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Wealth Therapy Tackles Woes of the Rich
HughPickens.com writes: Jana Kasperkevic writes in The Guardian that it can be very stressful to be rich. "It's really isolating to have a lot of money. It can be scary – people's reaction to you," says Barbara Nusbaum, an expert in money psychology. "There is a fair amount of isolation if you are wealthy." According to Clay Cockrell, who provides therapy for rich, this means the rich tend to hang out with other rich Americans, not out of snobbery, but in order to be around those who understand them and their problems. One big problem is not knowing if your friends are friends with you or your money. "Someone else who is also a billionaire – they don't want anything from you! Never being able to trust your friendships with people of different means, I think that is difficult," says Cockrell. "As the gap has widened, they [the rich] have become more and more isolated."
Sci-fi author John Scalzi has published an entertaining take-down of the cluelessness in this article.
If the simplest solution is to donate all your wealth?
Let me find the world's smallest violin for you guys.
Someone else who is also a billionaire – they don't want anything from you!
Anyone who claims that has no understanding of the psychology of the majority of billionaires. See Carly Fiorina and her 'good friend' Steve Jobs for an example. If you're a billionaire, then other billionaires are the ones that have the most of what you value and therefore the best targets. Stealing from the poor is far more effort - you need to steal from loads of them.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Awwww. I feel so bad now, I never knew!
What can we do to help? Is there a group where we can donate money? A foundation maybe?
Something like big brother poor brother association of America?
If being rich is such a problem, I'd gladly take some of that money off you.
Most societies would be more than willing to help ease the terrible burden of an abundance of assets. Raising the taxes on high incomes and capital gains would help reverse the Reagan-era onwards trend of wealth redistribution towards the higher income and wealth segments of society. We now know that wealth did not start trickling downwards, and grownups need to step in to correct the mistakes.
-- That grumpy BSD guy - http://bsdly.blogspot.com/
... is hire someone to manage their wealth and disguise themselves and go live among normal people to "cure" themselves of their own self imposed exile. AKA go live like a normal person instead. Wealth is something you can leave behind at any moment, there's no law of nature saying you need to be around your own wealth. AKA think of it like going on vacation.
People on this planet are so stupid.
I can only buy a yacht this month, not a yacht and a private jet. Wah wah wah.
But I honestly can't feel the slightest bit of sympathy for them.
alas, they can't afford pay attention... let alone for therapy.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Just give the wealth to me and become poor. Presto! Problem solved.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
If the rich feel that being wealthy is too stressful, maybe they should try being poor instead.
I get the jealousy but it is pretty reasonable that rich people have problems too. A lot of people that make it to the top of a major company for example are hated by all below them or at least separated. I can see that fucking with you. I dislike it when people call me sir. Imagine that from EVERYONE.
Of course progressive taxation should really be more of a thing, but I think this is really just a more extreme version of isolation caused by being the boss.
Another problem is that if you ever lose your wealth, you tend to lose your rich friends too. Other rich people might not be your friends because of the money, but because they're essentially just networking in order to get business opportunities. When you lose your wealth you become useless to them. I've personally noticed that the only real friends you have tend to be the ones you found in college. You might find a few from high school too.
Since this is a tech site and people work or have worked in that field I would say that everyone here is in the top 1%. Congratulations BTW.
So how many of the people here regularly deal with people in the bottom 70% on a regular basis. Unless traveling to remote parts of the world not that often.
So why would you expect America's or Europe's 1% from doing the same thing?
So, other people have their own problems. I bet you still complain when you stub your toe even though there are people with no feet.
Giving away money isn't the solution, any more than chopping your foot off solves the foot issue. You can't buy yourself out of the feeling people are judging you.
If they're not this guy: http://www.politico.com/magazi...
If they're not that guy, fuck 'em. If the system is making them hyper-privileged and it's wrecking their relationships and making it impossible to live as a human being, it's on THEM to change the system because the system is there to serve them.
They're guilty for a reason. They don't need therapy, they need reform and rehab, and they are the ones in a position to change things.
It's morally wrong to give 'em therapy and soothe their little feelings without addressing the larger problem. They're unhappy because they are BAD PEOPLE.
All of my multimillionaire friends are just tight as fuck and wont lend money to anyone. They will condescendingly refuse to let you pay your share for a taxi ride/meal. Other than that they are just like the rest of my friends only better dressed (normally)
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
my heart bleeds for their problems. Solution they could always give the mone away and then people would dislike these 'ex' super rich for the twats they mainly are instead of the money.
I wonder how many of these rich guys are actually guilty of how they made their wealth? Ripping people off, manipulating folks, stealing from hard working middle class? Probably not, but maybe there is few.
Don't drive around in Bentleys, Lambos, or those ugly as sin Mercedes SUVs. You don't need a 10,000 sq ft, 6 bedroom house when you have no kids. Live comfortably but not showy and don't advertise the fact that you are loaded and you won't have the problem of wondering whether people are only interested in your for your money because no one will realize you have money. But therein lies the problem: most of these people WANT others to know they have money.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
This is true all over. How often do posters on this site kick back and have a beer after their friends come home from their job on the lawn service crew, or as an auto mechanic? Are most of your friends in technical positions? Do most of your friends have interests that align with your own? Same sort of thing.
People responding to this article act like they are fonts of egalitarianism when if you look at it they are probably just as judgmental (up and down, the responses being a case in point) as the purported billionaires in TFA.
