Thursday, November 26, 2009

Inequality

The economics editor of The Telegraph quotes a report from consultants AT Kearney that the richest 1% in the UK hold some 70% of the country’s wealth.

He also quotes the latest UN report on the gini coefficient (in which a score of 0 means absolutely equal income across the population and 100 means one person has all the income), the UK scored 36.0, Australia 35.2, USA: 40.8. The gini coefficient (certainly in the US, probably in the UK) are at levels comparable with the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Just in case you doubted that the world population is divided between a small percentage who own most of the wealth and the vast majority who must work for them in order to survive.

1 comment:

ajohnstone said...

0.1% of all households in China, hold nearly half of the total wealth.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2009-11/20/content_9008654.htm

It said there are 143,000 multimillionaires and 8,800 billionaires in Beijing.There are 116,000 multimillionaires and 7,000 billionaires in Shanghai.
To be regarded as one of the city's "new aristocrats", or upper class ,high-rollers in Beijing need to spend at least 87 million yuan on property, cars and other luxury goodsand to own at least three dwellings of their own, including a villa, like the 400-sq-m Ziyu Shanzhuang villa costing 24 million yuan, a luxury apartment in the downtown area for work purposes, and a Siheyuan courtyard house probably in Houhai.

Most of them prefer investing in arts and they are willing to spend as much as 50,000 yuan for a year of piano classes, said the report.

In their luxury homes, they also have rare porcelain and jade ware collections interspersed with works of ancient or contemporary painters.The rich in Beijing consider Cartier as the favorite luxury brand

Said Rupert Hoogewerf, founder and publisher of the Hurun Report. "Many of them say they want to be a sort of upper class, rather than only being rich."

They probably drive a 1 million yuan Mercedes Benz R500 limousine and are also members of Yongfoo Lite, the most popular club for Beijing's wealthiest.Their wives usually frequent the Lan Club with friends, wear Bulgari platinum and diamond watches and drive BMW sports cars.

Japan's Osaka and Tokyo are the top travel destinations for spouses, and they attend musicals and the opera several times a year.

Annual spending of the rich in Beijing is estimated at about 5.7 million yuan, mainly for new cars, collections and about 1 million yuan for donations, the report said.