thirds of the world’s adults have wealth of less than $10,000, while the wealthiest 0.7% hold 41% of the world’s wealth.

But there are some heartening signs in the report. One suggests that some measures of mobility are high. Future projections of growth rates based on historical averages show that the fraction in the bottom category of wealth will fall steadily over a 60-year time-frame. After the first 30 years, the number of people currently at the bottom will be cut nearly in half. The authors write:
“Two generations ahead, future extrapolation of current wealth growth rates yields almost a billion millionaires, equivalent to 20% of the total adult population. If this scenario unfolds, then billionaires will be commonplace, and there is likely to be a few trillionaires too – eleven according to our best estimate.”...
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