Millionaire

For other uses, see Millionaire (disambiguation).

A large suburban home valued at roughly $1,000,000 (2006) in Salinas, California, shown for scale of purchasing power

Global share of wealth by wealth group, Credit Suisse, 2021^[1]

A millionaire is an individual whose net worth or wealth is equal to or exceeds one million units of currency. Depending on the currency, a certain level of prestige is associated with being a millionaire.^[2] Many national currencies have, or have had at various times, a low unit value, in many cases due to past inflation. It is much easier and less significant to be a millionaire in those currencies, thus a millionaire in the local currency of Hong Kong or Taiwan, for example, may be merely of average wealth, or perhaps less wealthy than average. A millionaire in Zimbabwe in 2007 could have been extremely poor.^[3] Because of this, the term 'millionaire' generally refers to those whose assets total at least one million units of a high-value currency, such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling.

At the end of 2011, there were around 5.1 million HNWIs in the United States,^[4] while at the same time there were 11 million millionaires^[5] in a total of 3.5 million millionaire households,^[6] including those 5.1 million HNWIs. As of December 2023^[update], there were estimated to be just over 16 million dollar-millionaires in the world according to the World's Wealthiest Cities Report 2024 by Henley & Partners. The United States had the highest number of millionaires (5.5 million) of any country, whilst New York is the wealthiest city with 349,500 millionaires.^[7] In countries that use the short scale number naming system, a billionaire is someone who has at least a thousand times a million dollars, euros or pounds.

Terminology

The word "millionaire" was apparently coined in French in 1719 to describe speculators in the Mississippi Bubble who earned millions of livres in weeks before the bubble burst.^[8][9][10] The standard French spelling is now millionnaire,^[11] though the earliest reference uses a single n.^[10] The word was first used (as millionnaire, double "n") in French in 1719 by Steven Fentiman, and is first recorded in English (millionaire, as a French term) in a letter of Lord Byron of 1816, then in print in Vivian Grey, a novel of 1826 by Benjamin Disraeli.^[9] Earlier English writers also mention the French word, including Sir William Mildmay in 1764.^[12] The OED's first print citation is Benjamin Disraeli's 1826 novel Vivian Grey,^[9] The anglicisation millionary was used in 1786 by Thomas Jefferson while serving as Minister to France; he wrote: "The poorest labourer stood on equal ground with the wealthiest Millionary".^[13]

Influence

While millionaires constitute only a small percentage of the population, they hold substantial control over economic resources, with the most powerful and prominent individuals usually ranking among them. The total amount of money held by millionaires can equal the amount of money held by a far higher number of poor people. The Gini coefficient, and other measures in economics, estimated for each country, are useful for determining how many of the poorest people have the equivalent total wealth of the few richest in the country. Forbes and Fortune magazines maintain lists of people based on their net worth and are generally considered authorities on the subject. Forbes listed 1,645 dollar billionaires in 2014, with an aggregate net worth of $6.4 trillion, an increase from $5.4 trillion the previous year (see US-dollar billionaires in the world).^[14]

According to a report by Hurun, a market research firm based in China, the global billionaire population stood at 3,381 in 2022.^[15] Sixteen percent of millionaires inherited their fortunes. Forty-seven percent of millionaires are business owners. Twenty-three percent of the world's millionaires got that way through paid work, consisting mostly of skilled professionals or managers.^[16] Millionaires are, on average, 61-years-old with $3.05 million in assets.^[17]

Historical worth

Depending on how it is calculated, a million US dollars in 1900 is equivalent to $36.6 million (in 2023):^[18]

• $24.8 million using the consumer price index,
• $61.4 million using the gold price^[19]

Thus one would need to have almost thirty million dollars today to have the purchasing power of a US millionaire in 1900, or more than 100 million dollars to have the same impact on the US economy.

Multimillionaire

"Multi Millionaire" redirects here. For other uses, see Multi-Millionaire (disambiguation).

Dated ways of describing someone worth n millions are "n-fold millionaire" and "millionaire n times over". Still commonly used is multimillionaire, which refers to individuals with net assets of 2 million or more of a currency.^[20] There are approximately 584,000 US$ multimillionaires who have net assets of $10M+ worldwide in 2017.^[21] Roughly 1.5% of US$ millionaires are "ultra-high-net-worth individuals" (ultra-HNWIs), defined as those with a net worth or wealth of $30 million or more. There are approximately 226,000 ultra-HNWIs in the world in 2017, according to Wealth-X.^[22] The rising prevalence of people possessing ever increasing quantities of wealth has given rise to additional terms to further differentiate millionaires. Individuals with net assets of 100 million or more of a currency are commonly termed centimillionaires,^[23] or more rarely hectomillionaires.^[24]

HNWI population

Number of millionaires and ultra-millionaires (more than $30M)

High-net-worth individuals (those with financial assets, not including the residence, greater than a million US dollars):

