What does it take in terms of assets, abilities, and/or income for you to consider them wealthy?
If they own a house, make at least 100k a year and can support their family comfortably, I would consider that wealthy. My father is in this bracket and he goes on vacations over seas, owns 3 relatively expensive vehicles, and still saves enough for retirement.
You don’t need a million dollars to live a rich, fulfilling life.
The tiers for me are: Doesn’t worry about money -> Doesn’t work -> Can afford a US senator to protect money. There are not titles for this kind of thing.
Of course, rich is a relative descriptor, like tall or heavy, some people are richer than others.
I would call anyone who doesn’t need to work in order to live (i.e. who can live off investments and interest) rich.
Sorry for linking back to the R word. But FIRE comes to mind with your post
Are old retirees rich, then? I wouldn’t consider that accurate.
If you’re not pulling in upper 6 figures from those investments, you’re still not rich.
If I ever manage to earn ~3000 euros (my current net salary) a month from just investments and interest, I will definitely consider myself rich. There may still be richer people than me even in that scenario, which is why I wrote that “rich” is a relative descriptor.
That’s a totally obtainable goal!
For everyone, right? Nobody works everyone just collects their 3k
For most of us reading this it is an obtainable retirement income. On the world stage if you can read this you are probably rich. A little bit of savings can get you 3k inflation adjusted once you reach “old age”.
Of course on the world stage this varies per country but I agree that a big of savings can get you there by retirement, especially if done early.
In China a common goal is to save 140k USD then invest it and retire by one’s mid 30s living a simple life.
That would be achievable in the US as well - 140k US saved and living a “simple life”. Those some people who try it go back to work in a few years because it turns out they value a more complex life. YMMV.
Relax. If you max out your ROTH IRA every year until retirement that is possible (for the US).
For everyone? Do you really believe that?
Everyone? No.
Anyone? Maybe.
If you max out your ROTH IRA every year until retirement that is possible (for the US). Yes, I believe one can easily save and invest in index funds. Based on compound interest with a return rate of 3-7% one could expect 450,000-1.05 mil after 35 years of working. That’s 583$ post tax dollars a month.
Post kids it’s been more difficult but I even picked up an extra job to make sure I can max out my retirement investments.
For everyone? Absolutely not. It is obtainable though. Even half of that per month would result in similarly good returns. The problem is investment education. Reminds me of my local communist reading group who to my surprise didn’t know anything about investing even though capital is like their whole thing.
Max contributions to a ROTH IRA is $7,000. Most people don’t have an extra $7,000 lying around. If you do, chances are you’re already in the top 10%.
I would still say that’s not true… I probably make half as much as you but I just try to be extremely frugal… just saying it’s doable
Old retirees that don’t need to work to live are rich, yes. If they can afford their rent and food and healthcare, they are doing better than 90% of humans on Earth.
No. Not being destitute doesn’t automatically make you rich. Things are not black and white. There’s a wide spectrum that is very flat until you get to the top 0.1%.
Bring in the top 10% doesn’t mean much when the different between top 99 and top 90 is multiple orders of magnitude larger than top 90 to top 10.
If your definition of “destitute” is having to work for a paycheck, you and I are not on the same page.
This is apt, because I know people who earn six figures but work 60 hours a week and are living paycheck to paycheck. They’re not poor, but they’re not rich.
A 6 figure salary while living in midwestern USA or elsewhere with low CoL is very different from living in most areas along the coast.
I would call anyone who doesn’t need to work in order to live (i.e. who can live off investments and interest) rich.
Some caveats I would add: (1) Excluding receivers of pensions and/or other benefits.
(2) Without moving to a different country. I could retire today, if I moved to a low cost of living country.For (2), in that country, you would be rich.
Someone for whom the normal and inevitable experiences of suffering (illness, death in the family, natural disaster, etc) have no real economic consequences.
The point at which you no longer know the well being of the people that count on you to survive, albeit employees or percentage of wealth held relative to the region. If someone you interact with is no longer human, like a landlord with a tenant that falls on hard times, anyone that feels they have rights that are more important than the well being of those in their immediate vicinity are worthless subhuman monsters I call rich.
I liked it back when the aristocracy was just called the “leisure” class. At least they didn’t spend their time playing at being an executive and pretending they earned what they have.
If you can basically do whatever you want and the cost is of little to no concern, you’re rich.
Eh I’ll adjust that a bit to “and you’re not required to work 40 hours a week to do so”. If you are living well and still working, then I’d still say congrats, but that’s not rich, that’s supposed to be the top end of middle class. (If it is anymore, well, who knows).
The big kicker is if tomorrow they lay you off, are you nervous or worried? Not rich then, the rich would shrug it off and take a few months or years off doing whatever they like. If your first thought when you get laid off is “how long will my savings last” or “I need to find another job”, congrats! Not rich.
But if you don’t need to work (or you’re someone like a board member or executive who shows up for 10 hours a week and claim they “work”, then no, your rich, you have enough were you don’t have to work anymore.
What if you don’t have to work and you can fly to Europe for vacation without much worry, but you can’t fly first class without worry?
Cost is a concern then.
There are very few people who feel this way. CEOs making millions per year feel like they need to work - their mansions, airplanes and such cost so much money they don’t dare not work. It never occurs to them they could live like the rest of us.
You can cure rich with a weekend in Vegas, Wealth is terminal.
Shit, for the obscenely rich, a green plumber can cure that.
Depends entirely on where you live. In my part of the world, a decent 1800 SF house goes for around $1.5M.
You’re not really wealthy until you can raise your own legion.
My definition for myself to be rich is:
I have enough money that I can pay someone(s) yearly wage to manipulate my wealth into enough money to cover their salary and then some.
Wealth is the feeling of having all your needs met and being satisfied with life in a stable and permanent way.
For me, being wealthy would mean that if they never intentionally earned another penny for the rest of their life, that would not prevent them from doing anything that they wanted to do within reason.
For normal people that would mean between two and five million dollars in liquid assets available to them.
If you get a golden parachute after losing your job, you’re overly wealthy.
Lots of other good definitions in here as well
Bezos is not wealthy. He just has a lot of money. I can’t imagine he’s found any real happiness with it. Sure a brand new Ferrari every week can buy you some happiness, but that’s short lived.
The man has a serious mental illness that will not be addressed, because he has too much money and power for anyone to be allowed to tell him he’s ill.
Billionaires are a danger to themselves and others. They should be admitted into a mental hospital against their will and they should be treated until they are cured.
This isn’t even a “CEO bad” joke. I honestly believe it’s a mentally disorder. Or maybe a specific mix of different disorders and unfortunate environments, circumstances and enablers.
What’s your take on Elon…I know mental illness, but I saw somewhere that his gaming account that was almost #1 got banned and all I can think is he’s obsessed with being no1
I’m not sure it’s quite the same level of blatant disregard for human life, or life in general, that Bezos has. Elon has different issues than Bezos, but definitely something unhealthy and dangerous about his behaviour as well.
