Decline Watch: Asia now leads the world in centa-millionaires
North America’s 1 percent are not pulling their weight, according to a new study by CitiGroup. Boomberg summarizes: The number of Asians with at least $100 million in disposable assets overtook North America’s tally for the first time as the world’s “economic center of gravity” continued moving east, Citigroup Inc.’s (C) private bank said. There ...
North America's 1 percent are not pulling their weight, according to a new study by CitiGroup. Boomberg summarizes:
North America’s 1 percent are not pulling their weight, according to a new study by CitiGroup. Boomberg summarizes:
The number of Asians with at least $100 million in disposable assets overtook North America’s tally for the first time as the world’s “economic center of gravity” continued moving east, Citigroup Inc.’s (C) private bank said.
There were 18,000 “centa-millionaires” in Southeast Asia, China and Japan at the end of 2011, compared with 17,000 in North America and 14,000 in Western Europe, the bank said today in The Wealth Report 2012, published in partnership with Knight Frank LLP.
James Poulos notes that this might actually be dangerous for Asian countries since "a growing class of superwealthy might actually exacerbate class tensions at a moment when the promise of cherry-picking Western hypercapitalism could turn more sour than ever."
Still, if you’re in, say, the car elevator business, it’s prety clear where your new customers are going to be.
Hat tip: My eagle-eyed colleague Preeti Aroon
Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating
More from Foreign Policy

No, the World Is Not Multipolar
The idea of emerging power centers is popular but wrong—and could lead to serious policy mistakes.

America Prepares for a Pacific War With China It Doesn’t Want
Embedded with U.S. forces in the Pacific, I saw the dilemmas of deterrence firsthand.

America Can’t Stop China’s Rise
And it should stop trying.

The Morality of Ukraine’s War Is Very Murky
The ethical calculations are less clear than you might think.