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If you own your home outright plus have 1.25 M€ in assets you would be considered very well off in all of Europe. I don't exactly know about "ultra-rich" though

by jamil7 2y ago

If you own your home outright plus have 1.25 M€ in assets you would be considered very well off in all of Europe. I don't exactly know about "ultra-rich" though.

Rinzler89 2y ago
Pretty much. If you look at the average wealth of the average German it's just sad. Europeans don't have much wealth and building wealth without inheritance is getting increasingly harder.
- yodsanklai 2y ago
  More interesting is the median wealth per adult. Several European countries are comparable or above the US for instance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... I'm a bit surprised to see how low Germany is on the list though.
  - vidarh 2y ago
    Partly there are wealth disparities, but there is also less value in building wealth in systems where your healthcare and pensions are reasonable even if you can. Unless you're dead set on leaving an inheritance, there is far less risk in spending what you can, or e.g. buying annuities that will run down your assets but guarantee you a lifetime income.
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    Comparing the median wealth between the whole US versus just the richest EU countries is not that great TBH when you consider the US has the same rich states vs poor states discrepancies that the EU has internally which drags medians down. You can either compare the whole US vs EU medians which contain the wealthy states and the poor states of both, or if you only want to compare the richest European states like Belgium, Denmark, Norway, etc then you can also only use the richest US states for comparison like California, Texas, New York, Washington, etc and then you'll find those in the US being far richer than the richest EU countries. Average Germans don't have much wealth since a lot of the population rents instead of owning their own homes so a lot of their wage growth just gets captured by the landlord class. You'll own nothing and be happy.
    - yodsanklai 2y ago
      > Average Germans don't have much wealth since a lot of the population rents instead of owning their own homes so a lot of their wage growth just gets captured by the landlord class. If the landlords are Germans themselves, it should move the median (more inequalities), but it doesn't explain low average.
      - Rinzler89 2y ago
        A lot of rentals in Germany are owned by real estate corporations or banks, so their rents just fuels their profits and share price instead of incomes of other Germans. SaaS (Shelter as a Service)
- tirant 2y ago
  Indeed, that is going to be a problem once the average European starts retiring under the current pension systems, with an increasingly aging population that won’t be able to cover the costs of the required pensions. Instead of promoting and incentivizing savings, this measure actually punishes the few who have managed to accumulate savings to survive in such a complicated future. I cannot believe that my fellow citizens support these impoverishing initiatives.

by jamil7 2y ago

If you own your home outright plus have 1.25 M€ in assets you would be considered very well off in all of Europe. I don't exactly know about "ultra-rich" though.

Rinzler89 2y ago

Pretty much. If you look at the average wealth of the average German it's just sad. Europeans don't have much wealth and building wealth without inheritance is getting increasingly harder.

yodsanklai 2y ago
More interesting is the median wealth per adult. Several European countries are comparable or above the US for instance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_pe... I'm a bit surprised to see how low Germany is on the list though.
- vidarh 2y ago
  Partly there are wealth disparities, but there is also less value in building wealth in systems where your healthcare and pensions are reasonable even if you can. Unless you're dead set on leaving an inheritance, there is far less risk in spending what you can, or e.g. buying annuities that will run down your assets but guarantee you a lifetime income.
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  Comparing the median wealth between the whole US versus just the richest EU countries is not that great TBH when you consider the US has the same rich states vs poor states discrepancies that the EU has internally which drags medians down. You can either compare the whole US vs EU medians which contain the wealthy states and the poor states of both, or if you only want to compare the richest European states like Belgium, Denmark, Norway, etc then you can also only use the richest US states for comparison like California, Texas, New York, Washington, etc and then you'll find those in the US being far richer than the richest EU countries. Average Germans don't have much wealth since a lot of the population rents instead of owning their own homes so a lot of their wage growth just gets captured by the landlord class. You'll own nothing and be happy.
  - yodsanklai 2y ago
    > Average Germans don't have much wealth since a lot of the population rents instead of owning their own homes so a lot of their wage growth just gets captured by the landlord class. If the landlords are Germans themselves, it should move the median (more inequalities), but it doesn't explain low average.
    - Rinzler89 2y ago
      A lot of rentals in Germany are owned by real estate corporations or banks, so their rents just fuels their profits and share price instead of incomes of other Germans. SaaS (Shelter as a Service)
tirant 2y ago
Indeed, that is going to be a problem once the average European starts retiring under the current pension systems, with an increasingly aging population that won’t be able to cover the costs of the required pensions. Instead of promoting and incentivizing savings, this measure actually punishes the few who have managed to accumulate savings to survive in such a complicated future. I cannot believe that my fellow citizens support these impoverishing initiatives.