Billionaire Bottom Lines on the Rise

People with a billion already in the bank account saw, for the most part, their balances rise even further this year, according to Forbes' list of the world's 691 billionaires.

Collectively, they cash out at $2.2 trillion, a whopping $300 billion more than the $1.9 trillion that the world's 587 billionaires made last year. Bill Gates and Warren Buffett still top the list, though the latter is catching up to the former's bottom line. Nearly half are American. Only 68 are women.

One of the new female entries on the list is none other than recently freed Martha Stewart. She's already making her share of headlines thanks to the new monitoring device she must strap to her ankle, ironically, as of the same day that Forbes released its results online. The share price of her company, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, soared while she was in prison, accounting for her new billion-dollar status.

Speaking of soaring, Google's two founders vaulted almost 500 spots on the billionaire list, ranking at No. 55 this year with a combined $7.2 billion -- compared to a paltry $2 billion last year -- due to the tech company's initial public offering last summer.

In covering the story, most newspapers ran the new results, pointing out local and state natives who made the list. They highlighted who got the biggest year-over-year gains and losses, and how many were college dropouts (18).

But the list's results lead to larger questions: Is the world generating increasing amounts of wealth year after year and, if so, how? And if not, who are the ones paying the price to make these people richer?

Copyright © 2008 Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism