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  • Screw you! It was a month ago and the term "1%" doesn't do me any good on NPR's little search whatever.
  • Wall Street journal says: "An annual salary above $506,000 puts you in the top 1%, while you need to make less than $2,500 a year to be in the bottom 1%. "

    WSJ calculator to tell you what percent you are.

    Mind you, it's a bit oversimplified, as it doesn't include such variables as family size, or accumulated wealth (I believe any meaningful conversation of the 1% can't just be about current income). Also of course local cost of living has a great deal of influence on what day-to-day life is really like at any given income level. All that being said, $506,000/year is a lot of money anywhere, for any family.
  • FUCK YEAH!!!!! FEAR ME FOOLS!!!! I'M IN THE ONE PERCENT TOO!!!!................in the bottom
  • You have access to a computer, it's a long way to the bottom.
  • Screw you! It was a month ago and the term "1%" doesn't do me any good on NPR's little search whatever.
    Chillax... Greentext means sarcasm.

  • edited December 2011
    Rym and Scott are the 1%.
    Depends on 1% of what. 1% of Bronies that make a podcast, maybe. Economic 1%, you must be dreaming. If we were in the 1%, I would make my own animation studio, animal shelter, private school, etc. I would not be riding the train every day and saving vacation and money for 2 years so I can go to Japan for a couple of weeks.
    Not really. The 1% starts at around $250-500k per annum. You don't need to be megarich to be a one-percenter, it's just more like a general lack of worry and the ability to buy large amounts of luxury goods and services. Those goods can range from "a couple hundred monthly in comics," to "a really nice car," to, if you're my friend's uncle, "a fifteen million dollar pier in Santa Monica." Also, because the US is batfuck crazy, lump in healthcare and other insurances with those luxury goods and services.

    Edited because I didn't read the whole thread and there seems to be some argument on figures.
    Post edited by WindUpBird on
  • PDF of 2007-2008 IRS tax data

    The useful bit's on page 4, where you can see a rough breakdown of number of tax filings versus household incomes. The top 1% is the top 900 filings or so, which is slightly more than the number of filings at $500,000 or above. So we can say that to be in the top 1% you needed to be making just under $500k a year as of four years ago.
  • VLC's taskbar icon has a santa hat on it.
  • Having enough money to buy a new microphone for a podcast isn't the same level as being in "the 1%"!
    I am further from the 1% than I am from abject poverty.
  • Having enough money to buy a new microphone for a podcast isn't the same level as being in "the 1%"!
    I am further from the 1% than I am from abject poverty.
    Maybe from a salary point of view, but from a lifestyle point of view you'd have to admit you're closer to the 1% than someone in poverty.
  • RymRym
    edited December 2011

    Maybe from a salary point of view, but from a lifestyle point of view you'd have to admit you're closer to the 1% than someone in poverty.
    Are you kidding? Do you know what the 1% live like? What that level of income affords? It makes me look like a pauper by comparison. The disparity of wealth and power between me and the "1%" is far greater than that between me and zero.

    True wealth is so far beyond me that I'd might as well not exist on the same plane as it. Those people make many times what I make, doing less, and paying surprisingly little in the way of taxes by comparison.
    Post edited by Rym on

  • Maybe from a salary point of view, but from a lifestyle point of view you'd have to admit you're closer to the 1% than someone in poverty.
    Are you kidding? Do you know what the 1% live like? What that level of income affords? It makes me look like a pauper by comparison.The people in the bottom of the 1% can buy a car as casually as you buy a video game console. The upper 1%, the real wealthy people, can buy a luxury car as casually as you buy chewing gum.
  • The upper 1%, the real wealthy people, can buy a luxury car as casually as you buy chewing gum.
    So only when old one is used up and there is need for new one?

  • edited December 2011
    The upper 1%, the real wealthy people, can buy a luxury car as casually as you buy chewing gum.
    So only when old one is used up and there is need for new one?

    Did you miss the part where I said "as caasually as." Fine, I'll try a different analogy.

    They buy luxury cars like you buy $1 apps. They buy luxury cars like you buy Steam games during a sale. You never play them, they never drive them.

    Post edited by Apreche on
  • The upper 1%, the real wealthy people, can buy a luxury car as casually as you buy chewing gum.
    So only when old one is used up and there is need for new one?

    Did you miss the part where I said "as caasually as." Fine, I'll try a different analogy.

    They buy luxury cars like you buy $1 apps. They buy luxury cars like you buy Steam games during a sale. You never play them, they never drive them.
    Much better analogy. Thanks.

