To ask if you are rich, and if so how you made your money?!

[jinglebelly]

I run a small ebay business but after DC 3 starts school I'd either like to retrain/get a degree or start up a larger business... I don't know any very well off people hence why I'm asking on mumsnet!

Thinking about the wealthy people I know. Most of the seriously wealthy run their own businesses. The ones that have been given money by their parents are generally comfortable, in that they have used it to buy a nice house, but not as wealthy as those running their own businesses.

The area I live in is full of people in their mid fifties who have retired quite early and live in expensive houses. They are wealthy due to buying property at the right time and retiring on final salary pension schemes!

Sorry, slow reader and typer - thanks to others saying nice things too!

Dh and I are comfortable and upwardly mobile. We did it by putting our nose to the grindstone at school and rarely taking our foot off the pedal in the employment market.

Spudulike where do you get your information??? of course state educated kids go into medicine and dentistry

The phrase "upwardly mobile" makes me shiver. Ugh.

Pia, does 'upwardly mobile' arouse class issues for you?

When I mean upwardly mobile, I meant our salaries/income are on a rising trajectory. Nothing to do with class. I am not from the UK in any case.

It says to me that someone believes they're improving on their social standing. It just feels very, very smug to me. Apologies!

Sadly, this thread is doing the opposite of inspiring me :(.
From what im reading...choose a career which will reap financial rewards, work like a slave all the hours you can (possibly neglecting children somewhat), buy property very young.

Shandy I am ok ATM but as you know any day can be chaos and everything falls apart. I count my blessings and suppose I work hard when I can because there are many times when I just can,t. I hope your dh gets another kidney put him in touch with me if he wishes don.t know anyone at all who has had 2. When you are that I'll money and houses and stuff are all meaningless xx

Oh and own your own business or dont be salaried.

Ill not I'll

This thread is about money. I was talking about money, not social standing. I hope I have made myself clear.

Well my experience tells me different
I know more than a handful of kids from our local comps who have done dentistry medicine law etc etc and gone to oxbridge UCL durham bristol st andrews etc - i know plenty

That last comment was to Pia

Wow! Loud and! Poor choice of phrase on your part, that's all.

I believe receiving inherited money young or living a very comfortable lifestyle when growing up can sap ambition.

Indulged, if people are laidback or want to take their time, they can hardly complain if they get left behind. Those are one of the hard lessons in life. It is sort of obvious but for some reason, it is not ofay to say so.

Pia, a bit sensitive, are you?

blueshoes Im not sure where the laid back concept is from. Its hardly laid back to study for many years and choose a profession which is salaried and not a high earning capacity. Lacking foresight if the aim is to earn high, but hardly laid back and left behind

Dentistry and medicine will give a comfortable life. But they are not big money spinners.

Top of the tree, over and above entrepreneurial wealth, are successful hedge fund managers.

toughasoldboots 'lies damn lies and....'

33% in your sample came from sthe state sector

there are barely any state grammar schools left in most of the country

At the end of the day, id rather save someone's life and remain comfortable

Most rich people I know are rich because their parents were rich, helped them buy houses, etc, so they then didn't have to worry about paying rent/mortgage for long, and don't actually seem to work particularly hard (guess everyone on this thread claiming they work really hard was a miraculous exception to the norm of inherited wealth- but I think cleaners work harder than bankers, so what do I know...)

Here's how not to be rich, in my experience: be born into a fucked up abusive family but work really hard at school, get all As, go to very good university, get depression because of seeing the huge levels of privilege others have (and expect) compared to having crap yourself and just wanting to do something socially useful rather than work in the city and get rich, work at jobs which seem to be ethical and help people, but have relationships by bad luck with men who treat you like crap, end up with fragmented career history though generally acknowledged high academic ability, and get treated like shit by employers but remain unable to set up a business because you don't have a rich mummy/daddy to pay start-up costs (delusional people think you can set up a business from nothing- only if your business is a crap one which provides nothing important to anyone). So basically if you want to be rich, be stupid, do poorly at school, sell out on any kind of ethical principles you might have as a decent person, and don't have children with men who are tossers (NB: often this won't be clear beforehand, so some kind of fortune-telling ability is handy).

Couple of observations: the whole school thing passed me by, hated every minute of it and came from a background where I was "prepared to marry well", didn't go to uni and didn't plan to have a career. I wasn't driven to go to achieve but I once I started work it interested me so much and I liked all the people so much I got caught up in it and worked my socks off. The other thing is, I was never one of the "the girls", always happier in my own groove, doing my own thing and certainly didn't get involved in City drinking at lunch or after work and alway very conscious that a wine too many would mean being tired tomorrow and just not doing it. Goodness, had I been like Xenia and had plan, goodness knows what I coudl have achieved.