[quote=@RoflsMazoy]
Wait hold on a sec, that would only be true if those numbers were a percentage of the world population, but population is always a set number. Earlier Santa said that level 7 is enough to be better than anyone who ever lived so in terms of modern population Level 7 is already enough to be better than 100% of the population.
[/quote]

His logic checks out, you know. Population isn't really a set number, but it still works because 1 in 100 means 1%.

Anyway, I tried it with real numbers and here's what I found: 

Assuming everyone in the modern world had sword skills, there would be 700 million level 1 or better swordsmen out of the total population of 7 billion. The level 2 swordsmen would number around 7 million people, meaning if you became a level 2 swordsman, you'd leave 693 million people in the dust. But that's less than a level 1 swordsman leaves, because the rest of the non-level 1 population would number around 6.3 billion, and the gap keeps getting smaller.

So yeah, it checks out. But from the sheer number of people in the world, it's kind of worth it to get into the big kid's club of level 5. Looking at it from a numbers point of view might discourage you, but from a person's point of view, it's good to add up people who are worse than you.