Bill Gates Remains The US Richest Person

Bill Gates the co-founder of Microsoft has again been named as the wealthiest person in the US and for the 17th year in a row. His fortune of $54 billion has been calculated by Forbes magazine.

Investor Warren Buffett is in second place with $45 billion, Larry Ellison the Oracle software tycoon is in third place and in fourth place on the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans is Wal-Mart heir Christie Walton.

This year it takes a net worth of at least $1 billion to get on Forbes list where as in 2009 it took $950 million. The collective net worth of the 400 billionaires has risen by 8% over the past year to $1.37 trillion, similar to the GDP of Canada or Spain.

Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder of Facebook, has seen his wealth grow by 245% to $6.4 billion putting him in 35th position in the richest list. His fellow cofounder Dustin Moskovitz is the youngest to make it to the richest. At 26 years old, and eight days younger than Zuckerberg, is one of 16 new entrants in the list which also includes another Facebook figure, Eduardo Saverin.

There are 34 people dropping off the list, 16 new entrants and 18 people returning to the list after previously dropping off, including Sydney Kimmel who made his fortune in the clothes business before becoming a film producer.

Of the 400 members of the richest 231 had donated to the Democratic party in the past five years, giving a total of $6.2 billion and 247 people donated $7.3 billion between them to the Republican party in the same period.