Bernie Madoff did not forfeit $170 billion in assets, in spite of what the USA Today headline and the first sentence of the AP article say. Obviously it was a typo (they meant millions), but it is really asking too much of the copy editors of the business section of the country's most widely circulated paper to know the difference between millions and billions. Bill Gates and Warren Buffet never had $170 billion. Madoff might be rich, but he's not that rich.
--Dean Baker