The Super-Rich Get Richer: Forbes 400 Are All Billionaires

The news is: On this list, $999 million is chump change.

For the first time, all 400 Gotbucks on the Forbes tally are billionaires, from Gates (worth $53 billion) down to the bottom, Los Angeles semiconductor magnate Sehat Sutardja ($1 billion).

It's not just the accumulated wealth that draws attention to the list; it's the eye-popping numbers that show the speed with which wealth is gained -- and lost -- at the dawn of this millennium. For instance, according to Forbes:

· Casino mogul Sheldon Adelson (No. 3, $20.5 billion) has made $1 million per hour over the past two years.

· Google Inc. founders Sergey Brin (No. 12, $14.1 billion) and Larry Page (No. 13, $14 billion) have each made $13 million per day over the past two years.

· Martha Stewart dropped off the list after losing nearly $400 million over the past year.

Forbes has been publishing the much-ballyhooed list -- which relies on research and estimates and rounds net worth to the nearest $100 million -- since 1982. The inaugural list contained only 13 billionaires. Even after the technology crash at the beginning of the century, a three-year war and a jumpy economy, the wealth accumulation among the richest Americans continues unabated and has risen to historic proportions, even if measured by an arbitrarily arrived-at number (400, the number of swells who could fit into the Victorian New York ballroom of Caroline Astor).

"It is a really big deal that it's all billionaires," said Forbes associate editor Matthew Miller, who edited the list and led the team that spent a year compiling it. "It shows economic growth and, as this magazine is a fan of capitalism, it shows progress."