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American ‘oligarchy’ decried by Biden gained $1.5T

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The very richest Americans are among the biggest winners from President Joe Biden’s time in office, despite his farewell address warning of an “oligarchy” and a “tech industrial complex” that threaten U.S. democracy. 

The 100 wealthiest Americans got more than $1.5 trillion richer over the last four years, with tech tycoons including Elon Musk, Larry Ellison and Mark Zuckerberg leading the way, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The top 0.1% gained more than $6 trillion, Federal Reserve estimates through September show. 

Biden warned of “a dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a very few ultra wealthy people,” in his speech from the White House on Wednesday. “Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.”

During his term, the super-rich grabbed a bigger share of a growing pie. Stock and housing markets boomed during a post-pandemic rebound that outpaced U.S. peers. It left all the income and wealth groups measured by the Fed at least a little better-off — and American households overall some $36 trillion richer, as of September, than when Biden took office. 

Measured in straight dollars, that increase was slightly bigger than the one recorded under Biden’s predecessor and soon-to-be successor, Donald Trump. But inflation complicates the picture. The spike in prices over the last few years means that wealth rose faster during Trump’s term in real, purchasing-power terms, as did the median household income.

Under both presidents, the top U.S. billionaires did far better than almost everyone else.

The richest 100 Americans saw their collective net worth surge 63% under Biden, according to an analysis that covers the four years between his 2020 win and Trump’s re-election last November, and excludes another 8% jump since then.

The 100 largest fortunes combined now exceed $4 trillion — more than the collective net worth of the poorest half of Americans, spread over 66.5 million households. The share of U.S. wealth owned by the top 0.1%, at nearly 14%, is now at its highest point in Fed estimates dating back to the 1980s.

“Those at the top of the income distribution often do well during periods of strong economic growth,” Kimberly Clausing, a University of California at Los Angeles law professor and economist who served in Biden’s Treasury Department, said in an email. “Recent U.S. innovation and productivity growth have helped fuel these high returns.”  

The U.S. stock market has nearly tripled over the last eight years, with several huge technology stocks leading the way, a trend that exacerbates inequality. The Fed estimates that almost nine-tenths of stock and mutual fund holdings are in the hands of America’s top 10%.

In his speech Wednesday, Biden warned of a “tech industrial complex that could pose real dangers to our country.”

Under Trump, technology billionaires on Bloomberg’s index doubled their net worth. Four years later their collective fortunes had nearly doubled again, to more than $2 trillion.   

‘Almost a parody’

Among them is Musk, one of Trump’s most enthusiastic supporters, and also the biggest individual winner by far of Biden’s time in office.  

Now holding an estimated fortune of $450 billion, Musk was worth barely $100 billion on election day 2020. Then his wealth surged, doubling in a couple of months to make him the world’s richest person by the time Biden was inaugurated. It’s since more than doubled again — including a $186 billion increase since Trump’s victory, which has left the owner of Tesla and X close to the levers of power.

Musk, who donated at least $274 million to elect Trump and other Republicans in 2024, was picked by the president-elect to co-lead a planned Department of Government Efficiency which aims to slash federal spending. He’s been throwing his weight around in European politics too, backing far-right parties in the U.K. and Germany.

“With wealth comes large amounts of power,” says Boston College law professor Ray Madoff. “With Elon Musk, it’s almost a parody.” 

Three in five Americans believe rich people have too much political influence, according to a Pew Research Center survey released Jan. 9. Overall, 83% of respondents said the gap between rich and poor is a “big problem,” with 51% saying it’s a “very big problem.”  

It’s one that has “dogged the country for about 125 years, since the first industrial revolution,” according to Madoff. One key difference from earlier periods, she says, is that the tax system is “no longer serving as a counterbalance to the growing wealth inequality.” 

Biden ran for office promising to boost taxes on the wealthy and close loopholes.

In his first State of the Union address, the president said he disagreed with some fellow Democrats who had questioned whether billionaires should exist at all. “I think you should be able to become a billionaire and a millionaire, but pay your fair share,” he said, adding his goal was to “grow the economy from the bottom and the middle out” and to “reward work, not just wealth.”

