Batman Vs Iron Man: Who’s Richer Between Bruce Wayne And Tony Stark?

Batman and Ironman belong to a special class of superheroes — they don’t really have cool superpowers such as super strength, x-ray vision or the ability to fly that other heroes like Superman and Thor naturally possess.

What Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark have, however, is money, and they got billions of it. Both superheroes put their wealth to good use, and they’re not afraid to splurge on cool gadgets and even cooler rides to assist them in their crime fighting. But fans can’t help to ask, who’s the wealthier one between these two dashing billionaires?

Who Is Richer According To Forbes?

Back in 2013, Forbes made a list of 15 of the top-richest fictional characters where Wayne was ranked sixth. His net worth is valued at $9.2 billion, which he inherited from his wealthy parents, most of which is invested in Gotham’s top conglomerate, Wayne Enterprises.

Meanwhile, Tony Stark’s net worth is estimated to be $12.4 billion. This placed him higher in the rankings compared with Wayne as he is fourth on the list.

Who Spends More To Fight Crime?

Another Forbes article made a comparison between Batman and Ironman’s crime-fighting expenditure to see who foots a bigger bill in fighting villains. The comparison had three categories, namely, suits, estates and transportation.

Suits

Batman’s suit, which includes the helmet, torso and limb protection and gadgets (belt, batarangs, cape), is estimated to be worth $4.6 million. For comparison, Ironman’s six suits are undoubtedly more high end and high tech, given their flight capability, which explains why they are collectively valued at $756 million.

Estates

The superheroes’ estates play an important part in their crime-fighting style since they act as their base of operations. For Batman, he’s got the $32.1M Wayne Manor as his front, the $100M high-tech Bat Cave underneath and his $230k/year trusted butler Alfred, bringing Wayne’s estates’ worth to $132.3 million. Ironman, on the other hand, has his $40M modern house, a $15M engineering lab, the $50M A.I. named JARVIS or a total worth of $105 million.

Transportation

In terms of transportation, Batman’s transportation assets (Tumbler, Bat-Pod and The Bat) are valued at $52 million. Ironman’s assets, which include an Audi R8 Spyder, a Bugatti Veyron and a Rolls Royce Phantom, are valued at $2.5 million.

This means that Ironman is the bigger spender at $863 million compared with Batman’s $188 million. Of course, it’s easy to see that Stark’s edge is only due to one item — his pricey Iron Man suits.

But Many Fans Disagree

Of course not all fans agree with Forbes’ assessment, especially with the superheroes’ net worth. This topic even started a lively discussion on Quora, where various fans gave plenty of reasons why Batman might be actually richer than Ironman.

One reason why people believe that Forbes might have grossly undervalued Batman’s worth is that he actually spent more money than Ironman did. “Look at it this way — Batman had to finance (or the majority of…) the construction and launching of the Watch Tower (with all the weapons, equipment, running of staff, teleporters, food [i.e. Flash’s crazy diet], etc…),” according to fan Karl Burgin.

For those who are wondering what the Watch Tower is, it is the space-based headquarters of the Justice League. Now space missions are one of the most expensive undertakings that the planet has ever seen. For instance, the U.S. spent $25.4 billion for the Apollo program, while the cost of the Space Shuttle program is estimated to be around $196 billion.

The implication is that if Bruce Wayne could afford to shoulder most of the cost in putting up the multibillion Watch Tower, then he must be wealthier than Forbes’ estimate and is certainly more loaded than Tony Stark. What do you think?