They go to the top universities and create their first fortunes early. Often middle-class and frequently mathematicians, they make their own money rather than inheriting it. One executive spending a third of the year in transit says forlornly: "We are the people who know flight attendants better than we know our own wives." So who are these people? They are nearly all men for a start, sacrificing family life in their search for a fortune. Freeland charts the rise of this class by examining global trends and exploring the consequences of the creation of such a money-laden elite, shifting smoothly from dense academic studies and interviews with George Soros to grappling with the success of Lady Gaga. And bear in mind the richer you are, the smaller proportion of your income you tend to pay in tax, levels diminishing even at the very top of the tree.ĭespite the cheap book cover and passing mention of private parties with pop stars paid a million dollars to perform, this is no voyeuristic glimpse into the fabulous lifestyles of the rich and famous. She quotes another shocking sign of our times: three decades ago the average American chief executive made 42 times as much as the average worker today this ratio is an obscene 380. Freeland is talking about the 0.1 per centers who look down with disdain at the paupers scrabbling around on a few million a year. They are the subject of this timely and absorbing analysis by former Financial Times deputy editor Chrystia Freeland.įorget the 1% targeted by the Occupy mob. Creaming off more and more wealth is a new elite, a transglobal class of mainly self-made men carving out unimaginable fortunes. There has always been a gap between rich and poor but this is just one sign of how the gulf has widened into a chasm over the past few decades. Trumping them all is Carlos Slim, the telecoms tycoon whose £53bn fortune is equal to that of an incredible 400,000 of his fellow Mexicans. The wealth of these figures from history pales in comparison with the strutting financiers of Wall Street, the geeky billionaires of Silicon Valley and the grisly oligarchs who plundered Russia.