Most Biden administration tax proposals weren’t adopted by Congress, however, including an idea to tax the unrealized gains of billionaires.

UCLA’s Clausing said several Biden policies did reduce wealth and income disparities, including the temporary expansion of the child tax credit, a new levy on stock buybacks and a corporate alternative minimum tax. 

‘What goes up…’

A key source of gains for Americans lower down the ladder is housing — the other main driver of U.S. wealth, along with financial assets, and one that’s much more evenly distributed across households.

Fed data show the bottom 90% of Americans own 56% of real estate holdings, compared with less than one-third of total wealth. The value of those working- and middle-class properties is up 47% since Biden took office, more than twice the rate of inflation.

Left behind during both Trump and Biden’s terms are the least educated Americans. The share of national wealth held by people without college degrees slipped under both presidents, and now is at the lowest level on record.

That trend could be exacerbated by the adoption of artificial intelligence, with the potential to kill jobs while boosting corporate profits, according to Patrick Artus, a senior advisor at asset manager Ossiam. The future course of inequality “very much depends on your assumptions about the effects of AI,” he said. 

John Cochrane, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, doesn’t see any harm to the economy or political system from billionaires with “paper wealth left invested in valuable companies that employ Americans and provide great products.” 

Anyway, he says, these gains won’t necessarily last. “What goes up can come down.”

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Accounting

IAASB tweaks standards on working with outside experts

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The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board is proposing to tailor some of its standards to align with recent additions to the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants’ International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants when it comes to using the work of an external expert.

The proposed narrow-scope amendments involve minor changes to several IAASB standards:

  • ISA 620, Using the Work of an Auditor’s Expert;
  • ISRE 2400 (Revised), Engagements to Review Historical Financial Statements;
  • ISAE 3000 (Revised), Assurance Engagements Other than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information;
  • ISRS 4400 (Revised), Agreed-upon Procedures Engagements.

The IAASB is asking for comments via a digital response template that can be found on the IAASB website by July 24, 2025.

In December 2023, the IESBA approved an exposure draft for proposed revisions to the IESBA’s Code of Ethics related to using the work of an external expert. The proposals included three new sections to the Code of Ethics, including provisions for professional accountants in public practice; professional accountants in business and sustainability assurance practitioners. The IESBA approved the provisions on using the work of an external expert at its December 2024 meeting, establishing an ethical framework to guide accountants and sustainability assurance practitioners in evaluating whether an external expert has the necessary competence, capabilities and objectivity to use their work, as well as provisions on applying the Ethics Code’s conceptual framework when using the work of an outside expert.  

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Accounting

Tariffs will hit low-income Americans harder than richest, report says

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President Donald Trump’s tariffs would effectively cause a tax increase for low-income families that is more than three times higher than what wealthier Americans would pay, according to an analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

The report from the progressive think tank outlined the outcomes for Americans of all backgrounds if the tariffs currently in effect remain in place next year. Those making $28,600 or less would have to spend 6.2% more of their income due to higher prices, while the richest Americans with income of at least $914,900 are expected to spend 1.7% more. Middle-income families making between $55,100 and $94,100 would pay 5% more of their earnings. 

Trump has imposed the steepest U.S. duties in more than a century, including a 145% tariff on many products from China, a 25% rate on most imports from Canada and Mexico, duties on some sectors such as steel and aluminum and a baseline 10% tariff on the rest of the country’s trading partners. He suspended higher, customized tariffs on most countries for 90 days.

Economists have warned that costs from tariff increases would ultimately be passed on to U.S. consumers. And while prices will rise for everyone, lower-income families are expected to lose a larger portion of their budgets because they tend to spend more of their earnings on goods, including food and other necessities, compared to wealthier individuals.

Food prices could rise by 2.6% in the short run due to tariffs, according to an estimate from the Yale Budget Lab. Among all goods impacted, consumers are expected to face the steepest price hikes for clothing at 64%, the report showed. 

