<p>I think it’s a pretty funny example of American pride to insist that our poor people are just as poor as any other country’s poor people.</p>
<p>Whether or not to count welfare benefits as income was a question during the last census. No was the final decision. US poor are less poor and the lower middle class is pretty close to poor, too.</p>
<p>Momzie, thousands of poor people live in Manhattan, but it’s true, you probably couldn’t live in a neighborhood that you would feel comfortable in! I have to admit though I thought 25 years ago that when our kids were grown we could sell our house and move to Manhattan into a doorman building with an elevator. Seems like the ideal retirement plan to me, but we can’t afford it. On the other hand, we could buy a very nice condo right on a Metro North line and have nearly all the same convenience.</p>
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<p>I just recently graduated college, so I mean their parents. </p>
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<p>Check the wording of the previous poster’s sentence (although it still may not be correct).</p>
<p>In any case, “taxes” is not exclusive to income taxes. Accounting for other taxes like payroll taxes, sales taxes, etc. typically results in a less steeply rising tax rate structure. Table 1 on page 6 in <a href=“http://eml.berkeley.edu/~saez/piketty-saezJEP07taxprog.pdf”>http://eml.berkeley.edu/~saez/piketty-saezJEP07taxprog.pdf</a> shows how it was like in 2004.</p>
<p>Following along. Generally agree with those who say class (upper, etc) is not exclusively about money or education. (Eg you can be a lawyer and not make a ton of money but generally you still “hang” with people of more means). Also think location does matter. The state I am in has terrible wages. But cheap houses. So it tends to all come out in the wash (as long as you don’t move away). </p>
<p>This is a hard issue. </p>
<p>I think this is a silly topic. It comes up periodically, and it usually boils down to rich people explaining why they really aren’t rich.</p>
<p>We could talk about cats…</p>
<p>I certainly don’t fit the definitions. I have a graduate degree but can barely afford to pay my monthly expenses. I just added extra moonlighting hours for next week so that I can get my car inspected at the end of the month.</p>
<p>"^Once a week is still very good. I have cleanning lady once in 2 weeks. On the other hand, having servants around every day would be annoying to me. I do not like when people come to cut our grass while we are at home. We have asked them to do it when we are at work."</p>
<p>I CLEAN other people’s houses - and change adult diapers - to pay my bills.</p>
<p>It amuses me to read threads where people with more monthly income than I have annual income explain why they think they are middle class and struggle financially.</p>
<p>We have lower wages but expensive and relatively poorly made homes on astronomically-priced real estate. Many very modest homes (often 40+ years old, single wall construction) have FMVs of $1mm or more due to land value, yet the family has the bulk of family assets tied up in the house. </p>
<p>Many folks here send their kids to private schools if they can because honestly, there is a significant difference in quality of education. Many are living paycheck to paycheck. </p>
<p>H’s definition of rich is that you can use your checkbook to buy just about anything, including a new car without overthinking the issue. </p>
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<p>One could say people are saving money by having a lower quality of life where real setae is more reasonably priced, less entertainment, infrastructure, culture. I am sure real estae price is not so directly related to quality of life but we need a method to compare wages in expensive area and otherwise. We can’t say high earners in NY is really poor because of living expenses. To some extent, it’s like saying someone with a comfortable and expensive house is poor since a lot of money goes into the house.</p>
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<p>I feel you, KKmama. I have a graduate degree in a STEM field and have been unemployed since January as I retrain for yet another career change. H makes good money and we don’t struggle, but it’s definitely a different life (and a different perspective) than the life we had ten years ago when we made 3 times more money.</p>
<p>Were we rich then? I’d say yes. Are we middle class now? I’d say yes, and that’s primarily because we saved so much money when we were rich just in case there were some unwelcome surprises in the future.</p>
<p>Why are people so loathe to admit that they’re rich? It’s like Hunt says:</p>
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<p>Look at the news every night. That’s why people aren’t interested in saying that they’re rich. 
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<p>Or at the movie Nebraska, which I found both humorous and depressingly realistic. The old codger thinks he’s won a million in one of those scam sweepstakes and everyone around him dreams up some way that he’s indebted to them for what they did for him in the past. All too close to real life.</p>
<p>I think this is probably the best definition of wealth:
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<p>People may be loathe to admit that they are rich because there is always someone around that is richer than they are.</p>
<p>I live in a wealthy neighborhood. The public school doesn’t even have a free/reduced lunch program. The district once had three kids eligible (children of the live-in help) and the schools just merely provided lunch for the kids (caterer provides daily food, no federal funds used for food).</p>
<p>I do not consider myself rich, even though dh and I have great incomes (2 engineers) and plenty of assets. Why? Because I live around folks that summer in the Hamptons (family of a Forbes top 100). Or has their own private jet and pilot on staff (owned a software company ages ago.) Or owns at least five other ‘vacation’ homes around the world that I know of (expanding empire, raking in tens of millions in pay for himself). So for me, it is merely a matter of perspective. I’m not rich compared to neighbors that I interact with daily. But according to the lists on this thread, my family is either upper class or rich. </p>
<p>So I don’t feel particularly rich. But I know I am compared to many folks that I do not know personally. It’s more of an abstract comparison. It hits me in the face now and then during conversations amongst coworkers at the office, because many of them are very much middle class or lower middle class. Example - when my kids started back at school one year, a coworker talked about how thrilled he was that his five kids would soon be covered by the free lunch program. Similarly, I can’t relate to flying to the family mansion in the Hampton’s for the summer. Equally, but differently, not in my experience. </p>
<p>I’ve been poor enough to be food and housing insecure. I can relate. I have never been rich enough to fly to my own fully staffed compound in a foreign country on a private jet. I can’t relate to that, so I cannot consider myself rich.</p>
<p>missbwith2boys, I think you’re absolutely right that how rich you <em>feel</em> is directly related to who you’re hanging around with. When I’m around people with less than us, I am acutely aware of how much easier it is for us to afford a nice dinner out or a vacation. When I’m around our friends with incomes many times ours, I feel very poor indeed. Our friends have drifted into these income differences as we’ve aged. It was much easier when we were all starting out and had roughly the same income. Sometimes it feels like we’re navigating a constant tightrope to not inadvertently offend the poor or the wealthy.</p>
<p>Then, homeless with the big bag of stuff must be very rich since the next person has a much smaller bag. Maybe these “rich” homeless do not need any assistance since they are so rich?</p>
<p>“Sometimes it feels like we’re navigating a constant tightrope to not inadvertently offend the poor or the wealthy.”</p>
<p>I agree with this and it gets tiresome in social situations. Sometimes you have to weigh every word. If I am with a group that I do not know really well, I find it easier to steer clear of conversations dealing with money, private schools, vacations or anything else that depicts socio-economic status. Better to just blend in and deflect direct questions.</p>
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Say what? Something must be lost in translation on this one, because it otherwise comes across as extremely insensitive and in poor taste.</p>
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<p>I think what MiamiDAP is saying is that some of the definitions of “rich” in this topic are just silly and useless. </p>