The wealth figures for X percentile seem low. I wonder where he's getting them. When I Google it, 2.4M was the 95th percentile two years ago.
Dad, Are We Rich?
31–40 of 164 posts
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Humans naturally anchor to their social network. If those people grew up in rural West Virginia with coal miner family income they would tell you that 250k/year is wealthy. You have to actively resist this anchoring behavior. You have to remind yourself that just because your neighbor has a 50k car, it doesn't mean that your 10k car is not a good fit for you.
I came from a poor area. I used to think 80k/yr was rich. Time passed, I got work in Silicon valley with a wife and kids. Living there I think 500k would be middle class. Not even upper middle class. Perspectives change as you are exposed
80k/yr CAN be rich, it all depends on location. 80k/yr would be poverty in the valley, most of that money going to just having shelter.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#33I think the author is a bit too narrow in their definition of "political clout". They seem to define it as the ability to personally influence federal policy. However, as a class, people with $4M in wealth or more have an immense amount of political clout. Most contemporary US local, state, and even federal policies are geared toward attracting and retaining these people. Think property tax caps, mortgage interest de…
In my opinion, the easiest way to have personal influence on federal policy is to be willing to spend your twenties working for peanuts on the Hill. Those staffers are the ones doing most of the real work.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#34I think the HN bubble is far detached from the real world. If you own 100k+ of assets, most of the people in the world will see you as incredibly rich. If you own a house in the Bay Area even with a mortgage most Americans will see you as rich. Sure you might not feel rich because you have to go to the office each day and you dont have a sports car, but you are.
Median and mean wealth per adult, in US dollars. USA: 61k World: 4k
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe...
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#35My measure of rich is "Can I live my current lifestyle without regular income from a job?". If the answer is yes, then you are rich. The trick here is to make sure to keep your lifestyle costs in line with your salary when you first start out, so that as your income grows you can save. So yeah, if you want a big house and nice cars and nice vacations, you wouldn't consider yourself rich compared to people who don't h…
I think a better way to say this is, are you a capitalist or not. Most people are NOT capitalists (don't own capital) that they live off of.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#36My measure of rich is "Can I live my current lifestyle without regular income from a job?". If the answer is yes, then you are rich. The trick here is to make sure to keep your lifestyle costs in line with your salary when you first start out, so that as your income grows you can save. So yeah, if you want a big house and nice cars and nice vacations, you wouldn't consider yourself rich compared to people who don't h…
I think a better way to say this is, are you a capitalist or not. Most people are NOT capitalists (don't own capital) that they live off of.
I guess I should have added a caveat that "my current lifestyle" needs to meet basic needs and make you at least relatively happy.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#37It's interesting to me that most classifications put middle class at the point when you earn more then 50% of the population. You would think middle class should be defined as the 50% of people that straddle the middle of the income bell curve.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#38The wealth figures for X percentile seem low. I wonder where he's getting them. When I Google it, 2.4M was the 95th percentile two years ago.
The income levels are also way off on globalrichlist.com
$60,000 a year makes you the 11,425,788th richest person in the world? US median household income was $59,039 in 2016 and if there are 125 million households in the US, then that means you are only the 62th million richest person in the US alone let alone the world.
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#39My measure of rich is "Can I live my current lifestyle without regular income from a job?". If the answer is yes, then you are rich. The trick here is to make sure to keep your lifestyle costs in line with your salary when you first start out, so that as your income grows you can save. So yeah, if you want a big house and nice cars and nice vacations, you wouldn't consider yourself rich compared to people who don't h…
[deleted]
Re: Dad, Are We Rich?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Humans naturally anchor to their social network. If those people grew up in rural West Virginia with coal miner family income they would tell you that 250k/year is wealthy. You have to actively resist this anchoring behavior. You have to remind yourself that just because your neighbor has a 50k car, it doesn't mean that your 10k car is not a good fit for you.
I came from a poor area. I used to think 80k/yr was rich. Time passed, I got work in Silicon valley with a wife and kids. Living there I think 500k would be middle class. Not even upper middle class. Perspectives change as you are exposed
You're way off base, median income in Silicon Valley is $110,373; 5x median income is not middle class by any stretch of the imagination. There is no city in the world where 500k a year isn't rich.