3 ms·

It’s the opposite actually. Very Rich people consume far less than average in proportion to their wealth and income. When you look at what people actually cons

It’s the opposite actually. Very Rich people consume far less than average in proportion to their wealth and income. When you look at what people actually consume, the US at least looks very egalitarian.

ChuckMcM 3y ago
I would be interested in reading any papers or studies that support that statement. Because of where I live I happen to know quite a few people who are in the "upper 10%" some probably better than that, and pretty much they universally spend more on maintaining one or more additional real properties, a plane or boat with its maintenance, and generally many more days out of the year travelling and paying for hotels/meals etc than what I consider "average". Sure they shop at the same grocery stores as everyone else, and they don't necessarily spend any more on those groceries, but they do eat out more and at places that I would not consider "budget". In general, their lifestyle has a higher "burn rate" than people for whom such an expenditure rate would result in a rapid decline of their net worth. But the problem with the original article (which was pointed out elsewhere that the number could be arrived at by multiplying the median salary of $55K by 60 years, is that without the methodology by which they reached the number, and statistics that better describe the "shape" of the data set, its kind of hard to take anything away from the statement of "$3.3M on average" that is at all meaningful.
dullcrisp 3y ago
That wouldn't prevent them from pulling the average up above the median though. Even if billionaires don't spend 30% of their income on housing, they still probably spend more than most people.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  In absolute sense, yes. But in a relative sense the portion they spend on housing is going to be much smaller than what your 'average income' person spends on housing. On top of that they probably own their properties outright whereas the average income person ends up paying interest on the bulk of the price of their home for decades.
  - dullcrisp 3y ago
    Yes but the article is talking about the total amount of money the average American spends in their lifetime as an absolute number. If a billionaire spends 100x less of their wealth compared to the average person, they could still skew the distribution, just not by as much as if they spend even more than that.

ChuckMcM 3y ago

I would be interested in reading any papers or studies that support that statement. Because of where I live I happen to know quite a few people who are in the "upper 10%" some probably better than that, and pretty much they universally spend more on maintaining one or more additional real properties, a plane or boat with its maintenance, and generally many more days out of the year travelling and paying for hotels/meals etc than what I consider "average". Sure they shop at the same grocery stores as everyone else, and they don't necessarily spend any more on those groceries, but they do eat out more and at places that I would not consider "budget". In general, their lifestyle has a higher "burn rate" than people for whom such an expenditure rate would result in a rapid decline of their net worth. But the problem with the original article (which was pointed out elsewhere that the number could be arrived at by multiplying the median salary of $55K by 60 years, is that without the methodology by which they reached the number, and statistics that better describe the "shape" of the data set, its kind of hard to take anything away from the statement of "$3.3M on average" that is at all meaningful.

dullcrisp 3y ago

That wouldn't prevent them from pulling the average up above the median though. Even if billionaires don't spend 30% of their income on housing, they still probably spend more than most people.

jacquesm 3y ago
In absolute sense, yes. But in a relative sense the portion they spend on housing is going to be much smaller than what your 'average income' person spends on housing. On top of that they probably own their properties outright whereas the average income person ends up paying interest on the bulk of the price of their home for decades.
- dullcrisp 3y ago
  Yes but the article is talking about the total amount of money the average American spends in their lifetime as an absolute number. If a billionaire spends 100x less of their wealth compared to the average person, they could still skew the distribution, just not by as much as if they spend even more than that.