HNWI Wealth Distribution (by Region)[25]
Region	HNWI Population	HNWI Wealth
Global	12 million	$46.2 trillion
North America	3.73 million	$12.7 trillion
Asia-Pacific	3.68 million	$12.0 trillion
Europe	3.41 million	$10.9 trillion
Latin America	0.52 million	$7.5 trillion
Middle East	0.49 million	$1.8 trillion
Africa	0.14 million	$1.3 trillion

Global cities with the most super-wealthy millionaires per capita (higher than $30 million)

According to wealth research group Wealth-X that released its latest UHNW Cities report, showing the residential footprint of the world's top ultra-high net worth (UHNW) individual cities. Excluding Monaco – which has very high UHNWI density – Geneva has the highest density of super-wealthy people per capita in the world. The city is known as the most compact metropolitan area, and also enjoys a concentration of affluence. Singapore has the second-highest concentration, followed by San Jose, the center of Silicon Valley, and the largest city in Northern California. While New York City leads in terms of overall UHNW footprint, London has a similar number of UHNW "second homers" despite a considerably smaller population. Paris features as the second-highest European city, after London, Wealth-X said. Among suburbs and smaller towns, Beverly Hills has the highest overall number of UHNW residents, and Aspen has the highest concentration on a per capita basis, the report showed. Ultra-high net worth individuals are defined by Wealth-X as those whose total net worth is higher than $30 million (R400 million).^[26]

Number of UHNWIs per country

The following is a list of the countries with the most Ultra high-net-worth individuals (UHNWI) as of 2023 as per the 2024 Knight Frank's Wealth Report:^[27]

Rank	Country	Number of UHNWIs (2023)
1	United States	225,077
2	China	98,551
3	Germany	29,021
4	Canada	27,928
5	France	24,941
6	United Kingdom	23,072
7	Japan	21,710
8	Italy	15,952
9	Australia	15,347
10	Switzerland	14,734
11	India	13,263
12	Spain	10,149
13	Netherlands	8,390
14	Taiwan	7,640
15	South Korea	7,310

Countries by number and percentage of millionaires

* indicates "Economy of LOCATION" links.

List of selected countries by Credit Suisse (2021)^[1]

Location	Number of millionaires (USD)	Share of global millionaires (USD) (%)	% of millionaires (USD) (% of adult population)
United States *	21,951,202	39.1	8.8
China *	5,279,467	9.4	0.5
Japan *	3,662,407	6.5	3.5
Germany *	2,952,710	5.3	4.3
France *	2,498,939	4.4	4.9
United Kingdom *	2,490,952	4.4	4.7
Australia *	1,804,644	3.2	9.4
Canada *	1,681,969	3.0	5.6
Italy *	1,479,830	2.6	3.0
Spain *	1,146,911	2.0	3.0
South Korea *	1,051,104	1.9	2.5
Netherlands *	1,039,239	1.9	7.7
Switzerland *	1,034,918	1.8	14.9
India *	697,655	1.2	0.1
Taiwan *	608,997	1.1	3.1
Sweden *	570,439	1.0	7.3
Hong Kong *	520,000	0.9	8.3
Belgium *	514,859	0.9	5.7
Austria *	346,172	0.6	4.8
Denmark *	306,823	0.5	6.7
Singapore *	269,925	0.5	5.5
Russia *	268,550	0.5	0.2
Mexico *	264,034	0.5	0.3
Saudi Arabia *	236,000	0.4	1.0
New Zealand *	225,487	0.4	6.3
Brazil *	207,000	0.4	0.1
Ireland *	181,727	0.3	5.0
Norway *	176,630	0.3	4.2
Indonesia *	171,740	0.3	0.1
United Arab Emirates *	169,113	0.3	2.1
Israel *	164,899	0.3	2.9
Poland *	149,120	0.3	0.5
Portugal *	136,430	0.2	1.6
Turkey *	115,473	0.2	0.2
Thailand *	86,216	0.2	0.2
Finland *	85,114	0.2	1.9
Philippines *	81,000	0.1	0.1
Kuwait *	78,650	0.1	2.5
Greece *	72,367	0.1	0.9
Egypt *	70,000	0.1	0.1

Number of millionaires by city

As of December 2023^[update], New York is the wealthiest city in the world with 350,000 HNWIs according to the World's Wealthiest Cities Report 2024 by Henley & Partners.^[28] The amount of wealth held by people in New York City is nearly $3 trillion.^[29] Some places have a sharp, quantitative increase in seasonal wealthy residents including cities such as Paris and Miami, Rocky Mountains ski towns like Aspen, and various beachfront towns of the French Riviera like Cannes.^[28]

Rank	City	Number of millionaires (2023)[28]	Millionaire increase 2013–2023[28]	Wealth held by residents (2021)[29]
1	New York City	349,500	48%	$2.9T
2	San Francisco Bay Area	305,700	82%	$2.6T
3	Tokyo	298,300	-5%	$2.5T
4	Singapore	244,800	64%
5	London	227,000	-15%	$2.3T
6	Los Angeles	212,100	35%	$1.3T
7	Greater Paris	165,000	12%
8	Sydney	147,000	34%	$1.1T
9	Hong Kong	143,400	-4%
10	Beijing	125,600	90%	$2.0T

Disparity in United States

Main article: American upper class

There is a wide disparity in the estimates of the number of millionaires residing in the United States. A quarterly report prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit on behalf of Barclays Wealth in 2007 estimated that there were 16.6 million millionaires in the US.^[30] At the end of 2011, there were around 5.1 million HNWIs in the US,^[4] while at the same time, there were 11 million millionaires^[5] in a total of 3.5 million millionaire households,^[6] including those 5.1 million HNWIs.