Fuck off and start distributing your wealth if it's so fucking hard to live with.
Some fucking people in this world don't even have clean water to drink and you fucking bitches are whining about how hard it is to be rich? You make me so fucking angry!
I remember hearing some question that was, I suppose, meant to test your character, or something. "Would you rather be poor and happy, or rich and unhappy?" I think the "correct" answer was supposed to be "poor and happy," but I beg to differ. I've been poor and happy before. I've also had more than my share of poor and unhappiness. I think I'd give "rich and unhappy" a try. And if I can't deal with that I'd give away the money until it made me happy.
Wow, could there be a MORE polarizing article than this? And really, it *needs* a takedown? Come on. This is like the class warfare version of race-baiting.
Coming into money, especially quickly (e.g. winning the lottery) has been shown time and time again to leave people in a MUCH WORSE situation than they started from because they don't know the first thing about handling that much money responsibly. As far as the issue of finding people with similar problems, isn't that just part of life? My wife and I don't have kids, and that makes it really difficult to find other people/couples we can connect with. It's the same thing.
So quit bitching about how clueless rich people are. You're just as clueless about them as they are about you.
Sci-fi author John Scalzi has published an entertaining take-down of the cluelessness in this article.
One thing Scalzi has missed in his screed is this:
Noblesse oblige is a French phrase literally meaning "nobility obliges". It is the concept that nobility extends beyond mere entitlements and requires the person with such status to fulfill social responsibilities, particularly in leadership roles.
And it's one of the things that's missing from a lot of the 1%ers. This society made it possible for them to be 1%ers. They have a debt to society. And like the Lanisters – who always pay their debts – so should they.
Money is evil, and should be turned over to people who are trained to handle it safely.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"she directly makes a comparison by encouraging people to replace the word "rich" with "black" to see the problem with how she says people speak of the rich."
Sorry, John, but if you don't "like" the implications of replacing group X with group Y in a sentence, the problem exists in your own wetware, not with the underlying premise. You don't get to discriminate against "the right" groups with impunity just because it happens to better fit your world-view. Nor does the whiteness of that cohort have any relevance to the analogy (and in fact, your mentioning it actually commits the offense you accuse Kasperkevic of) - If you describe someone as "hung like a bull", their lack of actual bull-ness simply doesn't matter in the least; not even if that person makes their living as a professional butcher.
Kasperkevic didn't intend to literally equate the struggles of the rich with those of blacks (something you, as a professional author, should have grasped); rather, she used it as a literary device to highlight the fact that calling for lynching any group, whether black or Jewish or rich, should offend us as a violation of basic human dignity.
The stupid rich deserves getting conned.
The smart rich won't fall for this crap and should be wise enough to cope with their life problems.
Specifically, 99% of people live on less than $22,000 per year. So if your incom is higher than $22,000, you are the 1%. Whatever you say of "the 1%" you are saying of yourself.
"It's really isolating to have a lot of money."
No, it is not isolating at all simply to have a lot of money. It is only isolating when you flaunt it and otherwise alienate people because of it.
If it weren't for all the bloody poor people, my life would be so much better! I mean, look at them! Always wanting something from you, like to be treated like a human being, when clearly, they're not! Begone peasants! You are ruining my life. Woe is me...
While I understand "you can't tell if people are friends with you or just with your money," at the same time I also feel that if you are extraordinarily wealthy and you're not gladly dumping excess money to your friends, you're not a very good friend. After buying a nice house in a nice part of a city I love and putting enough away that I could have ~$100k/year in spending money, there is literally nothing else I would rather spend money on than bringing the people I love up to the same level. I know a lot of people tend to become greedy, but if that happens you talk to them and if they are more attached to the money than you, just cut them loose. You've made an important discovery and it only cost you money you didn't need anyway.
I have friends that are way more wealthy than I am. I have friends that have much less. Our various degrees of wealth doesn't come up much as it is mostly immaterial to who we are. It isn't an issue until you make it an issue. We are all generous in the ways we can, and it's understood that some aren't as fortunate as others. Them's the breaks.
For the wealthy thinking they are more susceptible to being used than those lowly poor folks is sheer hubris. Assholes come from all walks of life, and especially the poor are more at risk simply because they are more desperate. You get to see where your morals really lie when you are poor.
This just seems like humble-bragging, and it's even more irritating since these seem like the same people who would rail against the the rich if their fortunes were different.
Hey, good to know. Hypocrisy resides with the wealthy too.
A couple of others have referred to this idea, which I have myself suggested to individuals who were troubled by "privilege." Give away all your money, get a job at Walmart and join the fight for $15 and hour and a union. All your (previous) troubles will seem so far away, you will make new and interesting and sincere friends and you will be contributing to making a better world. What more could you ask for?
If you go around driving a high end luxury car, Armani suits, gold Rolex watches, etc ... you're going to get attention.
Now, if you live your life like old school humble Protestants/Jews - live in a small house, wear Timex watches, at best a Brooks Brother's suit only when you need to, drive a Toyota, etc ... you don't have to worry.
And if you're really wealthy, biz causal and and a beat up anything. I actually met a very wealthy person and he was so low key I didn't know until I went to his place of business and one of his executives told me who he was - a guy who owned a $200 million concrete business.
Geeze!
Get bent and get over it.
That will be $10,000.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
Oh cry me a river, go pay an overpriced therapist to help you with your issues. You can afford one after all.
Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,
And show the heavens more just.
http://shakespeare.mit.edu/lea...
