The word millionaire was first used by Benjamin Disraeli in his 1826 novel Vivian Grey. If you stack one million US$1 bills, it would be 110m (361 ft) high and weight exactly 1 ton. A million dollars’ worth of $100 bills weighs only 10 kg (22 lb). One million dollars’ worth of one-cent coins (100 [...]

In 1750 there were about 800 million people in the world. In 1850 there were a billion more, and by 1950, another billion. Then it took just 50 years to double to 6 billion. Half the world’s population earns about 5% of the world’s wealth. There are more than 600 million telephone lines, yet almost [...]