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The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

bloomberg.com

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Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#21

Post by loeg »

jedberg wrote: post #3

This title, while informative, is unfortunately not super related to the article itself, which is about municipal bonds, who buys them and asking the question, why are people buying fewer muni bonds than before?

It's not that fewer muni bonds are being bought, but that fewer individuals are buying muni bonds:

> What’s disturbing about the data is that the number of investors claiming tax-exempt interest -- the municipal market’s constituency, if you will, is falling, after reaching a peak of almost 6.5 million in 2008.

The likely reason is that muni bonds aren't competitive with ordinary treasury bonds for people in lower tax brackets due to market pressure from investors in high tax brackets. So they make sense for fewer people and rational lower income investors move away from them.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#22

Post by nbsd4lyfe »

jpatokal wrote: post #15
nugget wrote: post #9

Consider four different people: 1. a lawyer who works 100 hours/week flirting with a heart attack and earns $480,930 2. a small business owner who sells their plumbing co after 4 decades and earns $480,930 from the sale, but never broke six figures before 3. a retiree who sits on the couch 24/7 and earns $480,930 in passive dividends 4. a professional of some kind who works 20 hours/week in a low stress job and earns…

Pray tell, what kind of low stress job lets you earn $500k/year with 20 hours/week? (Actual job, please, not "4-hour workweek" style passive investment income.)

I've been reading stories about a corruption case and apparently there's a lot of easy money to be had doing that.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#23

Post by tunesmith »

Some of it is just screwy. Like...

The average tax rate for the top 2% is higher than for the top 3%. That is as it should be, if you believe in progressive taxation.

It's higher again for the top 1%, and higher again for the top 0.1%.

But then it's lower for the top 0.01%, and lower again for the top 0.001%.

In fact, the average tax rate is lower for the top 0.001% than it is for the top 3%.

In 2015.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#24

Post by powvans »

jpatokal wrote: post #15
nugget wrote: post #9

Consider four different people: 1. a lawyer who works 100 hours/week flirting with a heart attack and earns $480,930 2. a small business owner who sells their plumbing co after 4 decades and earns $480,930 from the sale, but never broke six figures before 3. a retiree who sits on the couch 24/7 and earns $480,930 in passive dividends 4. a professional of some kind who works 20 hours/week in a low stress job and earns…

Pray tell, what kind of low stress job lets you earn $500k/year with 20 hours/week? (Actual job, please, not "4-hour workweek" style passive investment income.)

There are many such jobs available. We discuss this in detail at my weekend seminars, which you may attend for the low low price of $20k.

Seriously though, I think I might know of some semi-retired lawyers who make that sort of money, but that only happens after a lifetime of option #1.

Edit: you could make this kind of money with very little work as a board member of a large corporation. Once again, see option #1 for how to get to that point in your life.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#25

Post by tunesmith »

shiftpgdn wrote: post #7
refurb wrote: post #5

Is this household or individual? I only see "tax return" mentioned, so it could be a mix of both. A common Silicon Valley working couple, 10+ years into their careers are likely to be in the 1% if you roll in things like bonuses and stock/option grants. And at the same time you have people claiming to be middle class with incomes over $250K.

You don't feel a 250K annual salary is middle class? That is a king's ransom in most of the country.

Yeah but I think you need a much higher income than you used to (relatively) to feel reasonably assured of a comfortable retirement. If you believe that a middle class person should feel relatively certain they'll have a comfortable retirement if they work for 30-40 years, then it messes with the definition of what "middle class" really is.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#26

Post by charlesdm »

jpatokal wrote: post #15
nugget wrote: post #9

Consider four different people: 1. a lawyer who works 100 hours/week flirting with a heart attack and earns $480,930 2. a small business owner who sells their plumbing co after 4 decades and earns $480,930 from the sale, but never broke six figures before 3. a retiree who sits on the couch 24/7 and earns $480,930 in passive dividends 4. a professional of some kind who works 20 hours/week in a low stress job and earns…

Pray tell, what kind of low stress job lets you earn $500k/year with 20 hours/week? (Actual job, please, not "4-hour workweek" style passive investment income.)

Investing $5m of your own capital.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#27

Post by marnett »

refurb wrote: post #5

Is this household or individual? I only see "tax return" mentioned, so it could be a mix of both. A common Silicon Valley working couple, 10+ years into their careers are likely to be in the 1% if you roll in things like bonuses and stock/option grants. And at the same time you have people claiming to be middle class with incomes over $250K.

Social class PSA:

Lower, middle, upper-middle, upper class, etc do not map (as much as news media tries) to income levels. Middle class does not identify a level of income.

To identify income levels use quintiles instead.

Middle class is a social class and annual income has no causal effect on social class.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#28

Post by forapurpose »

nugget wrote: post #9

Consider four different people: 1. a lawyer who works 100 hours/week flirting with a heart attack and earns $480,930 2. a small business owner who sells their plumbing co after 4 decades and earns $480,930 from the sale, but never broke six figures before 3. a retiree who sits on the couch 24/7 and earns $480,930 in passive dividends 4. a professional of some kind who works 20 hours/week in a low stress job and earns…

> ultimately income tells a very small piece of the story

There may be other pieces but income is a very large one. Change the incomes of those people to $15,000 and we would see very large differences in their lives.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#29

Post by jpatokal »

dannylandau wrote: post #16
jpatokal wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pray tell, what kind of low stress job lets you earn $500k/year with 20 hours/week? (Actual job, please, not "4-hour workweek" style passive investment income.)

Managing Director at Hedge Funds. They just show up to collect the money.

My understanding is that most jobs involving moving around millions or billions of other people's money tend to be the opposite of low-stress.

Re: The top 1% of the US makes $480k or more in adjusted gross income

#30

Post by jpatokal »

charlesdm wrote: post #26
jpatokal wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pray tell, what kind of low stress job lets you earn $500k/year with 20 hours/week? (Actual job, please, not "4-hour workweek" style passive investment income.)

Investing $5m of your own capital.

A) That's passive income, and B) I'd like to know where you're getting those steady 10% rates of return.
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