No doubt that some rich people can be real snobs, burning millions on overly extravagant gifts and pointless gestures (diamond encrusted phones, massive brick homes shipped in from foreign countries, etc). But everyday people can be just as stuck up when they think of/meet the wealthy. The stories of people who win lotteries are quite revealing, many are suddenly inundated with "friends"/relatives who think that they are owed gifts, help, etc . That mindset translates to the wealthy, again many everyday people think that just because someone has more money to spare that they should be forced to pay for their troubles. Its nice when people are egalitarian, but it should by no means be forced or expected. People also seem to have a very poor understanding of ratios, If average people donated a single dollar to a cause it would do far more than several rich people donating a million dollars.
I've known stingy rich people and generous rich people. I've known stingy middle class people and less stingy middle class people. On the whole, the rich people I know are more generous. But I have been screwed over a time or two by rich people. However, most of the time when I have been screwed over, it has been by people that make about the same as me who desire to become rich by stepping on others and backstabbing others.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Stated problem: People don't like me because I'm rich
Actual problem: I choose to be a complete asshole and fuck people over to become disgustingly rich.
Rich people therapist: Will say absolutely anything to make disgustingly rich person feel better about themselves so long as they get paid
Solutions:
- take away the tax dodges that let the super-rich get or stay super-rich
- raise taxes on those same super-rich and lower the tax burden on the middle class
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
Cry me a river. Pass me my nano violin. Erect a palace of sympathy constructed from my salty tears.
If they don't like people always asking them for money, why don't they just get rid of their money? That's what I did.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
of poverty works wonders
Many dogs, if given unlimited food, will eat themselves to death. Yes, really. These dogs have no restraint and will consume food until their stomachs cannot physically hold any more. The stomach may rupture, and if not treated quickly, that is fatal.
I think of most of the super rich as suffering from the same sort of problem, only with money instead of food. They will earn, steal, and horde wealth beyond all sense. Even if it causes great harm to many others, damages society, they can't stop themselves. An example is wage theft. We have many people working in the restaurant business, for extremely low pay. But it seems the low pay isn't low enough to suit some owners, who bully their workers into working a few extra hours off the clock, delay paychecks, miscalculate the pay in their favor, and other tricks. It might be somewhat understandable if the franchises were struggling, but often they are doing very well indeed, don't really need more money. Nor is the owner hurting for money. Why then do they do it? They don't have good reason. Reasons of the "trickle down" variety are wrong. It simply is not possible for one person to use vast wealth efficiently. They can blow thousands on luxury conveniences that save a few minutes here and there, but it is not good value.
Meanwhile, the cheated workers must spend even more time struggling to get by on extremely limited means. The old expression "time is money" is so true for the poor. A lot of expense can be eliminated by burning more time. Dishwasher broken? Wash dishes by hand! Water cut off? Lug your laundry to a laundromat, use paper plates and plastic spoons, and as for showers, well, can rent a cheap motel room or visit the Y, but not every day. Instead, keep the deodorants and perfumes handy, and wear a cap to hide your hair. Toilets can be flushed with buckets of rainwater. Car repossessed? Take public transport, or bike or walk. The poor are forced to work around all kinds of things that the middle class take for granted, and ingenious and actually better and healthier though some of the workarounds are, it all takes time. What might they be able to accomplish if they didn't have to spend so much time scrapping and scrounging for every penny?
We should keep constant watch on the rich, and rein them in. Instead, we practically worship them. That's not good for anyone. People think the rich are really special, leaders and doers who've been rewarded with great wealth for their hard work, think it's all merited. Think they're John Galt. Some are, no doubt. However, when such status is given to someone who doesn't merit it, the result is almost always bad. That's where we as a society have fallen down. We let these undeserving rich get away with murder. In all the fraud and cheating that resulted in the Great Recession, only Madoff ended up in prison. This Angelo Mozilo should have gone to jail, instead he was only banned from ever running a company again, and allowed to keep much of the wealth he had stolen, and live on in freedom. Sure, he was fined a record amount, a fact they like to play up to try to show how tough they are on rich criminals, but it didn't reduce him to poverty, far from it. Since then, a few more perps have been put away, but it took years to do it. Meanwhile, little people are routinely dragged through the mud over petty debts. Some consequences would be okay if the big people faced the same consequences, but they don't.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
I had a friend I knew from before he started the business he eventually sold for millions of dollars.... he alienated me, not the other way around. I never asked for a dime, I never even talked about money. So, like a lot of others here, their paranoia is hardly my concern.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Just go incognito into the world.
1. Clothe yourself from Primark instead of Abercrombie and Bitch.
2. Rent a flat or house in the suburbs.
3. Get a middle class job. You might even find something easy that you also enjoy, so you don't spend a lot of energy on it.
4. Get a middle class car, like from Ford. Max price tag: 20K (British pounds, US or Canadian dollars, Euro - whichever takes your fancy). Don't drive to work in a Bentley.
5. Go pub crawling with your new found friends.
6. Tell then how the bank is robbing you blind (here are some hints: personal loans, mortgage, credit cards - but only if they bring it up. Don't overdo it.
7. Soul profit?
Don't EVER tell them about your billion clams in the bank. EVER! Nor your castle on the top of the hill.
You might need to switch town. Delegate your board position to somebody else so you can have time to be middle class friends with the middle class. Heck, you might even find some obscure talent this way.
