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THERE’S A BATTLE to be the richest person in the world right now with Bill Gates briefly relinquishing his crown during the day before grabbing back the top spot.
For the first time ever, Spanish clothing magnate Amancio Ortega overtook Microsoft founder Bill Gates according to Forbes’ real-time tracker
According to Forbes’ real-time tracker, the elusive multi-billionaire founder of European clothing retailer Zara smashed past Bill Gates to become the wealthiest person on the planet, when his fortune hit $80 billion (€72.5 billion).
It came after a surge in Inditex shares, the parent company that owns Zara.
It didn’t last too long though with Ortega’s shares dropping slightly from €33.99 per share to €33.80 per share bringing him back into second place.
The chopping and changing at the top shows how the elusive Ortega has quietly ascended the wealth rankings in recent years, as his company continues to perform well and expand.
Unlike many of the richest people in the world, Ortega has a fascinating rags-to-riches story. Born in 1936 during the Spanish Civil War, Ortega’s father earned 300 pesetas a month, a meagre salary.
Ortega’s biographer described his memories of a childhood during which his family could not always afford enough food. He left school in his early teens, working his way up from the absolute bottom rung as a messenger boy in a shop.
It wasn’t until he was 40 years old that Ortega got around to setting up Zara, the fast-fashion retailer that has gone from strength to strength — first growing in Spain, then neighbouring Portugal and France, then London. Now it’s all over the globe.
According to Forbes, Ortega’s wealth rose by 5.3%, another $4 billion, over the last 24 hours.
- Business Insider with reporting from Rónán Duffy
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You can make tea and take long breaks when at home. It’s a good fit right enough
@v39e84kK: You can make tea in the office aswell. Whats your point?
@v39e84kK: I’ll try again. You last reply to me was deleted by The Jouranal. Don’t attempt anything like that again, unless you want to end up in court.
@v39e84kK: You can make tea and take long breaks in the office environment too. Have seen many examples of this over the years in private and public sector jobs.
@Belebopz: That’s the joke.
@David A. Murray: Sound.
@v39e84kK: It’s not a joke, more a backhanded aside about public and civil servants. Go make me a cup of tea will you seeing as you have time on your hands there.
@v39e84kK: I trust me understand each other. What’s typed on the Internet is permanently there (even if deleted, it’s still on record). I want no public association (either visible or not) with that person. I can understand that we can all react on the Internet and type something we would wish to take back (or have worded differently), but I cannot afford any connection to be made, even if it was indirect.
@v39e84kK: Do not question authority.
If there’s any inefficiency or increased agro for tax payers then they should have to go back in person. I don’t trust civil service or state sector to ensure people are actually working from home.
@Damon16: maybe you should talk to someone about you’re trust issues ?
@Damon16: This implies you trust them currently!
Policy documents like this are all well and good but it will never be implemented as it’s written down, as it always comes down to the managers to do things right. I’ve a friend in the civil service who was being forced into the office, to do virtual meetings. Absolutely no rhyme or reason, other than micromanagement. In another Dept, all stats have gone up since wfh and backlogs greatly decreased.
Of course there will be people who will do nothing when at home … but they are the same people who do nothing when they’re in work either
Any chance the Motor Tax office can open ?
I know the folks in there will be filled with dread at the thought of risking their lives returning to work during a , eh , pandemic. The rest of seemed to fair ok returning to work long ago , with a low enough body count .
An anomaly on the online platform has been preventing me from donating to the tax fund for 9 months with no help on line .
@Keith Flood: Motor Tax Office in my local authority has been open to the public for months now
Let’s pretend there was no pandemic. Get up off your a*r*s*e*s & get to the office. Like retail staff, like doctors & nurses. Like every other hard working employee around the country.
@John Barry: Working from home does not make you less hard working or less effective. Some tasks I can do from home and some require me to be on site. Depends on the task. Just because hard-working shop workers, doctors and nurses jobs need to be on-site, doesn’t mean every hard-working worker should be on site. The pandemic has meant that thinking on working from home has changed. We can’t unknow what we learned, so going back to all pre-pandemic work practices makes no sense.
@Mickey Finn: very true. In general I have been more productive since working from home as I don’t get those constant interruptions from small talk or general office noise. Also, I am more likely to finish off a task in the evening, as I am not worried about missing a train/bus, and not shattered from the commute.
Hope that some private companies will follow this example, as the Right to Request Remote Work Bill as not been enacted yet, and it is already facing some serious opposition from Employers’ groups.
@Dr. Emmett Lathrop: It’s so Ireland that we are making a bill on allowing people to ASK for things. Amazing. Truly is a microcosm of everything wrong with Irish politics.
@Dr. Emmett Lathrop:
We only have to go in one day a month now for team meetings.
They’re after pulling out most of the desks & converting the office space to blocks of meeting rooms with all the latest tech in them.
100” Microsoft surface screens in the larger ones and 50” ones in the smaller. Full digital conference facilities. Really quite impressive.
@Dr. Emmett Lathrop: You already have the right to request wfh from your employer. As long as your employer has the right to refuse said request then I’d be more than happy for the bill to proceed. He who pays the piper calls the tune as the saying goes.
Or to put it another way they will work from the office 80 percent of the time (4 days a week).
What a crock of nonsense.
We were allowed to WFH one day a week before covid. So they are just reverting back to what was there before. Very progressive.
the kind of article to stir up envy…
It doesn’t effect me one way or the other but this government is bizarre with its reversals, it depends which way the wind is blowing
40,000 civil servants, huh, I live off Fishamble street, next to the Dublin City Council building, the street has missive pot holes and graffiti on the street bins. What do they do again? Their a joke, privatize it all.
have your say