<p>Your article probably resulted from <a href="http://www.oxfam.org.uk/blogs/2015/01/richest-1-per-cent-will-own-more-than-all-the-rest-by-2016" rel="nofollow">an Oxfam campaign</a></p>

<p>If you believe table 2 of a <a href="http://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/oxfam/bitstream/10546/592643/3/tb-economy-one-percent-methodology-180116-en.pdf" rel="nofollow">January 2015 Oxfam report</a> then about $\$250$ trillion. The campaign spliced together some information from Forbes on the richest $x$ individuals and a series of <a href="http://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/index.cfm?fileid=C26E3824-E868-56E0-CCA04D4BB9B9ADD5" rel="nofollow">Credit Suisse reports</a> - see the bottom of page 94 </p>

<p>The analysis has faced criticism: it concentrates on individual assets and liabilities, e.g. a US doctor whose student debt exceeds personal financial assets counts as poorer than a subsistence farmer in Africa, and uses a very large amount of estimation, so other reasonable calculations could be very different</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-08-02T20:44:36.830Z
it doesnt seem much, do you know if there's another source which says differently?
Pablo
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-08-02T21:18:22.440Z
@Pablo [Savills estimated that real estate was worth $\$217$ trillion](http://pdf.euro.savills.co.uk/global-research/around-the-world-in-dollars-and-cents-2016.pdf) - three quarters of it residential - and this was $60\%$ of the global mainstream asset universe of $\$372$ trillion.  So $\$122$ trillion different but a similar order of magnitude to the Oxfam/Credit Suisse number.  Even if you managed to come up with an average of $\$100,000$ per person you would not get above $\$740$ trillion, and remember there are a lot of children and poor adults in the world
Henry
CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-09-06T08:33:43.050Z
A recent report in *The Economist* said "Between 2000 and 2020 it [wealth] rose from $\$160$trn, or four times global output, to $\$510$trn, or six times output. Although much of this is tied up in property or other assets, the pool of liquid assets is still vast, making up a quarter of the total."
Henry
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-08-02T17:27:24.290Z
2016-08-02T17:27:24.290Z
Henry
<p>I was reading an article from 2015 stating that 1% of the world has half of the world wealth. They have several figures such as the world's billionaries have around 7 trillions dollars or the global world wealth pyramid which shows a percent of population by percent of the total wealth etc. but I can't see anywhere a figure of the total wealth of the world. Which is it?</p>

<macroeconomics>
what was the world's wealth in 2015?
Pablo
# what was the world's wealth in 2015?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2016-07-30)

I was reading an article from 2015 stating that 1% of the world has half of the world wealth. They have several figures such as the world's billionaries have around 7 trillions dollars or the global world wealth pyramid which shows a percent of population by percent of the total wealth etc. but I can't see anywhere a figure of the total wealth of the world. Which is it?

**Tags:** macroeconomics


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2016-08-02. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

Your article probably resulted from [an Oxfam campaign](http://www.oxfam.org.uk/blogs/2015/01/richest-1-per-cent-will-own-more-than-all-the-rest-by-2016)

If you believe table 2 of a [January 2015 Oxfam report](http://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/oxfam/bitstream/10546/592643/3/tb-economy-one-percent-methodology-180116-en.pdf) then about $\$250$ trillion. The campaign spliced together some information from Forbes on the richest $x$ individuals and a series of [Credit Suisse reports](http://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/index.cfm?fileid=C26E3824-E868-56E0-CCA04D4BB9B9ADD5) - see the bottom of page 94

The analysis has faced criticism: it concentrates on individual assets and liabilities, e.g. a US doctor whose student debt exceeds personal financial assets counts as poorer than a subsistence farmer in Africa, and uses a very large amount of estimation, so other reasonable calculations could be very different

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: it doesnt seem much, do you know if there's another source which says differently?  
> **username_1**: @username_0 [Savills estimated that real estate was worth $\$217$ trillion](http://pdf.euro.savills.co.uk/global-research/around-the-world-in-dollars-and-cents-2016.pdf) - three quarters of it residential - and this was $60\%$ of the global mainstream asset universe of $\$372$ trillion.  So $\$122$ trillion different but a similar order of magnitude to the Oxfam/Credit Suisse number.  Even if you managed to come up with an average of $\$100,000$ per person you would not get above $\$740$ trillion, and remember there are a lot of children and poor adults in the world  
> **username_1**: A recent report in *The Economist* said "Between 2000 and 2020 it [wealth] rose from $\$160$trn, or four times global output, to $\$510$trn, or six times output. Although much of this is tied up in property or other assets, the pool of liquid assets is still vast, making up a quarter of the total."  

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