"Everybody's naked underneath" -- The Doctor
Billionaires think BIG. They hang out with other billionaires because that's where the money is. If you're a billionaire, everyone you know, especially the other billionaires, are trying to figure out ways to get your billions. And you hang out with them because you're trying to get their billions. Billions isn't enough any more than millions was. The one who dies with the most wins!
This is common sense, and if you have ever visited an early-retirement forum, one of the things you will hear most often is that a person building wealth (for early retirement or otherwise) should NEVER disclose their financial goals, let alone the actual numbers, to ANYONE, including family and close friends. The reasoning is simple: the amount of good that can come of it is negligible, but the amount of bad that can come of it is infinite. People change when they discover that others have money (who don't necessarily look the part), and not for the better -- even if that money was earned honestly, even if they give significant amounts to charity. Countless horror stories are testament to this. The best course of action, like many aspects of life, is to blend in. And blending in means complaining about one's "unavoidable" expenses, not sharing one's dreams about becoming financially secure and self-sufficient.
It's not a zero sum game. Our poor gets richer, too, just not at the same speed as the richer. All you envious shits still have more and at cheaper prices than the envious shits of years ago. The poor in the U.S. is still better than some 90% of the world. Give your damn money away you selfish SOBs.
"Someone else who is also a billionaire – they don't want anything from you!
I call BS on this. The rich only want one thing in life and that's to get richer. If they can get inside information from a "friend" and then stab them in the back at the next stockholder's meeting to increase their own wealth they will do so without hesitation.
I could give you the number for people in the United States and you'd exclude yourself because you're not the top 1% of Orange County. If you are richer than 99% of people, then yeah, you're rich. Deal with it. Somebody else is even richer? Cry me a river.
You chose to move to a new place, although it was more expensive. Apparently the new place is -better-, or you would have stayed in the old place. In other words, you bought the advantages of living in the better place, and better stuff costs more. If you can afford to live in a nicer place, that's a sign that you ARE richer.
You observed that housing etc in some (better) places costs more, and used that to suggest that people who get to choose nicer places to live aren't doing better than those who can't afford to move to a nicer place. Let's try your same argument with transportation:
I assert "Mark Cuban is richer than most high-school students".
Your reply: "No, Mark's cost of transportation (private jet) is higher than the student's cost of transportation (bus). Therefore mark Cuban isn't actually much richer."
How about this one, which again is essentially the same as what you said:
Barak Obama's cost of entertainment (private concerts) is higher than mine, therefore he's not actually richer.
Yes, it costs more to live i Beverly Hills than it does to live in Sarajevo, but that cost represents the fact that it's BETTER to live in Beverly Hills than to live in Sarajevo. Paying Beverly Hills rent doesn't make you poor, it demonstrates that you're wealthy enough to buy in a nice neighborhood, and thereby buy the advantages of a nicer area.
On the other hand, the cost to live -under-a-bridge- eating out of dumpsters in Beverly Hills is about the same as the cost to live under a bridge anywhere else. Poor, poor you, you "have" to get a nice apartment, while other people get to spend less by living in slums overrun by gangs. Except you don't have to. You could go live int he slum, and keep your money in your wallet instead. Then, with huge amounts of cash in your wallet it would be obvious - even to you - that you're rich.
What's the figure for the top 1% of people in Beverly Hills? How rich do you have to be to be in the top 1% of people who live on 5th Avenue? Does it matter?
You're in the top 1% of -people-.
As soon as you start saying "but but but I'm not in the top 1% of Vermont residents" you're playing a sad game of no true (rich) Scotsman in a vain attempt to pretend you're not doing better than the vast majority of people. You are richer than 99% of PEOPLE. So you're rich. Get over it.
I grew up in a small town with a lot of old money people and some Nouveau Riche. The old money people, almost invariably, were friendly comfortable real people. Yes they lived in large fancy houses overlooking the water, and yes they had expensive toys, but they were also welcoming and positive people. The new money people, again, almost invariably, were snobbish conceited and seemed otherwise ill at ease within society. They drove fancier cars too fast on our residential side streets, lived in the 70's version of McMansions, and flouted their wealth in the face of others. It seemed to me that they were trying to convince everybody around them, and perhaps themselves as well, that they had "arrived" and that they were "somebody".
I now live in small rural somewhat isolated community with mostly blue collar and a mix of old money and new money people. Forty years later I still observe similar differences between the old money and new money. The new money seems much more to have a sense of entitlement. They want things their way regardless of societal rules.
You should get off your couch, away from your online porn and put the chips aside, because half the world is shlepping around buckets of water to boil so they don't go thirsty; how can you hipster tools of the failed Soviet States possibly hope to fit in with those world masses? Give it up, grab a bucket, and shlep water like the rest;
Raise money for a startup company for a while, and you'll see that wealthy people are very often asking each other for money. Many wealthy people are "deal" obsessed. They want access to the hottest investment opportunities, the most impactful philanthropy, they want to be insiders at the newest, trendiest companies... and they want their connections to co-invest with them.
Perot, Trump, Fiorina, Clinton,...
Seeing as he doesn't interact with poor people in Tanzania, or have a Bedouin tribe running his bank, or vote for Lapp mayoral candidates, your point is abject toilet. Yes, globally, those in the west are rich. Only a child (or someone wanting to not make rich people feel bad) would think that means local differences do not matter.
You mean the people who benefit the most from social stack politics want to claim they are oppressed?
Yeh.
