Excerpt from The Concentration of Wealth In the first place, then, I shall endeavor to contrast the conditions fifty years ago with those of to-day, in respect to wealth concentration. In 1854 there was published in the city of New York, a little volume* entitled The Wealth and Biography of the Wealthy Citizens of the City of New York. Some fifteen years before, the leading merchants of the city had met together, and made calculations as to the wealth at the command of each, in backing up their business enterprises. As the list grew, and copies were in demand, a regular publication was agreed upon; and this was entrusted to Moses Yale Beach, Esq, the publisher of the New York Sun. The book was then in its thirteenth annual edition; and in his preface the publisher says - The present edition is a careful revision of all previous ones, the largest portion of the contents having been entirely rewritten. Neither labor nor pains has been spared to make it absolutely correct, and it is ho ed not without success. Both from the character of the ub isher, and from the fact that the volume was the work 0 the business men themselves, we may safely assume that its contents are reliable. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.