As forms of government changed from monarchies to republic, and the industrial & technological revolutions shifted the power base to the West, we have seen the wealthiest people go from rulers to industrialists.

This past week, the Canadian government introduced higher capital gains taxes, which was met by investors and entrepreneurs suggesting it would dampen entrepreneurship. It led me to wonder if true entrepreneurs would be less inclined to undertake new businesses. 

When I taught a class at McGill on entrepreneurship, I’d introduce the class by saying entrepreneurship has existed since the dawn of history, with prophets and kings being the earliest examples of individuals who demonstrated the skills and traits required to succeed. 

As I’ve recently gone into a deep dive on the history of Iran and ancient Persia, and having published a biography on Alexander the Great… I wondered how much money was a motivating factor to those earliest of entrepreneurs. 

Step Aside

These days, the wealthiest people in the world are largely American, and all without an exception business people. Indeed, if you were to benchmark to adjust for inflation and account for how much of the total world’s wealth was at any given point under a given ruler’s control, the list of the wealthiest people of all time would consist mainly of rulers, usually absolute monarchs who ruled, and owned, everything.

While the methodology of these “theoretical lists” leave a lot to the desired and need to be taken with a grain of salt, it’s a reflection of three key trends and changes over the past two centuries: 
– the centre of the world has shifted from Europe to the United States of America;
– the industrial and technological revolutions have created untold riches by changing the shape of the economies and commerce;
– but also, as forms of government have gravitated from monarchies to republics,
then the list of wealthiest people is unrecognizable from what the equivalent of the Forbes’ richest looked like.

A few years ago, an article became popular after claiming that Africa’s Mansa Musa was the richest person to have ever lived. While his wealth was staggering and fueled by controlling all of the Mali Empire’s gold and salt mines – essential commodities in the 14th century which Mali was the only major producer thereof – it’s possible that he was amongst the wealthiest, but not the wealthiest of all time.

History has seen rulers top the wealthiest people list through their ownership of everything they conquered and the form of government they ruled over. For example, the most influential secular figure of all time, Alexander the Great, had by his late twenties conquered much of Asia, Anatolia, Greece, Egypt in North Africa and the Greek islands. As he ruled as an absolute monarch, in theory these lands – and what they produced – personally belonged to legendary Macedonian commander who defeated the Persian empire and would conquer much of the known world, before dying at 32. He ruled over Egypt, which produced a majority of the wheat the world consumed, and Persia with its endless amounts of gold – by default, Alexander surpassed Cyrus the Great as the richest person ever… but as his empire crumbled and others emerged – in Rome, modern day Mongolia, Turkey and abroad, the pattern continued.

Does Money Drive Leaders?

But money isn’t everything, especially to conquerors, one of the earliest entrepreneurs known to man. Cyrus wasn’t known for his wealth hoarding, but rather, for letting those he conquered live according to their local mores, customs and religion. The Cyrus cylinder was the first declaration of human rights, one of many inventions by the Persian empire, both before and after the Arabs conquered Iran and converted Iranians to Islam. Cyrus was the King of Kings by virtue of not killing the local rulers he would conquer… and this inspired Alexander. The Persians were able to build a large empire partly thanks to their systems of administration, taxation and postal network. The Greek’s empire crumbled largely due to poor succession planning. Alexander was a great conqueror, but an abysmal administrator and manager!

But, inasmuch as new tech entrepreneurs’ or athletes’ wealth towers over that of their earlier peers (eg. Michael Jordan earned $93 million to Lebron James’ 480 million), all of these rulers’ wealth pale next to Genghis Khan, who commandeered the largest empire known to mankind – though all he had was land. He lived a simple life.

When the prevalent form of government was monarchy (usually absolute ones), most of the earliest wealthiest individuals were kings. As monarchies made way for republics & industrial and technological revolutions reinvented business & commerce, business founders and owners took that mantle. The list of today’s billionaires says it all.

The Role of War in Profiteering

While the form of government has changed, the racket remains the same, and no racket is greater than war. Before, you fought wars to expand the foothold of resources available to you, but industrial revolution and comparative advantage economic policy changed how wars were profitable: you sell the helmets and shovels — and guns and ammo. This originally meant tanks but today could represent the technology required to win battles.

As Cyrus built the first world empire, he built a great fortune doing so. As the oldest nation in the world going back to 3200 BC, Iran has seen subsequent leaders accumulate massive wealth. While Iran has evolved from a 2500 year-old monarchy to a theocratic republic, the one constant is that its head of state has always been well remunerated. During the 20th century, rumours of Mohammad Reza Shah’s fortunes were the source of articles in the New York Times and Washington Post as his monarchy came to an end. Rumors pegged his wealth at tens of billions of dollars, a source of consternation among his critics. When the dust settled, the actual sum of his fortune – while large – was much more timid, $62 million, revealed by the exiled crown prince Reza Pahlavi, and revealed during discovery process in an unrelated legal matter. Today, we hear of Vladimir Putin’s possible $200 billion net worth, not too far behind is the net worth of Iran’s current supreme leader Ali Khamenei, whose assets have been estimated at $85 billion. The fact is, running Ancient Persia or Iran was always a lucrative endeavour.

While citing money as the sole cause of the 1979 Islamic revolution is over-simplistic, the fact remains, that “who earns how much and is paid how/by whom” is a question that seems to have always been part of Iranian society’s thinking. The regime in Iran has been criticized by its citizens for diverting the nation’s fortunes to underwrite its proxies in Lebanon, Palestine, Syria and abroad. Khamenei’s health and age suggest that before long, the nation will be looking at a successor – the first since Khamenei replaced Ayatollah Khomeini.

As succession planning becomes a bigger issue on Iranians’ minds, it’s fair to presume that money and finances will only become a bigger sticking point amongst the 90 millions that make up the Iranian nation.

In some ways, I suppose, human beings and societies are more similar than different.