Really? If you have even 1 billion dollars, you "earn" 100X more from your investments in the time it takes to eat a meal than the most expensive meal you can find. Why not pay the bill for everyone in the party? For chrissakes, how much is enough? Of course people want to hang out with you because you're rich. You have cool cars, houses, and lots of really nice toys. Why not let others enjoy your stuff as much or more than you do?
Earlier in life you may have had to work for your money, which might make you reluctant to give up some of it for either your own or others' pleasure. It's time to let go of that idea. You've made it. You won the prize. You reached the goal. You have so much of it that you can't possibly spend it as fast as you make it. You and the next 10 generations of your descendants will have enough so they never have to worry about having to work for their entire lives. Now it's time to enjoy it and if that means wasting some of it by buying cars for your relatives and friends, just do it and feel good about it.
Maybe whatever gibberish you're spouting would make more sense in a world without geopolitical boundaries, but until I can just pack up and go to some other country, I'm stuck in the US where I can move to Vermont if I wish without having to negotiate citizenship and visas and so on.
Those who want to wear the gold chains but don't want the little people, without the gold chains, noticing their gold chains.
I am not rich, but I certainly have bought shit to fill the whole in what was my personal life. Fill the fucking whole and you won't need a team of therapists that cater to rich people problems (Most likely so that they can have rich people problems of their own). You won't need someone to make you feel good about the fact that you spend money on buying stupid shit to make up for your personal problems.
I also have rich relatives. They are miserable and empty to be around, I would rather spend the holidays at a waffle house with my immediate family who are middle class than in their huge empty mansion.
just like people in the first world DO have problems. they may not be the same as the unfortunate but they are real.
The problem with the article however is that it comes CLOSE to addressing those problems maybe once. The rest of it is just rich people have their feelings hurt by the occupy wall street movement. Just banal idiocy.
.. was of Notch. I remember hearing after he made the big score selling Minecraft to Microsoft he was a bit depressed now that he was so wealthy. He might be a good poster boy for this article.
This goes for rich or poor. And if all you do is sit around with other rich people and talk about money, sounds like you are pretty boring people. I wouldn't want to hand out with poor people who just complained all day how poor they are either.
' One big problem is not knowing if your friends are friends with you or your money."
And yet they continue to marry only the most beautiful women they can without it bothering them too much.
Huh.
I'm not sympathetic to the wealthy. Try living in poverty for a month or so.
Not content with being super-rich, Steve also had to figure out how to pay less in taxes than every one else. Simple way to do that, don't accept a salary. Get stock options and have people fall all over yourself to give you a loan. Loans are liabilities, not income.
Legal tax evasion and like the Buffet Rule, no one talks about it anymore.
So we can travel by yacht.
having sympathy for the plight of the wealthy when there are so many lobby groups in Congress pushing to cut social programs while increase funding to "Latest Pork Make Me Money" program. When I stop hearing the cries of welfare takers all the while corporations slop it up at the government welfare trough for their business subsidies I might start having more empathy for the rich.
I think the real story here is Ms. Nusbaum's desire to get close to Money, and become its confidant and soother.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
It's been mentioned so many times before here I won't bother to repeat it.
Honestly, are we at "why don't they eat cake" already again? It's time to cut some slack above the neckline to remind some people what matters.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yes, it costs more to live i Beverly Hills than it does to live in Sarajevo, but that cost represents the fact that it's BETTER to live in Beverly Hills than to live in Sarajevo
This isn't strictly the case. There's some element of truth here, but it can also reflect the wealth of your neighbours (which doesn't necessarily make the place better to live in), the paucity of locally-available resources, the tourism industry, local policy decisions, certain cultural differences that change the supply and demand in the area, and a whole host of complicated economic factors. And you have a huge bias toward living where you already are (possibly because you were born there) since that's where your non-economic assets like family and friends live and possibly where you were born.
Two places that are equidistant from the farm that produces potatoes, in opposite directions, can find those identical potatoes cost twice as much in one place than the other because of cost of living differences. It's the same potatoes, travelling the same distance. We're not comparing private jets to public buses here.
Cost of living isn't guaranteed to be fair.
"Someone else who is also a billionaire – they don't want anything from you! "
BULLSHIT. The billionaire who is richer than you is competition who is winning. The billionaire who is poorer than you is trying to use you to increase their wealth.
And if being rich is so damn fucking difficult, GIVE IT UP. It's easy. People manage to become poor with no effort on their own. Try being poor, see how easy it is.
for money, for money can't buy me love.
-- William Gibson, Count Zero
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Okay, to if you don't interact with people worse off than you, you get to pretend they don't exist, and then complain about how you can only have TWO giant screen TVs. Got it.
All they have to do is give me all of their money and they won't have these problems anymore!
"I'm not rich since most of the other people in my country are rich too". "I'm downtrodden because I'm not richer than 99% of rich people - I'm not in the top 1% of the top 1%". That's a silly argument.
If you were born into the middle class of a rich country - if you're "only" moderately rich, you're extremely fortunate and I'm tired of hearing such people whine. If you immigrated to a rich country and worked your way into the middle of the rich, you're doing quite well also (and probably aren't one of the complainers.)
> And even so, I don't think he'd have to exclude himself because he's not the top 1% of Orange County
Not "has to", but "gets to". I'm talking to people who -want- to pretend they aren't the rich people. If you're posting on Slashdot, you probably work in the tech industry. (if you're posting on Slashdot during business hours, "work" means "post on Slashdot"). So you probably make more money than 99% of people. BUT you won't to complain about rich people. Which means you want to pretend you're not "rich people".
