What is Wealthy?

They earn over 200,000 per year, their house was bought for around 800,000 several years ago. They have massive 401ks and saving for their kids grow a lot every year.

They don't consider themselves as wealthy. They don't even consider themselves as upper class. They often consider themselves cash-poor. Our perceptions are different, to say the least. So, is there a definition for wealthy?

What does wealth look like? A lifestyle or a bank account?

As of 2004; there were around 200,000 millionaires in the United States. That's less than 1/10th of 1%.

OCCOM BILL wrote:

As of 2004; there were around 200,000 millionaires in the United States. That's less than 1/10th of 1%.

According to this 2005 article from MarketWatch, 8.9% of Americans are millionaires. That translates to roughly 2.6 million people.

And according to the same arcticle, in 2004 it was 8.2%.

Roughly 262,800 millionaire households are to be found in Los Angeles County, next is Cook County, Illinois, followed by Orange County, California. (Source)


What's your source, Bill?

On homeland security -- on homeland security, Democrats tried to double the number of containers at ports and airports checked for weapons of mass destruction. It cost a billion dollars. It would have been paid for under our bill by asking the 200,000 millionaires in America to cut their tax cut by 5000 dollars.

Wow, I think someone dropped a zero.

He probably meant to say 2,000,000 millionaires, not 200,000.

That would make more sense since, in his speech he was saying these millionaires would "only" have to pay $5,000 in extra taxes to come up with the billion dollars needed for extra security.

Millionaire or not $5K, is not chump change.

If the number 2,000,000 millionaires had been used, it only would have been $500 in extra taxes.

As of 2004; there were around 200,000 millionaires in the United States.

3 houses down from me a neighbor is moving because they had a baby and need more space....they are selling a 1,200 sq foot house built in the 50's (albeit he did a lot of renovation, and it's structurally sound) for $350,000.

oh....something I haven't run any numbers on, but I feel would much better benefit taxpayers as a whole, and in particular the poor, would be to eliminate the cap on earnings for paying social security taxes.

Rather than addressing estate taxes to the 2% of the population who leave behind large enough estates to be taxed, it seems people would benefit more by (a) having a larger social security benefit being paid out, benefiting the poor and (b) ensuring a way that social security will not go broke.

Without looking, I don't know what the cap is right now, but it's under 100K for I believe.

There are a lot more people that earn over the cap, than die with large estates.

If I earned more than the cap, I'd have no problem with continuing to pay soc sec tax, because if I earn, I pay.

But I already paid for my estate once.

I can see how someone from another country can hear 2 million is needed to be wealthy in this country and think that is impossible and untrue.

In america, one million is not a lot any more.
Yes, you can live on it and do it well but everything is so inflated here it isnt even funny.

You could take my household income >30,000 a year , or around 1,700 a month and plop that on someone else in another country and all of asudden THEY are wealthy.

... ... ...

It would take two typos and one hell of a coincidence for the math to still work. I'm not buying that.

Anyway, upon further thought, my point remains unchanged. 2 million out of 100 million + means 1 out of 50. Surely the wealthiest 2% of households should be considered wealthy?

This started while debating the fairness of Estate Taxes. I wonder how many people really know what Bush slid past them here. The $2,000,000 is a deduction.

Example: Man worth $3,000,000 will only pay tax on $1,000,000, at 39%... which equates to paying only 13% on the total (assuming he does nothing towards tax avoidance which is dubious. Before Bush's present to the richest 1%; he would have paid 55%. Which means, this year, millionaires will duck multiple billions in taxes and who do you think is going to make up the difference? If you guessed the poorer 99%, you're close, but not there. The answer is your children. That's right; people with the good fortune to accumulate millions of dollars during the course of their lives are returning the favor by F**king not just the poor and poorer, but their sticking it to the next generation as well. Seems more than a little ungrateful to me.

Next year the deduction will be 3.5 million and obscenely; the year after that it's completely free. All this because they called it the death Tax.

Consider these very rough numbers: Approximately 200 million tax payers hold approximately 50 trillion dollars in wealth. Each year; about 2.5 million of them are going to die (1.25%)... holding estates totaling about 625 Billion Dollars. For easy math let's cut that to $500 Billion, and then cut it in half to reflect the Estate Tax potential of $250 Billion (Roughly triple the amount we'd collect under current law when the deduction resets to 1 million, mostly on account of BS shelters) Anyway, $250 Billion per year would mean an extra $1,250 per year that your average Tax payer wouldn't have to pay some other way.

Would you rather owe $250,000 when you're dead or pay an extra $1,250 in taxes each year between 18 and 65? Seems easy, doesn't it? Simple math tells us that $1,250 times the 47 years is only $58,750... which sounds pretty petty... and it is but it's much too simple.

The wise man throws that $1,250 in an investment and with an annual return of 10% it'll be worth just shy of a million bucks by time you're 65 when you stopped contributing... but if you didn't touch it; it would mature to 4.5 million by the time you croak (80 average used throughout equation). The down side is; you now have to pay an extra couple million in taxes... but your net gift is now 5 times bigger as well. The truth is; it would take slightly more than a 5% R.O.I. over the course of your life to break even. The world's worst investor should manage that. Now here's the really fun part for poorer and the poor: Giant stagnant Estates will have money changing hands each generation which is what these days? 20 to 25 years? That's that much less money that you have to pay. Is this unfair to the holders of stagnant wealth? Not really. A mere 4% R.O.I. over 20 years is all it would take to sustain stagnant wealth perpetually.