Billionaires - or oligarchs?

Ruchir Sharma has taught us to look at rich lists with new respect. The author of Breakout Nations advises us to “watch the changes in the list of top billionaires, learn how they made their billions, and note how many billions they made”. A country that produces too many billionaires, relative to its size, is in all likelihood off-balance. “If the average billionaire of a country has amassed too much wealth, not just billions but tens of billions, the lack of balance can lead to stagnation. If the billionaires make their wealth from government patronage, it can lead to popular unrest. There should be a healthy churn in their ranks;” and “they should emerge predominantly from productive economic services, not from cozy relationship with politicians” — a point also made by Raghuram Rajan in Fault Lines.

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