<p>
</p>
<p>Lack of security over food, housing and health–often related to money issues–is a major source of stress for people. I have never had the situation described above but I do know that when I am worried about money I don’t sleep, eat poorly, am short-tempered and far from happy.</p>
<p>I’ve found some of the ideas in Shawn Achor’s books helpful.</p>
<p>I think there are studies that indicate there is a kind of maximum return on money in terms of happiness that falls at or around the upper middle class.</p>
<p>but… and it’s kind of underlying all the conversations on money on this board, being upper middle class does not guarantee enough savings to stay upper middle class in case of expensive illness or loss of job or career. There has been a lot of structural change in the economy over the past few decades. A lot of the state supported bubble economics allowed this to slip into our water unnoticed. But, now, as we look at it, we can clearly see it in the job market, in the income inequality, in the way we are living. </p>
<p>So, I think that the sense of the future being brighter than the present is gone, and the sense of the present being worse than the past is clear, and the educated people on this board know a trend when they see one. And we are not the only ones. So, people paying these college tuitions feel like their future is being really compromised during their peak earning years and they are paying for something that may or may not actually translate into an upper middle class life for their own kids. </p>
<p>If there were some correlation between these heavy tuitions and return on investment, people wouldn’t even be discussing it. Just my opinion.</p>
<p>I agree that our kids likely will not have the cheap rent and generous pay that we had in our early 20’s.
All the more reason to limit loans and spending when searching for a diploma.
They still will be better off than those without a degree, particulary as employers confess they hire workers with a degree for jobs that previously only needed a high school education.
They say they make better workers.</p>
<p>Busdriver11, others think like you.</p>
<p><a href=“http://thebillfold.com/2013/05/i-made-570k-last-year-but-i-dont-feel-rich-in-fact-i-feel-worried/”>http://thebillfold.com/2013/05/i-made-570k-last-year-but-i-dont-feel-rich-in-fact-i-feel-worried/</a></p>
<p>UCB, we don’t know what we don’t know. I wouldn’t know about some of these tax advantaged products if I did not work in certain areas of the financial field. I am sure there is plenty I don’t know.</p>
<p>A couple of people I know are going to inherit millions. I don’t understand some of the tax avoidance stuff they are doing. </p>
<p>Parents selling properties at a 30 to 40 percent discount to their kids. Parents providing financing to their kids and the kids using the income from the properties to pay the interest. This removes the properties from the estate saving millions in estate taxes. </p>
<p>Generation skipping trusts. Being able to gift $5 million. Putting assets in roth iras that are worth millions.
There is so much stuff I don’t know. </p>
<p>People are saving millions.</p>
<p>This is my pet peeve. If anybody is benefitting by this stuff and long term cap gains tax rates and whatever else is out there, I don’t appreciate your complaining when some poor or middle class person gets a subsidy to purchase health insurance or to go to school or to eat.</p>
<p>I hope Steve Ballmer is not complaining about anybody else’s subsidies. :)</p>
<p>Poetgirl: Re post #507–Russia has the highest rate of income inequality in the world. There was a story about it on NPR last year.</p>
<p>Have not read it, but the source seems reputable:</p>
<p><a href=“https://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/?fileID=BCDB1364-A105-0560-1332EC9100FF5C83”>https://publications.credit-suisse.com/tasks/render/file/?fileID=BCDB1364-A105-0560-1332EC9100FF5C83</a></p>
<p>@Bromfield2. </p>
<p>We have conflicting data then:</p>
<p><a href=“The 39 Most Unequal Countries in the World”>The 39 Most Unequal Countries in the World;
<p>
</p>
<p>^^^Here’s what I heard–don’t have time to compare data. Different definitions of income inequality??</p>
<p><a href=“If You Think Wealth Disparity Is Bad Here, Look At Russia : Parallels : NPR”>If You Think Wealth Disparity Is Bad Here, Look At Russia : Parallels : NPR;
<p>Bromfield, I linked the Credit Suisse report cited in the NPR article. Can’t say much about the GINI data and don’t have the time to pour over it. </p>
