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Global Rich List

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24 pointsxs22 comments

$1 in the US will buy you much less than $1 in Thailand. Raw income comparisons don't work. $32,400 in San Francisco is poverty (my conjecture) for a family of four.

At least appeal to something like The Economist's Big Mac index.

The value of currency has very little to do with absolute quantity, and everything to do with proportions and distribution.

If you can outbid 99% of the people at your marketplace for the things you want, you're in the richest 1%. That number is not the same in New York City as it is in Lagos.

This is true. But quality of life is much better in US. Even the homeless have access to shelters and the poor to food stamps. We should be grateful for our fortunate circumstances instead of being greedy and wanting more.

Do you make $32k per year or less and live in the US and support yourself / your family? If so, then perhaps you have a valid argument. Otherwise, I think you're insulting those who make that amount of money by putting them in the "we" group that you're trying to speak for.

Would you support large-scale income redistribution in the US? Anyone making over $400,000 is in a new bracket where all income over $400k is taxed at 70-90%?

Why is it wrong to be greedy or to "want more"?

Hi f00_4, typically being greedy means 'capital accumulation' or wanting more 'respect' in a field or say athletic, sexual or intellectual prowess. Behind the desire is a desire for a cessation of anxiety or insecurity, e.g., if I become rich, then I want to travel the world.

However the paradox, IMHO is that limitation is freedom, pain is joy. There is no bigger prison than having unstructured and unlimited amount of free time and capital. Personally, if it was up to me, I'd just wither away while playing Dota2, snort cocaine and numb myself with a personal harem of courtesans - which is just a dramatic device for what people in Western society do to "take the edge off" everyday.

Without pain, we can't appreciate joy. The desire to escape pain and anxiety numbs our entire existence. I'd weave a self-narrative to "redeem" myself at the end of the tunnel, at 15 I'd become the next Kurt Cobain, at 18 the next Great American Writer, at 21 the next Mark Zuckerburg, at 25 the next AirBnB 'Software is Eating the Traditional World' entrepreneur, 27 the next Enterprise Software entrepreneur, 35 the next technical architect at a respectable software company, 40 the next C-level executive and amassing sizable personal fortune (all the time scaling in my personal and social relationships, of course).

It is more liberating IMHO to accept my mediocrity and limitations. Than adding more layers of self delusion materialistic or intellectual or moral to get further stuck and perpetuate more lies. There is sometimes more joy and self-acceptance in a condemned man than a man condemned to the routines of capitalism. Not that kind of 'navel-gazing' self-denial seen in Western Zen monasteries, but the man on death row has finally ceased the struggle due to the gravity and starts to live.

The years pass by and the day is forever. There are fishes to be skinned and rice to be cooked and after eating, dishes to be washed studiously. So excuse me, I'm gonna go off and put the dishes in the dish washer.

Because is not going to make you happy, and on the long term is going to damage the mankind. Keeping the hippy crap out of the discussion, the problem is that you are already suffering from of the greed of your parents. And for your sons will be even worst. Problem is that greed, most of the time make you choose for an easy income vs substantial growth. But the problem is probably deeper. Someone few days ago suggested this book. I invite you to give it a try. http://hn-books.com/Books/A-Guide-to-the-Good-Life-The-Ancie...

Having more is great, up to a certain point.

I think that point is probably after you can buy everything that you ever wanted for yourself, and still have some left afterward. After that, unless you actually hire someone to spend your money for you, or you learn to want bigger and more expensive things, you are turning the economic flow from a perpetual circulation into a one-way dead end.

The word "greed" by definition implies wrong. It means that you want much more than you need. Because there are so many people that have less than they need.

Being "rich" is about wealth, not income! Very frustrating that this argument is always targeted towards income.

Income is a fairly large factor for most people's wealth...

Yes it is, but its not the only factor. Its an unneeded proxy, unless you are specifically addressing relationships between income and wealth.

When you are "top 1%" you need not to work (income is very misleading).

I think the real point here is for the OP to show that there is a huge disparity in what we consider to be poor and what people in other countries consider to be poor.

Sure $1 can get you more in Bolivia or Haiti but things like Playstations and TVs are WAY more expensive there. Yeah I can get rice and shitty medicine for $10. But overall high quality items are hard to get.

And yes you don't have wealth, but the potential is there. This just shows your earning power as compared to others regardless of spending. Even then your potential is high. Many people in other countries live in shitty one bedroom homes that are completely open.

It is meant to be a reality check, and yes "rich" is about wealth, but give yourself 20 years and how will you have spent your potential wealth, I'd argue that income is a decent indicator of potential wealth...

Thank you. I think some people at nitpicking at what the point of the article is getting at, but at least you got it.

I like how I'm in 1% for income, but in 13%-17% in wealth. Fourty more years and I might be able to own a flat.

A little outdated... The Salvadorean "Colon"[1] isn't used in that country since 2001.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadoran_col%C3%B3n

As much as I appreciate the concept, you need to adjust for buying power for these numbers to be worth anything.

Well it shows how wealthy you are on a global scale. I expect the average westerner on $32,000 wont realize they are in the top 1% (globally). It's certainly interesting to think about, you then realize just how much money (and power) the super rich have.

Oh really? Please explain this to London real estate market.

ITT: new IP to avg. income db.

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