As Taylor Swift continues to prove, writing ballads and pop songs about your personal life can be a lucrative career path. Overnight, the highly decorated industry veteran collected another accolade as she made her first appearance on the Forbes’ rich list of world billionaires.
The 14-time Grammy Award winner was ranked the 2,545th richest person in the world, courtesy of her US$1.1 billion (AU$1.69 billion) net worth. The ten-digit salary has been attributed to the success of her highest-grossing-of-all-time stadium tour, the Eras Tour, and the valuation of her ever-growing music catalogue—a body of work that’s ever compounding by the re-release of ‘stolen’ masters and new launches like the impending 10th studio album, The Tortured Poets Department.
According to the publication, Swift’s fortune “includes more than US$500 million [AU$768 million] in estimated wealth amassed from royalties and touring, plus a music catalogue worth $500 million and some US$125 million [AU$192 million] in real estate.”
Swift’s property portfolio includes the heritage, colonial-style Rhode Island estate ‘High Watch’ mentioned on Folklore’s “The Last Great American Dynasty”, her Tribeca penthouse in Manhattan—yes, the one she rents near Cornelia Street—and three reported mid-century mansions in Beverly Hills.
Currently Swift is the only musician to appear on the list solely based on her music and live performances. Though Rihanna debuted on the list in 2022 as the youngest self-made billionaire, a portion of her wealth was amassed due to the profitability of her cosmetics line Fenty Beauty and lingerie brand Savage X Fenty.
Like the makeup and music mogul, Swift is regarded to be self-made, however, Swift’s been categorised as “self-made who came from a middle-class or upper-middle-class background”.
This year marked the largest number of billionaires ever recorded, with over 2,781 in total and 141 more than 2023. (These new additions include Swift and the CEO of OpenAI.) While many across the globe face a cost of living crisis, Forbes reports that the nearly 3000 billionaires are richer than ever, with the total aggregate of their fortunes worth US$14.2 trillion (AU$21.8 trillion).
