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What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

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Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#721

Post by IshKebab »

jajko wrote: post #260
IshKebab wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but I really wanted to know what rich people buy that I don't know about. The top answer - while vaguely interesting - didn't actually tell me anything I didn't already know. I think the conclusion is probably that they don't buy anything we don't know about.

That's easy - experiences. This is what many rich pay their last dime for. You can get much better experiences than they pay for, for much much much less. Going for an exotic tropical beach location? Well they normally stay in sterile 5* bubble which is boring beyond belief and very unauthentic. You can go ie to Seychelles or Bali, live with locals in cheapish airbnbs, swim on same beaches or go to same restaurants t…

> That's easy - experiences. This is what many rich pay their last dime for.

The topic is stuff they buy that I don't know about.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#722

Post by AndyKelley »

opo wrote: post #635
AndyKelley wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Products that are produced by employee-owned, co-ops, or non profit businesses. Even then, however, those organizations will have operating expenses - for instance renting a building. The only meaningful way to get the money circulating back through the economy is taxation. Or, if that doesn't happen enough and the disparity becomes too great, war and/or collapse of society will chaotically and capriciously redistrib…

> The only meaningful way to get the money circulating back through the economy is taxation. Scrooge McDuck is a fictional character. Rich people don't have all their money hoarded in a pool of gold coins - excess money is invested back into the economy.

An investment is a measure of wealth. It's a credit, which is someone else's debit.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#723

Post by confidantlake »

randomcarbloke wrote: post #620
atwrk wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are decidedly a result of the taxation system of a country. The country decided they wanted to have this class of people to exist. (The degree of) Wealth inequality is always a product of society.

This is reddit level oversimplification.

Oh the irony.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#724

Post by SJC_Hacker »

leftcenterright wrote: post #19

So, no wealthy person is buying a physics lecture or investing in experiments to better understand the nature of this universe we live in? /s btw does anyone know if places like Fermi lab, CERN receive donations from the super-wealthy?

Generally its universities that are getting the money directly. Its mostly for big ticket items, especially buildings, and especially where they can attach their name to it. Like at Stanford its the "Gates Computer Science" building.

Other than that there are foundations that issue grants to individual researchers, e.g. Gates also has a foundation. There are others such as Burroughs-Wellcome, Clayton Foundation, etc.

The private foundations are generally very stingy with "Facilities and Administration" fees, which was in the news recently as the fight over NIH/NSF funding which can go in the 50-60% range. Private generally doesn't go over 15%, frequently its much less.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#725

Post by m463 »

Loic wrote: post #426
em500 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example I wish someone told me about the existence of Miele kitchen equipment before I accidentally rented an apartment of a well-to-do woman. Don't believe the hype. I got an apartment full with Miele kitchen equipment (from the previous owner, but less than 10 years old). They're nothing special, and I got a lot more random errors on the oven ("please contact service", tried that once, they were as clueless a…

We are all Miele at home and for the next renewal, I will go to Bosch/Siemens. Too many small failures here and there (less than 8 year old). I was sincerely surprised because 20 years ago, Miele was the gold standard (at least in Germany). So, I agree with you.

wasn't there an article posted recently where the bosch dishwasher needed the phone app for common funcitons?

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#726

Post by antonchekhov »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #407
EvanAnderson wrote: post #224

Through some odd circumstances I found myself receiving a lot of catalogs and sales solicitations for a reasonably wealthy person. Most of the stuff was what you'd exoect-- expensive furnishings, clothing, home goods. The two that were most interesting were the travel-related (guided trips in exotic locales w/ profiles and resumes of the local guides), and oddly specific and highly-focused catalogs (gardening, specif…

Yeah, post the company name — because I'm picturing instead a company posing was a company for the rich and famous. Do we remember The Sharper Image catalog?

The J Peterman catalog is still around around (at least, online) and approaches satire in its selection of goods (mostly clothing) that assiduously conveys "casual, interesting, old-money wealth". The Elaine Benes character on "Seinfeld" worked there, and had to deal with the kooky habits of the Mr Peterman character.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#727

Post by ryandrake »

rglullis wrote: post #712
ryandrake wrote: post #700

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah I think this is something that people in countries like the US don't instinctively understand, or at least I didn't. Guilty as charged. I have the American mentality due to being raised here, and I would be horrified to hire a housekeeper or servant. The "well, it's better than nothing" argument, while true, feels icky and exploitative. "Better than nothing" is a terrible bar and a sign of a broken society, an…

Does it feel "icky and exploitative" to you to use Über/DoorDash/TaskRabbit?

Kind of. I don't do food delivery at all, and only hire uber/lyft when all other options are exhausted, and when I do, I at least I feel sufficiently bad about it. I would definitely feel "icky" hiring a personal shopper or hiring a chauffer to drive me everywhere.

And yea, I know there are other less visible areas in every product and service value chain where people are exploited and yet I am part of society. I don't have an answer or solution to this that is politically feasible.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#728

Post by bane »

jjice wrote: post #502
bane wrote: post #488

Grew up poor, made it a little in life - could maybe retire now. The things I and the people I grew up with don't know how to do at all can be shocking. People who grew up similarly and ended up in middle class seem to be similar unless they put real time into it: - how to buy stocks, what ETFs are, what a 401(k) is, etc. - hiring people to clean your house, do yard work, etc. - traveling out of the country, or in ma…

I find this super interesting and something I've thought about a bit in the past. All of these things combined are relatively simple. You could give a decent breakdown of each bullet point within an hour each, with room to dive in deeper if needed. Now with the internet and all the great resources out there, the access is there for most people (in a place like the US) to learn about these. I think the main problem no…

yup, it's very hard to bootstrap without knowing where the next step even is in a dark room.

> All the things you lists are things I personally associate with familial education.

I absolutely agree. Or some good mentor. If your entire family runs paycheck to mouth, the likelihood of somebody able to guide you towards a low fee brokerage that provides you with the financial advice to differentiate between different investment instruments is vanishingly small. Even people who make it into white-collar jobs with 401ks are likely to only vaguely understand that it's something more than a weird savings account they can't touch.

Investment takes a certain kind of stomach and can be a very expensive training exercise. Lots of people don't do it well, even highly sophisticated and educated investors.

I remember we spent a couple weeks on stocks and bonds in a class in middle school, but basically zero time on personal finance, how loans work, how to read legal paperwork, run a ledger, etc. Those have almost always been a "learn on the job" thing since I've been alive.

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#729

Post by adolph »

jmknoll wrote: post #662
adolph wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or an interactive AI primer for your grandchild.

I dont know if this is just baader-meinhof at work or the fact that AI is so prominent in cultural discourse at the moment, but I feel like I am seeing Diamond Age references everywhere I look

Or maybe it’s that Hackworth hired a ractor instead of getting AGI completed

Re: What do wealthy people buy, that ordinary people know nothing about? (2015)

#730

Post by m463 »

ackbar03 wrote: post #544
noboostforyou wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Price is 3-4 times higher but it lasts 5-10 times longer and is much more pleasant to use. "The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. ... A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about…

I'm curious about this though, does a rich man actually wear the same pair of boots for 10 years? That being said, I've noticed that a lot of clothes that I bought 10 years ago or so are of pretty high quality compared to today, (and no, they are not rich man's clothes). Some of them I actually have been wearing for more than 10 years now.

One thing that better brands seem to have is longevity of sales.

If you find a good pair of boots, you can probably buy again without going through the investigation of an equivalent replacement.

That something to appreciate when you find something good.

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