The U.S., which through history has been home to rags-to-riches entrepreneurs rannging from Andrew Carnegie to Oprah Winfrey, dominates a newly compiled list of the world’s wealthiest self-made billionaires.
With Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, net worth $85.7 billion, at the top, the land of Horatio Alger is represented 14 times among Wealth-X’s list of the world’s 25 wealthiest self-made billionaires.
The combined wealth of the Americans on the list is $514.2 billion, about $2 billion greater than the GDP of Norway.
Berkshire Hathaway chairman Warren Buffet is second, with $70.1 billion, followed by Spanish fashion magnate Amancio Ortega with $65 billion.
After Gates, the tech sector is well represented by names such as Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, in fourth place at $51.5 billion; Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in sixth place with $39.8 billion; and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in eighth place with $35.3 billion.
The top 10:
| 1 | Bill Gates | United States | $85.7 bil. |
| 2 | Warren Buffett | United States | $70.1 bil |
| 3 | Amancio Ortega | Spain | $65 bil |
| 4 | Larry Ellison | United States | $51.5 bil |
| 5 | Ingvar Kamprad | Sweden | $48.1 bil |
| 6 | Jeff Bezos | United States | $39.8 bil |
| 7 | Carlos Slim | Mexico | $35.4 bil |
| 8 | Mark Zuckerberg | United States | $35.3 bil |
| 9 | Wang Jianlin | China | $35.2 bil |
| 10 | Michael Bloomberg | United States | $33.7 bil |