To think the problem with wealth inequality is that rich people don't know how rich they are?

[Neeroy]

Article in the Times today saying that people earning six figures 'don't feel rich'.

Because they are surrounded by six figure earning peers they are comparing themselves to people who have more rather than the 90% of the population that have far less. This is why the budget is poorly received in the news, because rich people think they already shoulder too high a burden when in fact compared to everyone else they still have far more disposable income. Even if they have to cut down on the number of holidays they go on. They aren't sitting in the dark under a blanket. Or only making food that doesn't require turning on the oven.

I don't think they realise how so many people have to live.

www.thetimes.com/article/1fb46414-8f65-436f-8f95-451d69626148?shareToken=8061d939633164c0dfbd805240c8e008

I know, right?

This actually makes the point quite neatly: 'snapping up the 300k/400k houses' made me laugh out loud because there's not a hope in hell I could afford a 300-400k house. And I feel relatively well off, day-to-day, compared to the people I grew up around - but it's still easy for me to complain and say things are expensive, forgetting that the majority of the people I went to primary school with that I still know do not own their own homes, do not go on the holidays I get to go on, etc. So I imagine the same is for you, and the same for the people wealthier than you.

It's like running speeds. It's all relative. I used to think a sub 30 5k meant I'd be a good runner. Now I'm sub 25, I still don't think I am because the post has moved. Unless you're the richest person in the world, there'll always be another degree of richness that makes you feel less rich.
It's naive, of course.
Do I think people with six figure salaries are rich. No. Well off, but not rich. Rich to me is having savings, investments, holiday homes and no mortgage.
I'm on no where near six figures but I still think that.

You’ll see on mn people saying ‘but you earn x, read the room!’ when people talk about earning anything over mw. I don’t know how people afford to pay most of their salary into a mortgage every month in places like London and Dublin, in my head that’s not rich, Rich to me is always have money on the ready. I think you can be rich and still be struggling horribly, the difference being it must be hell to not be able to talk to anyone about it because everyone is so bitter and angry!

Do you remember during the pandemic where people were calling for them to write off our mortgages? Just imagine if they did that. It is within their power to do so of course, but they wouldn't.

Who is the “they” to write off mortgages in this scenario? The banks? Do they really make enough profit to write off every mortgage up and down the country?

They should have a nice lifestyle and they are doing. And even with a decline they’re still having a nice lifestyle.

this is so true. I visited a stately home which has been owned by one family for hundreds of years. It was given to them as a gift from the crown. They never paid for it. Can you imagine?

If you have to work for a living you aren't rich. If you can live on the interest of your money and enjoy holidays and live in a nice house, you are rich.

I have some sympaths for the variable cost of living access the country.

However I couldn't afford to live where I grew up - in fact nether could my own parents - we had to compromise and more and match earning and living/housing costs up. My siblings are in HA housing in that area and lucky to have that.

I saw today on another thread apparently my working class family have wrong think and should be denied the vote but we freqently have poor schools lower spend per pupil poor acess to GP as number of patients per GP climb and hospital treatment frequently varies due to social economic staus of neigbouhood. So it's possible we just dealing with the erosion of state infrastructure first with less money to by pass poor services.

I've been brated on here about kids ND/SEN not getting diagnosed till very late - I've fucking tired but couldn't afford private - and suggest that we forgoe an annual foreign hoilday we have never had don't help. If you can't afford to by pass the broken system it sucks.

We're not where near 3 figure income but I can see if you've worked you way up there from a very poor background perhaps it's not the lifestyle envisgined in soemewhere like London or SE or you were born to it and can't replicate you'd get annoyed.

We've accesses education to earn more and have with compromises just about given the kids similar to slightly more in their childhoods than we had - and we both grew up in areas ravenged by Thatchers 80s policies.

I'm not sure it's an income issue but I do think there a class issue that looks down on large swaths of the country - rural, northern, lower social economic groupings - perhaps less eduation but these days perhaps not - and dimisses their concerns and issues - epitomised by BBC thinking - and it's beyoud irriating now - and I think that gets swept up in talk of income when I think it's more bubble with class and group think.

Stephen Barlett is a terrible person and snake oil salesman who unfortunately will never have to actually try and pay a mortgage and raise a family on 75k in london.

Watch his ludicrous interview with natalie dawson where he nods vigorously and as she spouts burnout isnt real amd shes "not a candle".

This is a woman who has been in work for a grant total of 12 yrs, the majority of which she has "self-employed" and working for a company she "founded" along with some other folks which was bank rolled by her multimillionaire husband who had over 150m in the bank when she married him (its much larger now).

This isnt a woman who has ANY comprehension of what real people are facing in normal daily life. She doesnt have to rush to do pick up, empty the dishwasher, cook after a fucking exhausting day, remember to do the laundry / get the thing, arrange to be home for a tradesman, work out how the fuck she'll get to work now the cars broken because she needs to wait until pay day to afford the repair.

