Extreme Earning Power
Talk about earning power: Forbes' wealthiest clock $1,000 in 30 seconds.
Sept. 20, 2007 — -- It turns out simply that being a billionaire isn't enough to make the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans. You now need to be worth at least $1.3 billion to rank on this annual list.
"We left 82 billionaires behind," said Matthew Miller of Forbes Magazine.
Those who made it in this year include Google's Sergey Brin and Larry Paige, who broke into the Top 5 at age 34 and are now worth $18.5 billion apiece.
That income adds up to quite a hefty salary every minute. Forbes calculated just how quickly these billionaires make their money, and in 30 seconds Oprah Winfrey makes another $1,000. She's ranked 165 on the list.
"So we just pointed out that Oprah just made $1,000," ABC's David Muir said to Miller.
"Right. While you and I were talking, she made about a thousand dollars if you look at the valuations," Miller said.
"I've got to interrupt you," said Muir, "because we're at 39 seconds now and Ralph Lauren just made another thousand bucks."
"It's unbelievable how quickly they make this money," Miller said.
Designer Ralph Lauren is among the 270 billionaires who are self-made. Coming in at No. 220 is the guy who controls the cheese on a lot of America's pizzas.
"Jim Leprino … makes all the mozzarella cheese for Little Caesar's, Papa Johns, Dominos," Miller said.
But do these billionaires really care about where they rank? You bet they do.
"Everyone either wants to be higher or lower than where they're actually at," Miller said.
When asked why they would want to be lower, Miller summed it up in one short word: Taxes.
When many of the billionaires were asked whom they'd like to have a drink with from the list, more than one said themselves, which might explain why only five billionaires said yes when Forbes invited them to play poker.
Oilman John Catsimatidis played with supermarket giant Ronald Burkle; Stewart Rahr, a pharmaceuticals distributor; Timothy Blixseth, a resorts entrepreneur; and Phillip Ruffin, a casino mogul.
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