If the world were 100 people: who has the money?
Shrink the world’s 5.5 billion adults to 100 people, lined up from poorest to richest. The richest one holds 41% of all the wealth; the poorest 50 together hold 1.2%.
How the wealth is shared
| Of the 100 adults | Share of all wealth | Average net worth |
|---|---|---|
| Poorest 50 | 1.2% | $2,440 |
| Middle 40 | 17% | $42,200 |
| Next 9 | 40% | $439,000 |
| Richest 1 | 41% | $4.06 million |
| Of the 100 adults | Share of all income | Average income a year |
|---|---|---|
| Poorest 50 | 4.4% | $1,570 |
| Middle 40 | 33% | $14,700 |
| Next 9 | 39% | $76,500 |
| Richest 1 | 24% | $428,000 |
Where the 100 live, and where the money is
Out of 100 adults, how many live in each region (dark) and how many of every 100 dollars of wealth they hold (green).
- South and Southeast Asia
- East Asia
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Latin America
- Europe
- Middle East and North Africa
- North America and Oceania
- Russia and Central Asia
Regions as defined by the World Inequality Lab. Money shares for countries not modelled separately are estimated from their region’s remainder.
Three more ways to split 100
Two ways to count
Our numbers convert every currency at market exchange rates: what the money is worth on world markets. The World Inequality Report converts at purchasing power parity, which values a dollar in a poor country more because prices there are lower. That makes the world look less unequal, but the story is the same.
| WealthPercentile (market rates) | World Inequality Report 2026 (PPP) | |
|---|---|---|
| Richest 10%: share of income | 63% | 53% |
| Poorest 50%: share of income | 4.4% | 8% |
| Richest 10%: share of wealth | 82% | 75% |
| Richest 1%: share of wealth | 41% | 37% |
| Poorest 50%: share of wealth | 1.2% | 2% |
Per adult, 2025. WIR figures from the report’s headline results (source).
Sources
- Chancel, L., Gómez-Carrera, R., Moshrif, R., Piketty, T. et al. (2025). World Inequality Report 2026. World Inequality Lab. Report
- Key figures of the World Inequality Report 2026 as reported by Storyboard18 (January 2026). Article
- Women’s share of labour income, World Inequality Report 2026, as reported by Global Government Forum. Article
- Chancel, L. (2022). Global carbon inequality over 1990–2019. Nature Sustainability 5, 931–938. Summary (PDF)
- World Inequality Database, 2026 update: income and wealth distributions by country. Data
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