International Women’s Day on March 8 is a good time to look back and take stock of how women performed in 2017. As the world celebrates womanhood and brings together global governments, women’s organisations, businesses and charities together to celebrate their success, a look at the fortunes of top women in business shows it is indeed a moment to celebrate.
A record 256 women made it to the 2018 Forbes World’s Billionaires ranking, taking their collective net worth past $1 trillion, marking a 20 per cent increase since last year. The number of self-made women also reached 72, up from 56 a year ago.
The richest woman in the world is Walmart founder Sam Walton’s daughter Alice Walton whose fortune rose from $33.8 billion to $46 billion over the past year. Thanks to a 43 per cent increase in Walmart shares, Walton moved one spot to number 16 in the list of richest people in the world.
Walton took the spot from L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt who passed away at the age of 94 last year in September. However, her daughter Francoise Bettencourt Meyers grabbed the second spot with a net worth of $42.2 billion. Meyers saw a rise in her fortune mostly because of a 33 per cent stake in the cosmetics giant that was founded by her grandfather in 1909.
Meyers is followed by Susanne Klatten whose fortune stands at $25 billion, making her the third richest woman in the world. Once again, her entry in the list is because she inherited a stake in automaker BMW, becoming the 8th woman in top 10 to have inherited her riches.
The only two women who do not make that list are Australia’s Gina Rinehart, who sources her fortune from iron ore, and U.S.’s Abigail Johnson, who heads Fidelity Investments. Even though Johnson took over her family business, she helped it grow substantially over the years.
Coming to India, Savitri Jindal topped the list with a fortune of $8.8 billion. However, she is still ranked 176th globally.
The second richest Indian woman is Biocon chief Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw who is also India’s richest self-made woman with a fortune of $3.6 billion. “Biocon makes a range of generics to treat, among much else, autoimmune diseases, diabetes and cancer. The company is Asia’s largest insulin producer with a factory in Malaysia’s Johor region,” Forbes said.
Besides success stories, this International Women’s Day also assumes significance given the number of high profile cases of harassment at work that were reported last year. A number of celebrities including Angelina Jolie, Uma Thurman and Gwyneth Paltrow had also raised their voice as ‘#MeToo’ started trending on Twitter.
Another case of pay disparity was reported by Hollywood actress Michelle Williams who was paid just $1000 to reshoot her scenes in ‘All the Money in the World’, while her co-actor, Mark Wahlberg was paid $1.5 million. The incident came as a shock as both the celebrities are represented by the same agent.
However, the Forbes rich list comes as a hope where 42 women made the rankings for the first time, including two American immigrants, Jayshree Ullal and Eren Ozmen. Ullal who was born in London, was raised in India before she took over as the CEO of Arista Networks in 2008. Meanwhile, a native of Turkey, Eren Ozmen who got her MBA from the University of Nevada, has taken her fortune to $1.5 billion.