You're richer (by income) than 99% of your fellow man. You have multiple cars, and have the luxury of choosing car that costs two or three times as much as another, as a status symbol. So how do you pretend to be the downtrodden poor? You must set the parameters to ignore the people who aren't doing as well you, the vast majority of people.
He says he's not well paid because while he's paid better than 99% of people, it's not better than 99% of the other rich people. What kind of argument is that? "I'm not rich because most people in my country are rich too." It's PRECISELY the same argument as "I'm not rich because my neighbors in Beverly Hills are rich too."
This sounds like the first major piece of propaganda to counter the political momentum of Sanders.
Almost as bad as CNN's 4000 references to Hillary as "Presidential" and the quick takedown and switch they did when their real poll showed Sanders as the winner of the debate.
You are absolutely right that wealth is not income, and income is not wealth. (Though properly managing a sufficient income is the primary cause of wealth.)
The thing is, in the US we've done a TERRIBLE job of educating young people about what wealth is. Most people know what their income is, but they don't know what their wealth is. People know whether or not their income if higher than $22K or $34K, so they can easily see that their income is higher than 99% of people. It makes it simple, and in some ways it's a more important number for people who want to talk about external causes for their condition.
Consider these two people
Bob earns $150,000, spends $60K on housing, groceries, etc, then blows the other $90K on fun.
Fred earns $150,000, saves $80K, spends $60K on housing, groceries, etc, then blows the other $10K on fun.
Obviously Fred is going to very quickly accumulate a lot more wealth. But just as obviously, Bob can't complain about Fred getting wealthier and wealthier while they have the same income and Bob chooses to spend his with Fred saves.
Being "rich" is of course harder to figure than just net worth in terms of assets minus liabilities. A person living in California, with instant access to safe and nutritious food and water is in a very real way "richer" than someone living 4,000 miles south who doesn't have access to clean water or safe food. So that's a much more involved comparison, while it's much simpler to compare income - AND someone with a much higher income can afford to arrange for safe food and water, so it captures elements of being "rich" that net worth doesn't capture.
I've never had this problem.
For safety, I've always made sure that I never "look" rich -- I wear ordinary clothes, drive a Prius, and live in an ordinary-sized house. I even refuse to live in a gated neighborhood.
I take great care to protect the privacy of the spreadsheet that totals up my net worth. Except for that spreadsheet, I make sure there is nothing else that indicates how much money I have.
It's true that every once in a while someone will get an inkling that I'm well off. Obviously, when I authorize a $35,000 bathroom remodel, the contractor is going to have a suspicion; or when my Schwab consultant looks at my account balances, he gets a partial glimpse. But nobody ever gets to see the whole picture other than me and my wife.
If somebody wants to broadcast their wealth, then they get to suffer the consequences. I have no empathy for them, because I know it's self-inflicted.
Your nicely nicely summarized your point when you said "cost of living isn't guaranteed to be fair."
True, it's not always exactly fair, but it does tend to fairness. This is both caused and evidenced by the fact that in general, populations can and do move over time. People came (in droves) from Mexico to the United States, despite family connections, despite the fact that it's illegal the way many of them did so, etc.
People in Manhattan (high cost of living) CAN move to Detroit (low cost of living) but they choose not to because Manhattan is a better place to live. They pay more for Manhattan because they get something of value for the extra money, they are choosing to "buy" Manhattan rather than Detroit (specifically, they choose to buy a condo in Manhattan rather than one in Detroit).
You -could- move to Nuevo Laredo, and be rich compared to your neighbors. But you choose not to because Nuevo Laredo is a poor place to live - having a bad city around you makes you less rich just as much as having a bad car makes you less rich.
I'm going to bet that wealth therapists pretend to show concern for rich people but are only interested in the contents of their wallets.
Naturally, Monty Python definitively addressed this issue decades ago...
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
Except I'm not wealthy, but everyone's digging so hard for $$ that even I have to watch my back... it is a sickness of society; don't get me started on poor women dating for free dinners :(
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It's easy to poke fun or exclaim they should give everything to charity blah blah... but as some have pointed out, a lot of /. readers are in tech, and comparatively well-off. This hit home recently:
I hooked up with an old friend who was relocating to my city. We'd grown up together. Because of different career paths, my household income is dramatically more than his. We're in the neighborhood of 5-percenters, and he is struggling.
It is uncomfortable at times. We tried to keep it a low profile, discretely picking up the tab, but it just gets weird. We're genuinely excited about our impending holiday trip, and he's struggling to figure out how to afford his bills. What's worse, is sometimes the frustration bleeds out the edges and he gets pissy... and I don't blame him, but I don't blame us for not wanting to be around it or always trying to watch our p's and q's either.
I won't stop being friends with him or anything. This forms a fairly minor part of our interaction, but it does exist. When we were both poor, back when we were 19? Nope. Today, with highly disparate incomes? Yup, and I get it.
On second thought, treatment for delusions of adequacy will suffice.
Have gnu, will travel.
