In 2010, singer-songwriter Bruno Mars had a megahit with his song "Billionaire."

Mars imagines what would happen if he became a billionaire. Along with Travie McCoy, he sang about all the good he would bring to the world with that kind of money but also of his desire to be on the cover of Forbes magazine "smiling next to Oprah and the Queen." As successful as Mars has been, his net worth is just $105 million.Forbes publishes the names of the world's richest people annually, and 12 Pennsylvanians are on the latest list released this week. One of them lives in Schuylkill County - none other than Yuengling beer owner-executive Richard Yuengling of Pottsville, who comes in at number 1,161 on the list. Forbes says for the first time ever, more than 2,000 people have a net worth of $1 billion or more.About Yuengling, 74, Forbes says, "Dick Yuengling turned his family's struggling coal-town brewery into a powerhouse with $550 million in sales in 2015." It went on to say: "He is the fifth generation to own D.G. Yuengling & Son, America's oldest brewery (1829). When he bought out his father in 1985, it was producing 137,000 barrels a year; today, it's one of the nation's five largest beer companies, pumping out about 2.8 million barrels annually.Forbes says that Yuengling drives a dirty Toyota Camry and heads to work so early that he has to pick up the newspaper directly from the distributor. "Like the four generations before him," Forbes says, "he refuses to sell out. Instead, after three decades lording over the business (sometimes manning forklifts and personally backing semi-trucks into his loading dock), he is preparing to hand the company to his four daughters, if he can let go of the reins."Yuengling places tied for sixth among the dozen Keystone state billionaires, who range from Campbell Soup heiress Mary Alice Dorrance Malone's $3.9 billion, to Dick's Sporting Goods CEO Edward Stack's $1.2 billion. Malone lives in Coatesville, while Stack lives in Pittsburgh. As the largest shareholder in Campbell Soup, Malone, 67, wound up in 460th place, while Stack, 62, placed 1,678th.We realize that trying to put your arms around a crazy number such as $1.8 billion is not easy, so I thought I would give it some perspective.• If you stretched 1.8 billion dollar bills end to end, it would cover 170,454 miles or almost seven times around the world at the equator or seven-tenths of the distance to the moon.• $1.8 billion would buy you more than five thousand $350,000 Rolls-Royce convertibles.• It also would buy you 600 million glasses of Yuengling Beer during happy hour.The Forbes' list confirmed what we suspected: The rich are getting richer. It was a record year for the richest people on the planet, as the number of billionaires jumped 13 percent, from 1,810 last year to 2,043. Their total net worth rose by 18 percent to $7.67 trillion, also a record. The change in the number of billionaires is the biggest in the 31 years that Forbes has been tracking the megarich globally.The other Pennsylvanians who made the exclusive list, their net worth and their claim to fame are:• No. 717 John Middleton of King of Prussia, $2.8 billion, tobacco.• No. 782 Henry Hillman, 98, Pittsburgh, $2.6 billion, investments:• No. 896 Michael Rubin, 44, Bryn Mawr, $2.3 billion, online retail.• No. 1098 Thomas Hagen, 81, Erie, $1.9 billion, insurance.• No. 1161 (tied with Richard Yuengling) Jeffrey Lurie, 65, $1.8 billion, Philadelphia Eagles owner• No. 1234 Brian Roberts, 57, Philadelphia, $1.7 billion, Comcast CEO.• No. 1567 Dorrance "Dodo" Hamilton, 88, Wayne, $1.3 billion, Campbell Soup shareholder and granddaughter of the company's founder.• No. 1567 Maggie Magerko, 51, Belle Vernon, $1.3 billion, owner of 84 Lumber• No. 1678 Richard Hayne, 69, Coatesville, $1.2 billion, owner of Urban Outfitters.While the net worth of these Pennsylvanians sounds impressive, their assets are like chump change compared to the world's richest top 5:No. 1 Bill Gates, 51, Microsoft founder, $86 billion.No. 2 Warren Buffett, 86, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, a multinational conglomerate company, $75.6 billion.No. 3 Jeff Bezos, 53, founder of Amazon.com, $72.8 billion.No. 4 Amancio Ortega, 80, of Spain, founder and former chairman of Inditex fashion group, best known for its chain of Zara clothing and accessories retail shops, $71.3 billionNo. 5 Mark Zuckerberg, 32, founder of Facebook, $56 billion.The youngest billionaire in the world for the second year running is 20-year-old Alexandra Andresen, a Norwegian heiress, who assumed her wealth when her father transferred control of their family's investment company to her and her sister. Each has a $1.2 billion fortune.By Bruce Frassinelli |

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