Six Of The 400 Richest Americans Live In Missouri: Forbes

ST. LOUIS, MO — Six Missourians are on Forbes' list of the 400 wealthiest Americans. Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos topped the list released Wednesday beating out his fellow Washingtonian, Bill Gates, who had been at the top since 1994.

The 400 richest Americans have a massive amount of wealth. According to Forbes, the minimum net worth needed to join the list in 2018 was $2.1 billion, the highest amount ever for admission. In all, Forbes says the net worth of the 400 was a record high of $2.9 trillion and half of that belongs to just the 45 richest people in the country.

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Here are the Missourians admitted to this elite club:

• No. 58: Stanley Kroenke, $8.5 billion (sports, real estate)
• No. 64: Pauline MacMillan Keinath, $7.8 billion (Cargill)
• No. 83: Ann Walton Kroenke, $6.5 billion (Walmart)
• No. 109: John Morris, $5.7 billion (sporting goods retail)
• No. 223: Rodger Riney, $3.5 billion (discount brokerage)
• No. 232: David Steward, $3.4 billion (web IT provider)

Some other notable points from Forbes’ reporting:

• Only 57 women were on the list (about 14 percent)
• Those with self-made fortunes vastly outnumber those with inherited wealth
• President Donald Trump dropped 11 spots on the list compared to 2017, coming in at No. 259; see the New York Times blockbuster account of how Trump made his wealth, which differs significantly from the president’s account.

Forbes’ takes a hard and thorough look at the wealth of those on the list to figure out just how much they’re worth. Reporters at Forbes conduct interviews, look over documents, assets and factor in debt in their calculations. (You can see a more detailed methodology here.)

The top 10 billionaires on the list are:

1. Jeff Bezos (Amazon)
2. Bill Gates (Microsoft)
3. Warren Buffett (Berkshire Hathaway)
4. Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)
5. Larry Ellison (software)
6. Larry Page (Google)
7. Charles Koch (Koch Industries)
8. David Koch (Koch Industries)
9. Sergey Brin (Google)
10. Michael Bloomberg (Bloomberg LP)

Just the top three — Bezos, Gates and Buffett — hold more wealth than the bottom 50 percent of Americans combined, according to Forbes.

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