Talk:William Henry Vanderbilt
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The line, "...however his worth was to pale in comparison with the likes of John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie." seems not to fall in line with neutral-POV, and seems too much of a subjective/relative statement for an encyclopedic article.
It is also misleading from what I can tell. Given assumptions that Vanderbilt was worth $200 million in 1885, Carnegie $225 million in 1901, and Rockefeller $200 million in 1902 and $900 million in 1937 (numbers which may be inaccurate, but are the ones I could locate), various comparisons (see http://eh.net/hmit/compare/) either have Vanderbilt's wealth in modern terms worth:
- Significantly less than 1937 Rockefeller via CPI and GDP deflator
- About the same as 1901 Carnegie/1902 Rockefeller via CPI, GDP deflator, unskilled wage, and per capita GDP
- Greatly more than 1901 Carnegie/1902 Rockefeller/1937 Rockefeller via Relative share of GDP
At least for Carnegie (at what I believe was Carnegie's peak, before the greatest part of his philanthropy campaign), Vanderbilt's wealth seems to meet or surpass it by most reasonable measures. Comparison with 1937 Rockefeller is more complicated.
I suggest removal of that sentence fragment.
WELL CHELLO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.139.22.134 (talk) 18:41, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
