The classic rags-to-riches story of the wealthy man has him starting out with a barrow at his local market place and then coming up with a brilliant idea which sees his business take off to the point where he becomes rich and then very rich. It does happen – occasionally. But as the Wealth-X and UBS Billionaire Census shows, more often than not the ultra-wealthy received part of their start in life thanks to a university education.
Globally, nearly two-thirds of billionaires have a university degree. A quarter of them have a postgraduate degree; and ten per cent have a doctorate. In the UK, where there are more billionaires than any other single country in Europe, as many as 80% of them have a degree.
This figure is particularly significant when you consider that most of these people received their degrees in the 1960’s, ‘seventies or ‘eighties, when only some ten per cent of the UK population had a university degree. It is only since a Labour government was elected in the UK in 1997 that there has been a drive to increase the number of people with degrees to around 50% of the population. This has led some to question the value of many modern degrees.
As was revealed recently, even though more billionaires live in Europe than in any other continent, the USA is home to more billionaires than any other single country in the world (see, Europe is Home of Choice for Billionaires, https://orcap.co.uk/europe-is-home-of-choice-for-billionaires/). So perhaps it is to be expected that 16 of the top 20 universities which have produced billionaires are in the US.
In fact, the leading eight universities for producing billionaires are American. Top of the list is the University of Pennsylvania, coming in ahead of Harvard, Yale, the University of Southern California, Princeton, Cornell, Stanford and the University of California, Berkeley, in that order.
The rest of the world gets a look-in at that point. Next, reflecting India’s growing wealth, is the University of Mumbai, followed by the London School of Economics (LSE) – the only UK university to make the top 20. And in eleventh place – also reflecting the growth of a new economy – is the Lomonosov Moscow State University, known to its alumni as MGU. After eight more US universities, EH Zurich completes the list.
The fact that the only UK university is LSE, and not Oxford or Cambridge, points also to where the majority of billionaires have taken their university education to make their fortune: most of them have been successful in finance, banking and investment.
It is interesting to note that many of these billionaires continue to demonstrate that they value education. More than half of them are involved in philanthropic projects; and the biggest single cause they support is education, particularly higher education. The universities are well aware of this, seeking donations from their wealthy graduates. Perhaps nowhere is more aware than Harvard. The university which has produced the second most billionaires has a fundraising target of $6.5bn.
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