Yes. And Elon Musk could afford to feed the world's hungry for a decade. Most people (you included) have no idea what a billion means. You could ask a million people to count a billion dollars and their grandchildren would die still trying to do it.

Problem with both of those thoughts.

If the big boss was only able to earn £75k then the people below them, and below them would each have much less to justify the extra responsibility. Everyone would have much smaller salaries leaving those nearer the bottom struggling even more.

If people could only have £10 million, then what would inspire companies to grow. A lot of the big companies that employ many people are only to the level they are at due to the owners greed motivation to want more and more. Not great someone hording that level of wealth, but it is a motivator we need to create stable jobs. Elon musk was used for example on this thread. I think his ego might have carried a few of his ideas along, but if he was capped at 10 million and decided he was done at that point. Look how many jobs and ideas would have been missed out on

I read years ago she has four homes. Maybe time for her to sell one or two. She has a high net worth but maybe too much in property if she feels poor.

My husband and I are fairly average earners, between us, household income well below 6 figures, big mortgage, we don't really struggle, but we do budget. I partly agree with you that some of the top 10% may be out of touch regarding the struggles of the bottom 50% as you sometimes see threads on here saying, I'm 30+ and only have £500k in house equity and £200k in savings, is this okay or should I worry?

However our biggest problem is not families on 6 figure salaries and big mortgages. It is the people with 8, 9 and 10+ figure bank accounts!

There is a reason why multi millionaires and billionaires are getting exponentially richer whilst the bottom 95%, even those on 6 figure salaries, are feeling the COL crisis more and more.

Rich getting richer and working/middle class getting/feeling poorer is demonstrably linked! We do genuinely need a wealth tax, and we need to get the world on board! No one person should be a billionaire, it gives an individual too much power and political influence, I mean what is wrong with capping personal wealth including assets at 100 million? More money then you could possibly spend in a lifetime?

Billionaires should not exist on a planet where children go to bed hungry and people die from cold, heat or lack of sanitation. Its crazy that we as a species have allowed this. I mean we're literally burning the world to stuff already overfilled pockets. Climate change should bloody frighten alot more people, even if starving kids don't.

This. If you can dabble in work or even part time work, and have the freedom to walk away if it gets too stressful or your boss is toxic; and have the ability to go live off of your investments—you’re rich. If you’re chained to that toxic job because if you quit without something else lined up, your world will crumble (repossession of car, house, etc)—you’re not rich.

There’s another angle here - which is that a lot of people also don’t realise how different the whole
lifestyle and work expectation is, and what it took to get to that point.

Those top ten percent earners are working a lot more than typical working hours, and have been doing that for a very long time. They have costs associated with that work pattern (eg extended hours child care). Roles with very limited work / life delineation.

So it’s not comparing like with like.

I agree.
I have a friend who lives in a £3 million pound home and no mortgage and has well over £1 million in the bank and a business which brings in more than enough to keep her family, have foreign holidays, eat out in top restaurants etc but when I once referred to her as being very comfortable she disagreed.

I don't think you understand it either @Neeroy "six figures" goes from "100 000" to "999 999"
It also goes for 100k supporting a family of 5, to 100k supporting a single individual.
It's not one big bucket that you can define as "rich".

I earn 100k, I would have felt very rich with that when I was single about 8 years ago. Actually, I earned half of that and felt rich.

Now, being the main earner of the family with 2 toddlers and a third on the way, and the crazy years of inflation, I definitely don't feel rich.
It's six figures that pays for the mortgage on a semi-detached house that's too small, basic holidays at our parents because we can't afford to travel, no savings, a car that keeps breaking down but we can't afford to replace, commuting over an hour at 6am to avoid peak fares that increase by 20% each year, a childminder and council nursery because we couldn't afford the private nursery anymore...

Nope, that's not rich, that's just trying to maintain basic standards of living that used to be a given 20, 30 years ago.

The shame is on those earnings way way way more than that, who thinks it's ok to pay themselves millions whilst they keep their staff on minimum wages.

Definitely correct @Neeroy.
People on MN frequently complain about feeling poor because they cannot afford fresh berries and organic meatevery day, when some people cannot afford even basic food.

Carers in residential homes work hard and carry a huge amount of responsibility. Why don't they also deserve a nice lifestyle?

Nobody is in receipt of 'your money'.
Nobody on income related benefits receives more than high earners do.

Yes, I’m aware of what Elon can pay off, but let’s be real—a US resident isn’t going to pay off all of the UK mortgages. He won’t even help the poor in his home country, SA. My question is whether the banks have that much profit on their balance sheets—after taxes, payroll, rent, etc—to write off ALL of their mortgages (without raiding the savings accounts of the everyday people).

Six figures is rich.

Wealth is hoarded by the very few, the rest of us fight over what's left.
That is a very old fashioned Marxist idea and is nonsense: there is NOT a fixed amount of wealth in the world. Entrepreneurs are expanding the wealth in circulation.
If you want a more comfortable life devise a way of providing goods or services, learn about added value and service.