So you are rich. You got there either because you were a greedy little piglet or a parent left you a pile of money. And being a wealth addict you know you want more. So where is the best place to get a big pile of money to add to your stash. Mining the poor and wretched is too slow. You just have to manipulate way too many poor people to steal one penny at a time. But hanging out with rich people gets your leads as to where big money might be had. And if you need an investor only a rich guy is any good to you at all. One way to think about it is Donald trump. He is a living proof that a man can be a liar and an idiot and still have a pile of wealth. The wealthy are not smarter or more able they are simply greed bags with feet.
that people want it BOTH WAYS. They desire to publish their wealth to make others feel less as human beings, yet they do not want to face the consequences of the results.
Karl Martell.
Educate yourself.
So, I am turning to you as an individual in the community Timothy,
Slow news day?? How does this article relate to the phrase "news for nerds??"
I mean really??
Whats next, Pot-heads hanging out with other potheads?
Hmm a story on addiction?
A story on the 12 steps?
You are reporting on a typical social interaction as observed by various institutions, universities and private testing firm's/labs.
Bird of a feather?
Now I am turning to the crowd,
Guys and Gal's, Fellow nerds in the industry..
Is it possible to expand on how this relates to you, your lives, and your interests?
Help me to understand how This insightful piece of commentary is relevant to the spirit of the publication?
Is it the aspect of the fact that most of the 1%'ers are White?? I hope not..
Are you lookign for money, a handout, or something as a result of this type of coverage?
Are you afraid of the retaliation as a result? You know how touchy those "RICH" people get when you talk about them generally with out expressed permission..
What that being said, What's really changing hands as a result of this article?
Looking @ /., care to comment?
Looking @ DHI Any comments?
Like a fart in an elevator, we all know its there, we all know it happened, but no one wishes to really deal with it, versus just simply telling us about it..
Thanks,
c ya
Since when is WEALTH a PROTECTED CLASS? Wealth is not like melanin, or eye structure or a place of one's birth. Wealth is a mutable status. The process of its change does not involve exotic medicine, just thugs with guns, badges and papers signed by a judge.
It is not wealth alone that this happens. Generally speaking, achievement alienates. I had two friends in high school. They were a year behind me. For reasons including but not limited to emotional preparedness, finances, grades and identity politics, I did not go to college. They had gone on to college. Today, one is a patent attorney and the other is a manager at HP. I contacted them about eight years ago and did not want anything to do with me. It is not just wealth.
If you want to reason from world totals, gross world product is $80-$100 trillion, depending on how you count. Divide by 7.3 billion people, that's $12,300.
The World Fact Book says average is $16,100. So yeah, most people (by far) aren't American technology professionals. If you happen to be American and salaried, you're the rich.
Ps, it's been a couple of months since I looked up the 1% number. It's possible I remembered wrong and it's $33,000 to be in the top 1%, with $22,000 being the top 2% or something. Either way, most people on Slashdot are in the top 1% or very close to it. If you care whether you are in the top 1% or the top 2%, you can of course look it up. Either way you're rich.
I don't think the rich or wealthy should be hated or judged or anything like that simply on their wealth alone. There are insanely disgustingly wealthy people who are fucking awesome intelligent caring individuals who may have no problem enjoying the fruits of their labor while at the same time doing more good in the world (relatively and comparably) to other people of lesser fiscal equivalence. At the same time some of the mega rich are fucking disgusting greedy tics and some homeless people would lay down on the railroad tracks to make your life a little more comfortable... I find myself often judging people with more money, being resentful towards them, but at the same time... most people judge me that way, not understanding my circumstances... Do you have any idea how decently snazzy you can dress yourself just finding some of the good stuff at goodwill and buying used accesseries that do just as well of a job as the brand new stuff? Sure some one who is really into fashion or has true class may notice, but the majority won't... It's just the same old don't judge a book by it's cover and birds of a feather flock together... I won't feel bad for you if your porsche gets scratched, because sorry... to me that's a paint job on a fucking car and I have my priorities.... And I'm honestly not sure how many people would be willing to have compassion for some one with a 300,000,000 dollar net worth when they are just struggling to survive, no matter what their problem is... which sucks... but it usually goes the same way... how many homeless people have heard 'get a job ya bum!?'
The two tools of the JEW, 'government' and 'religion'. Since the Jews killed Ceasar then made up the bogus 'jeesus' fables so dupes 'turn the other cheek' for suicide by jew schemes, and went on to either take over governments or in the case of the bogus 'usa' make up 'government', the jew propaganda remains the same. "you need government' 'look what government gave you', this, after it was nordic whites that did the actual work, paid the bogus 'tax', which jews used to buy weapons and a 'military' for their world conquest, and along the way threw back some of the nordic white 'tax' in the form of roads and a few other trinkets.
Now, troll with the 'you owe government' bullshit post. Your scum jew fraud 'government' did not do anything for my family, or for me, except extort your scum fraud 'tax', and destroy MY territory with masses of scum parasites like yourselves. My family has been in this territory since the early 1800's building, and I realize some of your tribe was here before that, but you nor your family were, I don't give a shit who you pretend to be, whereas my family was and before that were elsewhere building that which the jew steals and destroys. Your bogus claim that your fraud 'government' is the reason for the success of others only applies to the scum parasites you hand money to from the pockets of nordic whites, and your fraud printing presses, but of course never from yourselves as you jews also leech your printing presses and also scam your 'holocaust' fraud payouts.
