The problem with billionaires — and the debut of True Net Worth | Randall Lane

0:03You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu.

0:10Randall Lane: Who wants to know the secret of every billionaire right now in the world, which is nobody likes them. There are now at least 3 ,400 billionaires on the planet, and only a small minority of people view them favorably. Forbes, Chief Content Officer Randall Lane, should know. He has spent the last 35 years tracking the world's richest people, their habits, their philanthropy, and yes, their egos. Forbes tracks pretty much every billionaire in terms of how much they give to charity, how much end result goes into charity. Compare that with the average American teacher, fireman, gives 2 % of his or her income to charity.

0:52Randall Lane: that gap as somebody who loves entrepreneurial capitalism bothers me. In his talk from the TED 2026 stage, Randall says that while today's billionaires are deeply unpopular, the world actually needs them to stimulate widespread prosperity. But how do you encourage the ultra-wealthy to spend money on the public good instead of just piling it up? He debuts a new Forbes ranking that may seem counterintuitive. Reward billionaires for giving away money. That's all coming up right after a short break.

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3:31And now our TED Talk of the day.

3:34Randall Lane: Now I am a journalist, trained as a journalist, but I spent most of my last 35 years as an anthropologist. I've kind of been embedded with a very unique subspecies. You might know them by their Latin name, Billionaris Maximus. And when I got to Forbes out of college in 1991, there were all of 274 billionaires in the world. It was a very aspirational little club. You know, Bruno Mars and his song Billionaire sings the dreamings of being on the cover of Forbes magazine, standing next to Oprah and the Queen. Well, you know, fast forward, if we did that cover now, It would be very crowded. Forbes tracks 3 ,428 people, we believe have a net worth right now of a billion dollars or more.

4:22Randall Lane: And they all have one thing in common. Who wants to know the secret of every billionaire right now in the world, which is nobody likes them. Forbes and Harris X, we conducted a survey a couple weeks ago, 1 ,009 Americans. The results are not good. Trial lawyers are kicking billionaires' ass. They are tied with members of Congress. They are barely beating TikTok influencers. But there's a disconnect going on right now because the world needs billionaires. The world desperately needs billionaires. If you look at countries that have billionaires, they tend to have all the things that we all love.

5:05Randall Lane: Progress, jobs, growth. I mean, let's go to China. At the beginning of this century, there were no Chinese billionaires on the Forbes list and almost 500 million people live in extreme poverty. Fast forward 20 years, it's almost the opposite. Almost 500 Chinese billionaires and no one living in extreme poverty. That is not a coincidence. If you go to Nigeria, one of the largest countries in the world by population, only four billionaires, about 100 million people live in extreme poverty. There are no billionaires in Cuba. There are no billionaires in Iran. There are no billionaires in Belarus.

5:46Randall Lane: History shows that incentive creates personal wealth and societal wealth. When you cap earnings, that correlate with repression and stagnation. So why all the hate? Why all the hate? Wealth disparity is some of it. In a few weeks, if SpaceX goes public as scheduled, Forbes believes that at that moment, Elon Musk will become the world's first trillionaire. That's a million million. But here's the deal. Elon is no richer, not much richer, at least when you measure by GDP, as John D. Rockefeller when he became the world's first billionaire 100 years ago. John D. Rockefeller, he was an OG monopolist.

6:41Randall Lane: But by the end of his life, doing lots of good works, he was highly respected. Andrew Carnegie even more so. People don't resent billionaires. People want to become billionaires. People resent billionaires when they forget that the purpose of business is to create happiness, not who dies with the most toys. So here's the scorecard right now. Here are the five richest people in the world. Hey, it's Elise. Jumping in to describe the image Randall just shared on stage, he's showing the Forbes top five billionaires in this order. Elon Musk, Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg.

7:21Randall Lane: All Americans, all with a net worth north of $200 billion. Forbes tracks pretty much every billion in terms of how much they give to charity, how much winds up, end result goes into charity. Right now, these five collectively, compared to net worth, less than 1 % of their net worth has been donated to charity, 0.9%. Compare that with the average American, teacher, fireman, gives 2 % of his or her income to charity. that gap, as somebody who loves entrepreneurial capitalism and defends entrepreneurial capitalism, bothers me. That gap is why there are pitchforks, but that gap is something we can address, and we can address by leaning into the final decision maker that a lot of billionaires have when they decide if they're going to be philanthropic or not, which is their egos.

8:25Randall Lane: It turns out that a lot of people care about where they are on various Forbes lists. In fact, in 1982, the very first Forbes for 100, we had one tycoon who helped us create an immutable law of wealth tracking, the Trump rule. Take what the Donald tells you, divide by three, and refine from there. Saudi Arabia's Prince Awaleed created an entire public company basically to get higher on the Forbes list. Every year before the Forbes issue came out, the billionaire's issue, he would buy up his own stock, pump up his own stock, and after it came out, he would sell it. Kylie Jenner's team gave us what we believe are bogus numbers about her company to get onto the Forbes billionaire's list, and she's not even the thirstiest member of the Kardashian family.

9:18Randall Lane: During COVID, Kanye West called me every other day, we talk about an hour at a time, mostly about how he thinks he was richer than we said he was. When we respectfully disagreed, he respectfully responded by tweeting my cell phone to 30 million followers on Twitter. That was a tough day. But Kanye inspired an idea. Why can't we lean into this strange leverage we have over some people. Why can't we create a list that rewards people for donating to charity versus penalize them by taking them further down on the Forbes list?

10:06Randall Lane: So we've created something called True Net Worth and we're gonna debut it right here. True Net Worth is your regular net worth combined with the money you've donated that we appreciate like you still own it. Here are the top five by True Net Worth. Hey, again, Randall just showed a picture of the Forbes top five true net worth in this order. Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Larry Page, and Sergey Brin.

10:42Randall Lane: Look at my friend. Look at my friend Warren Buffett. He's already given more away in today's dollars than he still has. He's pledged 99 % of what's left to charity. And he stipulated that all that money has to be spent down within 10 years of his death as opposed to just sitting on a foundation gathering interest for years. That's true net worth. Now let's look at the biggest movers on this list. Elise here, the last picture Randall showed on the screen is showing the biggest movers in this order. Mackenzie Scott, Dustin Moskovitz, Reed Hastings, Lynn Schusterman, and John Arnold.

11:27Randall Lane: Mackenzie Scott is giving away money, faster, smarter, no strings attached, than pretty much anyone in history. She's the 84th richest person in the world by net worth. She's 26 by true net worth.

11:44Randall Lane: people don't value what you can't measure true net worth offers role models for billionaires for millionaires for thousandaires give while you live give faster and bigger maybe than you're comfortable with give your money or your time but what all of it does is support the system that makes all of us prosperous thank you

12:13that was randall ling at ted 2026 if you're curious about ted's curation find out more at ted.com slash curation guidelines and that's it for today ted talks daily is part of the ted audio collective this talk was back checked by the ted research team and produced and edited by our team martha estefanos oliver Friedman Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tonsika Songmarnivong. This episode was mixed by Lucy Little. Additional support from Emma Taubner and Daniela Ballarezzo. I'm Elise Hu. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening.

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