U.S. millionaires say $7 million not enough to be rich

[Richard Hakluyt]

Heh, I was thinking the other day that the term "millionaire" is essentially meaningless. Lots of people have more than $1 million in assets, and that doesn't make them anything like rich.

Though if you exclude real estate and retirement savings accounts, that does change things. Most people have most of their wealth tied up in those two things.

There was a recent survey about the rich in the Economist that gave some figures for this. Credit Suisse estimates that there are 24.2m dollar millionaires with the rather loose definition that a millionaire is anyone with more than $1m in net assets. They reckon that 41% of these live in the USA. Capgemini defines it more stringently, as someone with investable assets of $1m or more (excluding their home), they reckon about 10m people meet this criteria.

I would imagine that the looser definition includes many people in their 50s and older who have had a reasonably successful career. I'm somewhat surprised that the two figures are not more different. $1m in investable cash is much rarer in the UK than, say, a pension that will pay out >£20k; which as Dguller points out is a major financial asset.

[Malthus]

Heh, I was thinking the other day that the term "millionaire" is essentially meaningless. Lots of people have more than $1 million in assets, and that doesn't make them anything like rich.

Though if you exclude real estate and retirement savings accounts, that does change things. Most people have most of their wealth tied up in those two things.

There was a recent survey about the rich in the Economist that gave some figures for this. Credit Suisse estimates that there are 24.2m dollar millionaires with the rather loose definition that a millionaire is anyone with more than $1m in net assets. They reckon that 41% of these live in the USA. Capgemini defines it more stringently, as someone with investable assets of $1m or more (excluding their home), they reckon about 10m people meet this criteria.

I would imagine that the looser definition includes many people in their 50s and older who have had a reasonably successful career. I'm somewhat surprised that the two figures are not more different. $1m in investable cash is much rarer in the UK than, say, a pension that will pay out >£20k; which as Dguller points out is a major financial asset.

I'm surprised too - though if you disallow personal real estate *and* retirement accounts, as in the article in the OP, I'll bet that figure shrinks even further.

[Actuall, I'm also surprised that there are only 24.2 m millionaires under the loosest definition.]   

[Crazy_Ivan80]

since they apparently can't appreciate what they've got it's clear that they don't need it.

take away the money until they're left with 50K annually. that should help in the "don't whine you rich ass" department.

[garbon]

since they apparently can't appreciate what they've got it's clear that they don't need it.

take away the money until they're left with 50K annually. that should help in the "don't whine you rich ass" department.

You are an idiot. But then we all knew that already.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Referring again to the survey in the Economist it seems that only 16% of these well-off people inherited their dosh; 47% made the money from starting and growing a business, 23% through highly paid employment. I guess if we took their money off them we would have to live in a society with few new businesses to generate employment and a shortage of surgeons and suchlike 

[garbon]

Referring again to the survey in the Economist it seems that only 16% of these well-off people inherited their dosh; 47% made the money from starting and growing a business, 23% through highly paid employment. I guess if we took their money off them we would have to live in a society with few new businesses to generate employment and a shortage of surgeons and suchlike 

Please don't troll. We all know that wealthy people don't deserve the money they have.

[Eddie Teach]

Why?  Do you think I hang out with trailer trash or something?

I heard recently that New Jersey is the state with the highest per capita income in the country.

[Ed Anger]

The poors in this thread amuse me.

[Admiral Yi]

The Atlantic has an article on the unhappiness of the super-rich.  Their cutoff was 25 mill.

When I asked one of my Wall St. buddies back in the late 80s how much it would take to walk away he said 5 mill.  He called it "fuck you money."

[Monoriu]

I could retire at 23 on 2 million dollars quite easily.

Home for say 300k in the midwest is quite large, say five cars over the next 50 years, thats 200,000.  Taxes on the house maybe 50-70,000. Discretionary spending including food maybe 40-50,000 a year.

Invest cautiously receiving 5-7% on 1 million over that period....and you can outlive that fairly easily. 

But if you invest cautiously, the return could be around 2-3%. 

[Monoriu]

Heh, I was thinking the other day that the term "millionaire" is essentially meaningless. Lots of people have more than $1 million in assets, and that doesn't make them anything like rich.

Though if you exclude real estate and retirement savings accounts, that does change things. Most people have most of their wealth tied up in those two things.

The article talked about "investable assets".  That would exclude your home, but would include restirement savings accounts.

There is a reason why these surveys are run by big financial services companies.  They are trying to find out the size of their potential client base.  They want to figure out how many people they need to hire, how much they should spend on advertising and where, how much money to allocate to each branch etc. 

They want their clients to give them money to invest.  You can't entrust your primary residence or your retirement accounts to your broker, that's why those are excluded. 

[Crazy_Ivan80]

since they apparently can't appreciate what they've got it's clear that they don't need it.

take away the money until they're left with 50K annually. that should help in the "don't whine you rich ass" department.

You are an idiot. But then we all knew that already.

at least I'm not you, which would be a million times worse.

[Eddie Teach]

You two really oughta work on your insults. 

[Martinus]

Yeah, my new house was bought for almost a half million dollars.

Wow. That's insane.

[Caliga]

Half a million dollars to live in Alberta?