From Marginal Revolution (
see here)
The richest 70 members of China’s legislature added more to their wealth last year than the combined net worth of all 535 members of the U.S. Congress, the president and his Cabinet, and the nine Supreme Court justices.The net worth of the 70 richest delegates in China’s National People’s Congress, which opens its annual session on March 5, rose to 565.8 billion yuan ($89.8 billion) in 2011, a gain of $11.5 billion from 2010, according to figures from the Hurun Report, which tracks the country’s wealthy. That compares to the $7.5 billion net worth of all 660 top officials in the three branches of the U.S. government.
The wealth gap between legislatures holds with statistically comparable samples. The richest 2 percent of the NPC — 60 people — had an average wealth of $1.44 billion per person. The richest 2 percent of Congress — 11 members — had an average wealth of $323 million.
The wealthiest member of the U.S. Congress is Representative Darrell Issa, the California Republican who had a maximum wealth of $700.9 million in 2010, according to the center. If he were in China’s NPC, he would be ranked 40th. Per capita income in China is about one-sixth the U.S. level when adjusted for differences in purchasing power.
This is an interesting statistic. It shows how this is a major theme among many different countries is that the rich are incredibly wealthy and the poor are very poor. I find it shocking that the 70 members of China’s legislature make more than the 535 members of the US congress, the president and his Cabinet, and the 9 Supreme Court justices but the per capita income is less than the US per capita. This is surprising to see the the Chinese congress are much wealthier but the per capita income is so much lower than the US. I think that is interesting that China has this large gap because they are a communist country.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Cate, it seems very interesting that there is such a wide gap in citizens in a communist country. This statistic is also very surprising because of how few people were included in this increase in wealth.
ReplyDeleteI just think its funny how we always think that people in America are the only greedy ones or the only people making money. Its nice to see for a change the other side of the coin. To go along with what Cate said, the rich just get richer and the poor just get poorer no matter where you live. I see this being a huge problem here in the near future.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I wonder how drastic this gap will become in the next decade or so..
DeleteI agree with Mike
ReplyDeleteI agree with cate with the rich being very rich ebbs the poor being very poor. It was also interesting that the richest person out of the group would be ranked only 40th in china
ReplyDeleteWow! Hello communism. Those numbers are absurd to us, but with the cultural difference, I wonder how people in China feel about that inequality gap. This makes me think about the lack of individualism displayed by the workers in the Foxcom video, where the interviewees stated they didn't have "hopes or dreams" in a monotone, lifeless fashion.
ReplyDelete