Back to others, how did jews scheme it all, Look at 'washington' face on the dollar, jew, bogus 'founders' didn’t 'found' anything, all jew cons. The so-called 'constitution' is a fraud. They made up the bogus 'government' and 'states' to 'tax' dupes to get themselves trillions in weapons. http://jim.com/treason.htm copy page, ignore rest of site, sites bait with L. Spooner then use other bs to distract from the fact that we are free. All 'law' is based on contract between men. There is no other law. Any other claim of 'law' is but cons making up fraud papers to dictate 'laws' to 'tax' and kill you. It is a fact you are free. You let them make you a slave to parasites you never owed a fkg dime to. It was jews - 'who brought the slaves to america' by walter white, archive.org . The jews brought and owned most of them, then when the southerners were seceding to be free of bogus jew 'government', the jews ran around screeching 'free the slaves' so scum idiot northerners went and slaughtered their southern racial kin who were trying to be free of the jew. A century later after jews were making up bogus version of the kkk to stoke division, the same time bashing general 'whites' for slavery which most didn't own slaves and there were over 300k white irish slaves, the jews screeched again to con the bogus 'minorities' bs so jews gave themselves 'special' status to further crush whites with false guilt so idiot whites would pay for lying jews and blacks we owed nothing to and for every 'welfare' and scum immigrant parasite. In 1965, 95% of the usa population was white. Mostly nordic white, some millions of 'white' ashkenazi jew race faking as 'white'. They are not nordic white. It's jews behind the mass immigration destruction of us.
http://balder.org/judea/Hate-Speech-Laws-Immigration-Jewish-Influence-USA.php
The scum jew tribe is now spraying you with nano chip chemtrails and has also sprayed a virus that is delayed effect and will start killing mass numbers of nordic whites soon. All that will be left of 'whites' are the fraud 'white' ashkenazi scum jew race and other races. The nano chips from the chemtrails are for mind rape and control of those non jews who survive the first virus. 'wireless' was never for your benefit. This article on the 'rich'. The 'rich' are jews, who you gave your life future to in trade for bogus trinket 'tech' or a bogus 'house loan' or some 'welfare' bs. Idiots cling to 'stuff' and fail to see the mass destruction and agenda, bogus 'wars' bogus 'bailouts' mass 'welfare' parasit
They made up 'conspiracy theory' and other phrases to hide behind and keep people juvenile, it's the ultimate and most obvious conspiracy. A lot of links and info in that post.
On the other hand, the cost to live -under-a-bridge- eating out of dumpsters in Beverly Hills is about the same as the cost to live under a bridge anywhere else.
If you're taking something that's free, well, of course. Free is free.
But a bag of rice in New Mexico is going to cost more than a bag of rice in rural China, even if it came from the same place, and/or is the same quality rice. Green onions (and not froo froo "organic" or heirloom or whatever labels we want to use) in Germany will just cost more than scallions in Sri Lanka. Empty land, not even a house, but a plot of dirt that you could put a shack on costs a hell of a lot more in California than it does in Niger. Now when you start adding in more advanced things, like indoor plumbing, of course the costs grow much faster.
But that's because the other way works just as well. A carpenter in California doing the exact same work as a carpenter in Argentina is quite likely to be earning quite a bit more. Is he living the high life? Doubtful. Carpenters don't make that much money in the US, and Argentina isn't exactly a third-world country either.
You could go live int he slum, and keep your money in your wallet instead. Then, with huge amounts of cash in your wallet it would be obvious - even to you - that you're rich.
Or he could use direct deposit, and no one would be the wiser!
This is one of the best long cons I've ever seen. Where can I sign up to help these poor rich billionaires...? There, there, your poor tormented soul, let me take this heavy burden off you. No, no, make it a bit heavier, more, more, I can take it....
Doing the 'poor, weak' meme, 'stress to feed yer family' bs. The 'rich' are jews. they don't breed until they have the money to feed their spawn. of course the way they get their money is by scamming using their jew 'government' and 'holo' fraud. On the other side the idiot masses bought the jew fraud fake 'normal' life, and 'you're owed' bs, and 'singo mommies' bs the 'po familee' bs. The jews got ahead by duping morons to breed even if you don't bother to plan and save and be in a couple, Two responsible people that pay attention and don't just breed then pretend it's something someone else dumped on them. 'stress to feed yer family'
You breed, don't give a shit about your 'stress'. jews push the moron 'weak' meme to ply idiots with the 'poor' or 'stressed' bs. Where are all those idiots 'stress to feed their familee' when it comes to the fake we're being robbed and assaulted by jews, we're being sprayed with nano chip chemtrails.
Their idiot ignorance busy 'feeding' the spawn they couldn't afford to squat out costs the rest of us.
You feeding your spawn, the spawn you Chose to make, doesn't excuse you from getting off your ass to stop the assaults by the jews. Most kdiots don't care about their spawn, they squat them out dump them in 'day kare' and fake 'stress' to keep a fake life going following jew mass murderers.
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hidden posts. - click show all comments button - also slide bar over at top to see all posts. have to do both to see all posts. notice what they hide.
Piketty tax should fix it.
http://worldif.economist.com/a...
If the rich were really feeling 'left out' as this ridiculous article suggests, then why aren't they doing something about their image? It's not like they don't have the money to invest into some PR or to do something to help people out.
This is also seen in Washington. They've already bought out the politicians, they have the influence already to put themselves into a better light by getting things passed to help the common man (universal healthcare, higher taxes on the rich, high minimum wage, etc). Instead, they don't. They do the opposite. They get government to make them richer and poor poorer.
If they really are feeling like they're segregated from everyone else, well congrats to them. They succeeded in doing so in spades and personally I don't think a single one of them is actually sorry about it (or will ever be).