<p>Forbes has its own take on the issue:</p>
<p><a href=“Income Inequality Deception”>http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2014/11/11/income-inequality-deception/</a></p>
<p>I’m not invested in being “right”. Income inequality in the US has never been at this level since they started keeping records. </p>
<p>“Clearly, people don’t like to have this pointed out to them, even if they’re making a lot more money than a bus driver. But it seems to me that the people who need the lecture are not the bus drivers; rather, they are the people who don’t feel rich despite having above average wealth in a very wealthy country. To put it more bluntly, people with above average wealth in the United States who don’t feel rich have been duped by advertising.”</p>
<p>I’d say that clearly, people don’t care for the thought police who decide they can lecture whomever they choose if they have a different opinion. It seems quite presumptuous to tell people how they should feel, particularly when people have different ideas of what constitutes “rich”.</p>
<p>Kind of reminds me of my kids rolling their eyes at us when we tried to lecture them to eat their vegetables because there were starving children in China. Eating tiny vegetables with lead in them, no doubt.</p>
<p>“Subscribers to Dujour, a luxury lifestyle magazine, must meet at least 5 of 7 criteria: a net worth of $5 million, a house worth over $1.5 million, average annual income over $250,000, liquid assets of $1 million, online annual expenditures of at least $10,000, off-line annual expenditures of at least $100,000 and annual philanthropic donations of at least $10,000.”</p>
<p>If you’re spending $100,000 a year on discretionary consumer expenditures, you should be making more than $250,000 a year, IMO. </p>
<p>I don’t know why anyone would subscribe to a magazine like that. Unless they sent you a free gift certificate with it. Otherwise, they’re probably just trying to sell you overpriced products. And many of those people they think they are catering to, are wealthy because they like a deal, not because they want to overpay.</p>
<p>I see what the guy was talking about in your link, dstark, coming from his personal perspective. But I am curious that he includes 200K of investment income into his total income. Whereas many people with investment gains just count it in their net worth. Maybe he’s just counting what he pays taxes on, and if he’s getting that in taxable income, that doesn’t sound like a good plan if he’s paying high taxes on it. He needs to find a way to tax protect it, at least until retirement.</p>
<p>We have a family member who is a doctor, and decided to downscale quite a bit when Obamacare came around. He realized he’d be getting a large overall pay cut, so they changed their lifestyle significantly.</p>
<p>PG --if you did not have a mortgage or car payments, you could manage to spend $100K a year on a $250K salary.</p>
<p>Busdriver–I finally got curious enough to google the magazine title and it appears that the publisher ‘data mined’ his mailing list and sent it free of charge. Cost to produce/mail is $10/issue but advertising sold for $42K/page. <a href=“DuJour magazine on the menu for those with the most money in Chicago, U.S.”>DuJour magazine on the menu for those with the most money in Chicago, U.S.;
<p>I questioned the usefulness/timeliness of a quarterly print publications. Wouldn’t those in the know want to know before a magazine hit their mailboxes? But I see that they distribute a monthly via email. </p>
<p>It’s also an app.
It sounds like if no one on this board recieved one, then they aren’t the group targeted.
It also sounds like advertiser costs are enough so that they can be mailed out without being asked first.
<a href=“DuJour magazine on the menu for those with the most money in Chicago, U.S.”>DuJour magazine on the menu for those with the most money in Chicago, U.S.;
( it costs $10 to produce a copy but cover price is $7?)
Or you can sign up to recieve weekly email newsletter.
What. Fun.</p>
<p>Busdriver11, I think the guy counted the investment income because he can count on that income on a regular basis. If it was just a one shot deal, I doubt he would count it.</p>
<p>That just seems like the type of overpriced garbage that you’d throw in the trash. Anything that is bragging about an elite lifestyle, for only qualified people, sounds like just another way to overcharge for things. </p>