WORLD: Poor You, Rich People!

. LONDON, England / The Economist / CHARTS / July 6, 2009 The world's rich are suffering too THE WEALTH of the world’s richest people fell by almost a fifth last year to $33 trillion, according to the World Wealth Report from Merrill Lynch and Capgemini. A rich person is defined as having at least $1m of assets besides his main home, its contents and collectable items. The number of rich people shrank by 15% to 8.6m, or 0.1% of the world's population. Their wealth declined by more than 20% in North America, Europe and Asia, but by a bit less in Africa and the Middle East. Latin America’s rich were the least affected: they lost 6% of their wealth, and the number there fell by less than 1%. In North America, which had a large proportion of people just above the $1m threshold, the ranks slimmed by 19%. [rc] Shutterstock Copyright © The Economist Newspaper Limited 2009