  • Rym and Scott, did you plan your opening statements? Or did you guys live together too long?
  • Rym and Scott, did you plan your opening statements? Or did you guys live together too long?
    Opening statements of what?
  • edited December 2011
    Couple of posts up.
    Are you kidding? Do you know what the 1% live like? What that level of income affords? It makes me look like a pauper by comparison.
    Are you kidding? Do you know what the 1% live like? What that level of income affords? It makes me look like a pauper by comparison.
    Post edited by Apsup on
  • That was a quote glitch.
  • That was a quote glitch.
    Oh, taking a closer look, so it seems. So even Scott the great master of the Internet makes mistakes.

  • If only blockquoting was like the blockquoting of yore.

    Also, I would like to know if 2bfree works, and how old he is, and his currently living arrangements are.

    Your lifestyle changes when you have a decent career/job, live on your own, and are frugal enough to afford luxuries like vacations and trips to various parts of the world.
  • The upper 1%, the real wealthy people, can buy a luxury car as casually as you buy chewing gum.
    One of the interesting things to me is the distance between the bottom of that 1%, and the top. I really need to do the math on this at some point, or find the place where someone else has.

    If you're making $500K/year in one of the higher cost-of-living parts of the US, and are supporting a family of four, you can't really buy luxury cars as casually as chewing gum. Top-level luxury cars can run $200K or more, and most rational people wouldn't spend 2/5 of their annual salary without thinking about it (especially if they don't have tremendous wealth, a separate but related issue). But there are plenty of people wealthy enough to spend that kind of money without really thinking. The concentration of wealth in only a small number of families is even more extreme than the 1% statistics show.

    On a related note: I loved this article, and especially this quote from it:
    Thus you can imagine my amazement this summer when I watched the Republicans in Congress push the United States to the brink of default - and the world to the brink of ruin - over whether to repeal a portion of the Bush tax cuts and raise my taxes by 3.5%. I know a lot of people with high incomes and even the conservatives among them were confused by that sequence of events. Here is a secret about rich people: we wouldn't have noticed a 3.5% tax increase. That is not only because there isn't a material difference between having $1 million and $965,000, which is obvious, but also because most of us don't actually know how much money we are going to make in a given year. Most income at that level is the result of profits rather than salary, whether it comes in the form of bonuses, stock options, partnership distributions, dividends or capital gains. Profits are unpredictable and they tend to vary wildly. At my own firm, the general rule of thumb is that if we are within 5% of our budget for the year, everyone is happy and no one complains. A variation of 3.5% is merely a random blip.
  • There's this creepy guy at karate with no concept of personal space. Today we were doing 2-person stretching, and when he was pushing on my back, he was keeping his head right behind mine. When he was counting, it sounding like he was whispering sweet nothings in my ear.
  • edited December 2011
    There's a Hulu Latino. I kinda want to pick a random show and start watching it. No Sabado Gigante though =(
    Post edited by Ruffas on
  • Mujeres Asesinas
  • edited December 2011

    Maybe from a salary point of view, but from a lifestyle point of view you'd have to admit you're closer to the 1% than someone in poverty.
    Are you kidding? Do you know what the 1% live like? What that level of income affords? It makes me look like a pauper by comparison. The disparity of wealth and power between me and the "1%" is far greater than that between me and zero.

    True wealth is so far beyond me that I'd might as well not exist on the same plane as it. Those people make many times what I make, doing less, and paying surprisingly little in the way of taxes by comparison.

    -------------------------------------------------------------
    What I had in mind was the fact that people in poverty have this constant hammer waiting to fall on them if they make one mistake that affects their finances. They are making choices between what basic necessities of life they are going to spend money on at any given moment.

    Meanwhile the difference between say someone making 65-100k a year and someone making 500k or even a million a year is really a matter of the quality of the toys they can buy. The pedigree of the wood in their furniture or the leather in their car seats. They both can pretty much go anywhere on vacation, the difference being how many stars their hotel will have or whether they take coach or a private jet to get there.

    It is my contention that as a matter of freedom that money gives you, someone making say 65-100k a year has more in common with a millionaire than someone living in the projects on welfare.
    Post edited by 2bfree on
  • edited December 2011
    It's true that after a certain point, once your daily necessities are met and you feel relatively secure, happiness plateaus regardless of your wealth.
    At that point, money becomes power, potential to do things and take risks. The poorer you are, the fewer risks you can take with your capital.
    Rym, as of right now, could not found (for example) a broadcasting company. However, if he made 1,000,000 a year, founding another company and investing in it would not have as much risk of destroying his life.
    Post edited by gomidog on
  • A friend of mine is trying to write a drinking song for Motorcyclists called "Don't crack a fat in your romper suit."

    I have strange friends.
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