The Ultra Wealthy Have Gotten $2 Trillion Richer

The Ultra Wealthy Have Gotten $2 Trillion Richer

It seems that the ultra rich and super wealth were able to increase their net worth this year, and their are more of them. According to the recent Wealth-X and UBS World Ultra Rich Report of 2014, there are 12,040 new individuals who have more than $30 million dollars in net assets. With that number, there are now 211,275 people who are considered to be “ultra rich”, which is more than a 6% increase compared to last year.

They also earned more money giving them a combined total wealth of $30 trillion dollars, which is larger than most countries economies, including the United States. Additional, the United States has the most amount of these super rich people. A large majority of these individuals attended schools such as Harvard, The University of Pennsylvania, Stanford University, Columbia University, Yale, Cornell, M.I.T., and New York University; pretty much all of the top U.S. schools.

Another interesting fact is that the 211,275 ultra rich only make up around .004% of the worlds population, and they still manage to control nearly 13% of the entire wealth of the world. Looking at the statistic these people, on average, are between 57-59 years old, have two children, have more than one home, are friends with at least one billionaire, and  spend around $1 million on luxury goods each year.

Around 68% of these people are self-made wealthy people, while 17% inherited their wealthy. When you break that down 68% of men were self-made while only 34% of women were self-made (48% of super wealthy women inherited their wealth). These ultra rich have earned their money in a variety of different fields. It is interesting to see how the ultra rich were able to increase their earnings, while everyone else either remained the same, or earned less. Then again, the ultra rich probably have more means to increase their wealth than your average person.

Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Written by Sebastian Hensiek

From Philadelphia, Sebastian is a fan of music, writing, art, and entertainment.