When Forbes released the first Forbes 400 list in 1982, it only took $100 million ($300 million in today’s dollars) to rank among the nation’s 400 richest people. Steve Jobs made the cut, as did Yoko Ono and mob moneyman Meyer Lansky. The richest person in the U.S. was shipping tycoon Daniel Ludwig, who had a net worth of $2 billion ($6.1 billion today). In the four decades since, thousands of people have claimed a spot on The Forbes 400 only to die, donate or squander their fortunes. Yet, even as the cutoff has ballooned to $2.7 billion—giving the ultra-rich an even larger share of American wealth—17 people from the original Forbes 400 list remain on the 2022 ranking, our 40th-anniversary issue. Some, like Warren Buffett and Nike cofounder Phil Knight, have never left this elite group. Others, including Donald Trump, have had a rollercoaster run—making, missing, then remaking The Forbes 400, sometimes multiple times, since 1982.

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