The Yale Budget Lab projected that the tariffs would result in a loss of $4,700 a year on average for American households.

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Accounting

At Schellman, AI reshapes a firm’s staffing needs

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Artificial intelligence is just getting started in the accounting world, but it is already helping firms like technology specialist Schellman do more things with fewer people, allowing the firm to scale back hiring and reduce headcount in certain areas through natural attrition. 

Schellman CEO Avani Desai said there have definitely been some shifts in headcount at the Top 100 Firm, though she stressed it was nothing dramatic, as it mostly reflects natural attrition combined with being more selective with hiring. She said the firm has already made an internal decision to not reduce headcount in force, as that just indicates they didn’t hire properly the first time. 

“It hasn’t been about reducing roles but evolving how we do work, so there wasn’t one specific date where we ‘started’ the reduction. It’s been more case by case. We’ve held back on refilling certain roles when we saw opportunities to streamline, especially with the use of new technologies like AI,” she said. 

One area where the firm has found such opportunities has been in the testing of certain cybersecurity controls, particularly within the SOC framework. The firm examined all the controls it tests on the service side and asked which ones require human judgment or deep expertise. The answer was a lot of them. But for the ones that don’t, AI algorithms have been able to significantly lighten the load. 

“[If] we don’t refill a role, it’s because the need actually has changed, or the process has improved so significantly [that] the workload is lighter or shared across the smarter system. So that’s what’s happening,” said Desai. 

Outside of client services like SOC control testing and reporting, the firm has found efficiencies in administrative functions as well as certain internal operational processes. On the latter point, Desai noted that Schellman’s engineers, including the chief information officer, have been using AI to help develop code, which means they’re not relying as much on outside expertise on the internal service delivery side of things. There are still people in the development process, but their roles are changing: They’re writing less code, and doing more reviewing of code before it gets pushed into production, saving time and creating efficiencies. 

“The best way for me to say this is, to us, this has been intentional. We paused hiring in a few areas where we saw overlaps, where technology was really working,” said Desai.

However, even in an age awash with AI, Schellman acknowledges there are certain jobs that need a human, at least for now. For example, the firm does assessments for the FedRAMP program, which is needed for cloud service providers to contract with certain government agencies. These assessments, even in the most stable of times, can be long and complex engagements, to say nothing of the less predictable nature of the current government. As such, it does not make as much sense to reduce human staff in this area. 

“The way it is right now for us to do FedRAMP engagements, it’s a very manual process. There’s a lot of back and forth between us and a third party, the government, and we don’t see a lot of overall application or technology help… We’re in the federal space and you can imagine, [with] what’s going on right now, there’s a big changing market condition for clients and their pricing pressure,” said Desai. 

As Schellman reduces staff levels in some places, it is increasing them in others. Desai said the firm is actively hiring in certain areas. In particular, it’s adding staff in technical cybersecurity (e.g., penetration testers), the aforementioned FedRAMP engagements, AI assessment (in line with recently becoming an ISO 42001 certification body) and in some client-facing roles like marketing and sales. 

“So, to me, this isn’t about doing more with less … It’s about doing more of the right things with the right people,” said Desai. 

While these moves have resulted in savings, she said that was never really the point, so whatever the firm has saved from staffing efficiencies it has reinvested in its tech stack to build its service line further. When asked for an example, she said the firm would like to focus more on penetration testing by building a SaaS tool for it. While Schellman has a proof of concept developed, she noted it would take a lot of money and time to deploy a full solution — both of which the firm now has more of because of its efficiency moves. 

“What is the ‘why’ behind these decisions? The ‘why’ for us isn’t what I think you traditionally see, which is ‘We need to get profitability high. We need to have less people do more things.’ That’s not what it is like,” said Desai. “I want to be able to focus on quality. And the only way I think I can focus on quality is if my people are not focusing on things that don’t matter … I feel like I’m in a much better place because the smart people that I’ve hired are working on the riskiest and most complicated things.”

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