According to TNS Financial Services, as reported by CNN Money, 2 million households in the US alone had a net worth of at least $1 million excluding primary residences in 2005.^[31] According to TNS, in mid-2006 the number of millionaire US households was 9.3 million, with an increase of half a million since 2005.^[32] The study found that half of all millionaire households in the US were headed by retirees. In 2004 the United States saw a "33 percent increase over the 6.2 million households that met that criteria [sic] in 2003", fueled largely by the country's real estate boom.^[33]

A report by Capgemini for Merrill Lynch on the other hand stated that in 2007 there were approximately 3,028,000 households in the United States who held at least US$1 million in financial assets, excluding collectibles, consumables, consumer durables and primary residences.^[34] According to TNS Financial Services, Los Angeles County, California, had the highest number of millionaires,^[35] totalling over 262,800 households in mid-2006.^[32]

Top 10 counties by HNWIs (more than $1 million, in 2009)^[36]

County	State	Metro area	Number of millionaire households
Los Angeles County	California	Los Angeles	268,138
Cook County	Illinois	Chicago	171,118
Orange County	California	Los Angeles	116,157
Maricopa County	Arizona	Phoenix	113,414
San Diego County	California	San Diego	102,138
Harris County	Texas	Houston	99,504
Nassau County	New York	New York	79,704
Santa Clara County	California	San Francisco	74,824
Palm Beach County	Florida	Miami	71,221
King County	Washington	Seattle	68,390

See also

• Aggregate demand
• Billionaire
• Business oligarch
• Distribution of wealth
• High-net-worth individual
• Upper middle class
• Upper class
• Six figure income
• Wealth concentration
• Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (game show)
• The Millionaire Next Door (book)
• Moscow Millionaire Fair
• Pierre Lorillard II (first American to be designated a "millionaire")
• List of African millionaires
• Lists of billionaires
• Sunday Times Rich List

References

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2. Marlys Harris. How to marry a billionaire. Money Magazine. 21 June 2007. Archived 1 July 2007 at the Wayback Machine
3. Hungwe, Brian (6 February 2014). "Zimbabwe's multi-currency confusion". BBC News. Retrieved 31 March 2019.
4. Bennettsmith, Meredith (2 November 2012). "Number of high net worth individuals in US". Huffington Post. Retrieved 2 November 2012.
5. "Number of millionaires in US". Business Insider. Retrieved 2 November 2012.
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7. "World's Wealthiest Cities Report 2024". 2024.
8. DeJean, Joan (2018). "Chaptrer Twelve: The Invention of Money". The Queen's Embroiderer: A True Story of Paris, Lovers, Swindlers, and the First Stock Market Crisis. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. fn.15. ISBN 9781632864765. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
9. "Millionaire (n. and adj.)". Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved 20 July 2008. 1816 BYRON Let. 23 June (1976) V. 80 He is still worth at least 50-000 pds—being what is called here [sc. Evian] a 'Millionaire' that is in Francs & such Lilliputian coinage. 1826 B. DISRAELI Vivian Grey I. ix, Were I the son of a Millionaire, or a noble, I might have all.
10. Buchet, Pierre-François, ed. (October 1719). "Faits Fugitifs". Mercure de France (in French). Paris: 201. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
11. "millionaire". English to French Dictionary. Cambridge University Press. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
12. Mildmay, Sir William (1764). An Account of the Southern Maritime Provinces of France: Representing the Distress to which They Were Reduced at the Conclusion of the War in 1748. Thomas Harrison. p. 88. Retrieved 11 October 2019. several persons became bankrupt, who, before the war [of the Austrian Succession], were esteemed amongst the number of their millionaires; a term given to their rich merchants and brokers, when supposed to be worth a million of livres
13. "Millionary, n. and adj". Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved 21 July 2008. 1786 T. JEFFERSON Observ. on Démeunier's Manuscript 22 June in Papers (1954) X. 52 The poorest labourer stood on equal ground with the wealthiest Millionary
14. "Inside The 2014 Forbes Billionaires List: Facts And Figures". Forbes.
15. Block, Fang. "U.S. Boasts 38% of the World's Population of Centi-Millionaires". Barron's.
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19. "Gold price trend".
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32. TNS :: TNS Reports Record Breaking Number of Millionaires in the USA Archived 4 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine. Tnsglobal.com. Retrieved on 2011-11-23.
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36. Top 10 U.S. Counties With The Most Millionaires. Streetdirectory.com. Retrieved on 2011-11-23.