As the world’s greatest democracy and freest country, the U.S. being number one in many areas should come as no surprise. We lead the world by a wide margin in military spending. At the same time, we have the world’s larger prison population.
The U.S. is unquestionably number one at paying more per person for medical coverage than people living in any other country. What makes this fact impressive is that we are far from being number one in life expectancy!
Some of our fellow citizens have benefited greatly from our freedoms and are now sitting on top of the world’s greatest fortunes. As of December 14, 2024, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a handful of our awesome achievers show their dominance at being the world’s wealthiest by currently holding the four top spots and all but one of the remaining top ten spots. Go down the Bloomberg list a little further, and you will see that U.S. citizens hold 14 of the top 15 spots, all of whom have fortunes exceeding $100 billion. Calling this result impressive would be a gross understatement.
Their success at accumulating wealth should be celebrated at least as much as the more publicized accomplishments of other people including Tom Brady, the Willliams sisters, LeBron James, Tiger Woods, Mikaela Shiffrin, and Beyonce. Much has been made about Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour grossing over $2 billion. That amount is put to shame by the growth so far this year in the average wealth of the wealthiest U.S. ten of $65.78 billion, an amount that is more than thirty times greater than Swift’s tour amount, and less than 1% of the additional expansion in the wealth of Elon Musk.
Below is a table showing the size of the wealth of the world’s 15 wealthiest individuals and its growth thus far in 2024 that is derived from the December 14 Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The sole non-U.S. citizen on the list is France’s Bernard Arnault, who, unlike our U.S. heroes, has lost money.
To understand how our wealthiest billionaires have been doing, three years ago I posed a fundamental question: How many seats need to be on a rocket ship to carry people worth a trillion dollars? My answer at the time:
Using the Bloomberg figures, [during] the beginning of 2020, 16 seats were required. At the beginning of 2021, the number needed had declined to 9. The “good news” is that as of the end of 2021, the number has been further reduced to only 7. That represents more than a 50% reduction in just two years–an impressive rate of progress.
As of December 14, 2024, using Bloomberg figures, the number has been reduced to four (with $114 billion to spare), half of whose passengers are rocket men themselves, Musk and Bezos. A second rocket seating the next 7 wealthiest U.S. citizens would also be carrying passengers’ worth over $1 trillion. Wow! Just three years ago, the rocket ship required the wealthiest seven to reach that goal.
The Magnificent Elon Musk
The increase in Elon Musk’s wealth alone so far this year would make him the third wealthiest in the world just behind himself and Bezos. What an impressive guy? And to think that as of May 11, Bloomberg showed the wealth of Musk to have declined by $45.8 billion since the beginning of the year.
Has anyone ever had a greater turnaround going from $45.8 billion less to $226 billion more? What a performance!! Should his achievement make us prouder than when we produced the first person to walk on the moon?
Wisely, soon after his down period, Musk showed that when the going gets tough, the tough get going. This clever guy saw the wisdom of hooking up with the transactional stable genius and joining his quest to Make America Great Again. Musk might now be positioned to be the first to reach a trillion in wealth. Fortunately, taxes should not be an obstacle since the increase in the value of his stock wealth is not subject to tax unless the stock is sold at a gain.
However, everything about Musk is not necessarily groovy. His reputation as a philanthropist may come up short. The New York Times recently reported under the title Musk’s Foundation Gave Away Less Money Than Required in 2023, “For the third year in a row“ his “charitable foundation” with “more than $9 billion in assets” fell “$421 million short of the amount it was required to give away in 2023.”
By donating to his foundation, Musk may have saved a bit on his tax bill. From the New York Times article: “Tax experts said if he claimed” donations to his foundation “on his personal taxes in the year given, those gifts would have been very beneficial to him. Because of the deductions allowed for charitable gifts, they potentially saved Mr. Musk as much as $2 billion on his tax bills,” which would have added to the federal deficit he plans to slay.
Poor Jeff Bezos: Losing out to Musk
The New York Times describes Musk and Bezos as “longtime business rivals” labelling them “billionaire rivals.”
Many people seek to be number one. At the start of the Biden administration, Bezos was the wealthiest man in the world. Now, he is far behind Musk whose current lead over Bezos is $209 billion, having increased this year alone by $156 billion according to the cited Bloomberg figures. If Bezos wants to recapture the top spot and displace Musk, he has a lot of ground he must gain. It will presumably require the more vigorous exploitation of people who work for him and the elimination/takeover of competitors so his companies can become more monopolistic.
However, in his rivalry, Bezos is likely to fall short given what could be characterized as the wisest and most lucrative investment in the history of politics. The reported $277 million Musk spent on Trump and Republican candidates in the recent election has paid great dividends. His wealth stood at $269 billion on October 1 and has increased by $186 billion since then, 670 times greater than the amount he invested in Trump and the Republicans. And this has happened before Trump is in office, during which time Musk will be in a position to further enhance the value of his wealth.
Obviously, Bezos has not recently invested as strategically and as thoughtfully as Musk. The poor guy. His wealth has only increased by $38 billion since October 1, $148 billion less than his billionaire rival.
Thank You Joe Biden
Many may be hurting financially after almost four years of Biden’s presidency. However, our top achievers haven’t done badly.
Below is a table based on Bloomberg numbers illustrating what has happened to the size of the wealth of the current wealthiest 10 U.S. Citizens from right before Blue Collar Joe entered the White House to the present. As can be seen from the table, their wealth has increased $983 billion, a “mere” 93.7%.
How will our wealthy friends do under Trump? Stay tuned for what should be some great times that will likely include them paying lower taxes and facing fewer obstacles in their pursuit of even greater fortunes.
Afterword
The Bloomberg Index on December 17 shows Musk’s wealth to be at $486 billion. His gain for the year is $257 billion, an amount greater than the $250 billion holdings of number two, his billionaire rival, Bezos. However, according to the Bloomberg Index, on December 18, the wealth of Musk slipped $28.4 billion to $458 billion. Yikes!
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