We are living in the scraps of great empires long dead before us. The richest men in the world are in our past not our future.

In history there are 17 ( or perhaps even more ) people richer than Elon Musk today ( Inflation adjusted ):

Elon Musk net worth : 260 billion USD

1. Mir Osman Ali Khan - 270 billion USD

2. Jakob Fugger - 328 billion USD

3. John D. Rockefeller - 341 billion USD

4. King Croesus - 345 billion USD

5. Cyrus the Great - 350 billion USD

6. Andrew Carnegie - 372 billion USD

7. William the conqueror - 400 billion USD

8. Mansa Musa - 400 billion USD

9. Rothschild family - 500 billion USD

10. Abdul Rahman bin Auf - 606 billion USD

11. King Solomon - 2.1 trillion USD

12. Augustus Caesar - 4.6 trillion USD

13. Joseph Stalin - 7.5 trillion USD

14. Akbar the first - 21 Trillion USD

15. Emperor Shenzong of Song - 30 trillion USD

16. Alexander the great - 32 trillion USD

17. Genghis Khan - 100 to 150 trillion USD

It is kind of crazy that for a lot of history kings used to own entire nation states yet there are less than 20 people on the list richer than the richest man alive today.

As global wealth continues to go up, we can expect some of those previous records to be easily enough broken, such as Mir Osman, Jakob Fugger, and John D. Rockefeller by the end of the year.

The Rockefeller family today is worth 10.3 billion USD.

Genghis Khan's inflation adjusted net worth is the hardest to believe.

Similarly, the greatest empire of all time was the Persian empire, which at its peak around 480 BC accounted for 44% of the world's population.

In comparison, India's share of world population today is 17.76%.

In all other ways except technologically and genetically, we are today living in the scraps of far greater empires and greater men.

I am personally betting on Elon Musk's net worth crossing 1 trillion USD. Which would make his net worth 150x lesser than that of Genghis Khan.

Conclusion:

Genghis Khan was the greatest man that ever lived. Nobody will ever be able to beat his record for centuries to come.