Anderson Cooper

Anderson Hayes Cooper was born on June 3, 1967, and is often regarded as the world's richest journalist. The 54-year-old, who was born into a wealthy New York City family, is the anchor of CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360," which pays him a whopping $12 million each year. According to finance.yahoo.com, the American-born television journalist and comedian is worth $250 million, the most of which comes from his employment.

Cooper was born in New York City into a distinguished family, the son of heiress Gloria Vanderbilt and novelist Wyatt Emory Cooper. Cooper began working as a fact-checker for Channel One News, a news program carried in many American middle and high schools, in 1990, after receiving a B.A. in political science (1989) from Yale University. During this period, he obtained a press pass and flew to Southeast Asia, where he self-produced coverage of Myanmar's political unrest (Burma). Channel One ran these news segments, and Cooper was eventually named chief foreign correspondent.

Net worth: $250 million