Here’s A Closer Look
into The Backgrounds
of
The Top Billionaires
It’s no surprise that Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are among the top billionaires in the U.S. But what may be surprising are the backgrounds of the country’s wealthiest. A new analysis dug into the lives of the richest people on the Forbes 400 list. It found net worth, demographics, education level, and other facts about the billionaires.
The analysis revealed that the list is predominantly male driven. Only 12% of the top 400 billionaires listed are women. When breaking down generations, 41% are part of the Silent Generation, while 37% are Baby Boomers, 16% are Generation X and only 6% are Millennials, this all coming from the top 50.
Tech is the leading industry among the top 50, with 37% in the industry. Other top industries that are producing billionaires are finance and retail. However, when you zoom out and look at the entire list of 400, there’s a shift in industries. Real Estate, Hedge Funds, Private Equity and Investments are the top company types that produce the most billionaires. When looking at brands, Walmart is at the front of that pack, producing the most billionaires on the list (8). Right behind them is Facebook (5) and Cargill (5).
When looking at education levels among the top 50, it’s easily assumed that most of them went to college. But what many might not know is that 14% of them are actually college drop-outs. Some of the most common majors included business administration, economics, and electrical engineering.
Now to net worth. The richest person on the list is Jeff Bezos, worth a whopping $190.6 billion. Elon Musk ($180.7 billion), Bill Gates ($121.8 billion), Mark Zuckerberg ($100.0 billion), and Warren Buffet ($87.9 billion) follow closely behind to round out the top 5 billionaires in the country.
The analysis opened our eyes to these billionaires and gave us a closer look into their pasts. You can find more information on the analysis and the methodology here.
