Yet again, Forbes has released their “Richest List” for 2011.

The combined wealth of the top 10 listed above amounts to 406.1 billion Dollars. And according to Forbes, the total net worth of the 1,210 billionaires listed is roughly 4.5 trillion Dollars.

Just to put things in perspective (because I have no idea, sincerely, of what 4.5 trillion dollars represent), I checked this Wikipedia entry of Heavily Indebted Poor Countries and found this tidbit: “The IMF estimates that the total cost of providing debt relief to the 40 countries currently eligible for the HIPC program to be around $71 billion (in 2007 dollars)”.

I guess this is what heavy concentration of wealth looks like.

For the past decade and a half I have been making all my content available for free (and never behind a paywall) as an ongoing practice of ephemeral publishing. This site is no exception. If you wish to help offset my labor costs, you can donate on Paypal or you can subscribe to Patreon where I will not be putting my posts behind a lock but you'd be helping me continue making this work available for everyone. Thank you.  Follow me on Twitter for new post updates.