Poor Belgium

The2010 Wealth Reportshows the picture the rich part of this world. It also highlights the value of real estate, and the attractiveness of cities. Starting with the good news: Brussels is still seen as one of the most important cities in the world:

The main reason is the political importance of Brussels:NATO and EU, and not the financial, cultural or economic importance:

Brussels isvulnerableand depends on its attractiveness for diplomats, expats and international headquarters. Safety is an issue for these people, and complaints are rising because of car/homejackings, and other forms of violence. Also, Brussels has some work to do on tidiness, compared to cities like Singapore, London and New York.

The report shows that there are roughly 50,000 millionaires (=investable assets of 1mio USD) living in Belgium. The methodology is somewhat unclear to me, claiming that it"builds on the work of Vilfredo Pareto and subsequent academic developments in the fields of both economics and statistics. Parameterisation of the wealth distribution is validated against a number of statistical sources, including data from the IMF, UN, national household surveys, national balance sheets and rich lists. Growth figures are measured in both real terms and local currencies in order to allow for adjustment for inflation and exchange rate fluctuations."

With 46,000 millionaires, Belgium looks poor compared to the Netherlands (100,000 - 60% larger population) and Switzerland (165,000 - roughly same size as Belgium, lower GDP).

In our country, the sentiment grows that they should tax more "the rich", if necessary chasing the goose with the golden eggs. But looking at the data, they should perhaps worry that Belgium is quite a poor country compared to the other European neighbours.