Power really does rest in the hands of the few

October 20, 2011

A study that seeks to go behind ideology to study the connections of the powerful has revealed that the global economy only has a handful of players. Conducted by complex systems theorists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich the study “examined the connections between 43,000 transnational corporations [and] has identified a relatively small group of companies, mainly banks, with disproportionate power over the global economy.” Of those companies there is a “super-entity” of 147 even more tightly knit companies. Less than 1% controls 40% of the wealth of the entire network. Some of the companies included in this “super entity” include JP Morgan Chase & Co, Goldman Sachs Group Inc, and Sun Life Financial Inc. Read more in New Scientist.