Amazon founder Jeff Bezos became the richest person in modern history today
Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder and chief executive, is certainly having a happy Prime Day today.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a daily tracker of the world's richest people, Bezos was worth more than $150 billion this morning, which made him the richest person in modern history.
The achievement even takes into account inflation when Microsoft founder Bill Gates was worth $100 billion in 1999. That wealth would equate to about $149 billion today.
Although Bezos has since fallen back to a measly $145 billion net worth from his peak this morning, his rank as the world's richest person has been on-and-off since July 2017. Bezos and Gates have swapped spots on lists of the world's wealthiest people depending on how well their respective companies Amazon and Microsoft perform.
But Bezos is at the moment around 60 percent richer than Gates, who is only worth $95 billion today. Although that's significantly less than what Bezos is worth, Gates spreads his wealth and Bezos simply doesn't (his first donation ever was made just this year).
It's worth noting that Gates has given away such large chunks of his fortune that he would actually have around the same net worth as Bezos if he still owned all of those assets: billions of dollars and more than 700 million Microsoft shares.
He's been giving to charitable foundations since the 1990s and even founded his namesake Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that works to better healthcare and reduce extreme poverty.
That's the exact opposite of Bezos, because rather than being charitable, Bezos has a history of stinginess and poorly treating those who work for him.
Multiple reports have documented Amazon employees working in unpleasant conditions, and Washington Post employees recently protested their low pay and benefit packages (to a point that President Donald Trump, who constantly blasts media, even tweeted about the conflict).
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Who knows how much tightfisted Bezos will be worth after this Prime Day. But we at least certainly know he's having a great day — go enjoy those deals that help this man get even richer!
