Shh (2 of 20)

Continuing on with examples of how the wealthy in this country have more advantages to grow their worth and attain more power, we have the hedge fund.

Hedge funds, which are also restricted to accredited investors, use a variety of often complex strategies, such as high-tech, proprietary trading platforms that buy and sell stocks in milliseconds. There were more than 8,000 hedge funds at the end of 2009, according to Hedge Fund Research.

John Merrill, chief investment officer of Tanglewood Wealth Management in Houston, says less than 25 hedge fund managers have stellar long-term records that make them worth often hefty fees, which can be 2 percent of the portfolio every year plus 20 percent of any profits. For regular investors it can be a challenge to even identify the most successful funds, which can be secretive about their track records, he adds.

Something else to note as well. Hedge funds are not obligated to disclose their activities to third parties. In addition to being very under regulated, hedge fund disclosure is not available to the non investor. Even to investors, they have very limited transparency and this is how someone like Madoff was able to run (an actual as opposed to make believe) Ponzi Scheme.

So, hedge funds are another example of something that is offered only to the very wealthy which further cements their ability to maintain power over the rest of us.