If you grew up lower class and became rich

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m surprised that anyone thinks “I make hours of business phone calls from my vacation house” = I work harder than poor people.

Lol, they think that because they can't unplug when they're on vacation. Meanwhile all my vacations are like, back home to attend funerals or some crap like that. I work, but I can't afford a nice vacation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What surprised you most about being rich? Or what surprised you most about the lives of rich people?

DH and I are UMC/UC, and grew up in UMC/UC communities, but LMC to poor (fluctuating, depending on time and other variables) ourselves. We are keenly aware that there is no one to help us if we were to need money. You learn a lot about people, their attitudes toward money, and their sense of entitlement, when people think you have more than they do. We learned that many (most?) people like to count other people's pennies, and make assumptions about how other people acquired their money, and spend (or don't spend) their money. A uncomfortably large number of people think you should be spending it on them. It is eye opening.

One consistent observation DH and I have made is that people who are down to earth are assumed to not be rich, in this area, which DH and I find comical. We gravitate toward people who are self made, for this reason, and strive to avoid pretentious or stuffy people who take themselves too seriously (and tend to be as boring as they seem).

[Anonymous]

What surprises me the most is how much rich people think about making more money. I thought once you had enough you would quit obsessing over it. But while middle class kids go out into the world and become nurses and teachers and physical therapists and project managers, rich kids all seem to be told they need to go into finance and management consulting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How uncomfortable I am with it.

+1000

[Anonymous]

How small the world of other rich people is.

We just came back from a resort in another part of the country where it seemed like half the families there were from our city and small group of private schools. Most people I met at the resort knew someone I knew.

We recently went to a political fundraiser where we only knew one other couple going. But when we arrived there were so many people we knew - many of which also knew each other not through us.

You really end up in just like an orbit of other rich people if you do typical rich people things like private schools, philanthropy, luxury travel. I had no idea about this growing up MC (and LC at various times).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in bottom 1% (food stamps, free hot lunches, absent father) and moved up to probably top 5% (est. 350k/yr.).
When I was coming up, I actually believed that poor people were poor because they didn't work hard, and that rich people busted their ass*s off to get rich. Hah, was I a fool.
1) The higher one moves up, the easier their job gets because of deference, prestige, etc.
2) 90+% of wealth in America is inherited, no one worked for it (except the dead people who actually built it).

PP here - I've worked cleaning restrooms and as a $600 an hour lawyer. I'd rather spend 70 hours per week as a lawyer (where people repect you and defer to you) vs. 40 hours cleaning (where people assume you are stupid).

With respect to net worth, most MC, UMC, & UC people will inherit most of their life's net worth when their parents pass away. Most poor people will inherit a funeral bill. So yes, most NW is inherited.

[Anonymous]

People in America are mostly self-made. See
https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/personal-finance/articles/heres-how-many-multimillionaires-are-really-self-made/ (relevant quote below)


Bank of America Private Bank surveyed people with household investable assets of more than $3 million and over the age of 21. Here's what it found when investigating how those multimillionaires built their wealth:

28% are legacy wealth. They had an affluent upbringing and an inheritance. On average, 20% of their assets came from inheritance.
46% got a head start. This includes people who had an affluent upbringing with no inheritance, and people with a middle-class upbringing plus some inheritance. Those in the latter group got an average of 12% of their assets from inheritance.
27% are self-made. They had a middle-class or poor upbringing and no inheritance.
---
Even the "legacy wealth" group only got an inheritance that was 20% is their assets.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]What surprised you most about being rich? Or what surprised you most about the lives of rich people? [/quote]

Access to information. It’s easy to know best doctors, best stores, best any kind of services for different price points. I have many friends I can ask for referrals and if I don’t my umc/uc neighborhood list serv has lots of well off people with the bandwidth to respond and share info too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in bottom 1% (food stamps, free hot lunches, absent father) and moved up to probably top 5% (est. 350k/yr.).
When I was coming up, I actually believed that poor people were poor because they didn't work hard, and that rich people busted their ass*s off to get rich. Hah, was I a fool.
1) The higher one moves up, the easier their job gets because of deference, prestige, etc.
2) 90+% of wealth in America is inherited, no one worked for it (except the dead people who actually built it).

PP here - I've worked cleaning restrooms and as a $600 an hour lawyer. I'd rather spend 70 hours per week as a lawyer (where people repect you and defer to you) vs. 40 hours cleaning (where people assume you are stupid).

With respect to net worth, most MC, UMC, & UC people will inherit most of their life's net worth when their parents pass away. Most poor people will inherit a funeral bill. So yes, most NW is inherited.

HuH? Most NW is NOT inherited.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in bottom 1% (food stamps, free hot lunches, absent father) and moved up to probably top 5% (est. 350k/yr.).
When I was coming up, I actually believed that poor people were poor because they didn't work hard, and that rich people busted their ass*s off to get rich. Hah, was I a fool.
1) The higher one moves up, the easier their job gets because of deference, prestige, etc.
2) 90+% of wealth in America is inherited, no one worked for it (except the dead people who actually built it).

PP here - I've worked cleaning restrooms and as a $600 an hour lawyer. I'd rather spend 70 hours per week as a lawyer (where people repect you and defer to you) vs. 40 hours cleaning (where people assume you are stupid).

With respect to net worth, most MC, UMC, & UC people will inherit most of their life's net worth when their parents pass away. Most poor people will inherit a funeral bill. So yes, most NW is inherited.

HuH? Most NW is NOT inherited.

Are you thinking about amount of net worth or the number of people whose wealth is from inheritances? Because “old” wealth, while inherited by a smaller number of people, is a much larger amount than the self made people making and saving a couple million. Take Trump. He received between 200-400M from his dad. It would take 100 self made multimillionaires to amass that amount of wealth.

[Anonymous]

I grew up below the poverty line and now am living at the top 1%. My husband grow up MC/UMC.

I am generally surprised at the lack of awareness that comes with not wondering whether you'll have enough money. Until quite recently, I kept records to the penny and everything was quite tightly budgeted. I remember one of my friends in law school not understanding why I had a shoe box full of receipts. She thought I was weird. I was too embarrassed to explain. I've explained to my husband many times that a budget is a math equation, not some subjective evaluation of whether a purchase feels reasonable. He doesn't get what life without a safety net is like. Letting go of that chronic worry, and the energy that went into managing it has taken some time. It is freeing but I am still inherently a bit put off by people who haven't experienced a need to budget. It's not their fault, but it always reminds be of how Daisy is described in Great Gatsby, careless of any mess they make in the world because its never been brought home to them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How small the world of other rich people is.

We just came back from a resort in another part of the country where it seemed like half the families there were from our city and small group of private schools. Most people I met at the resort knew someone I knew.

We recently went to a political fundraiser where we only knew one other couple going. But when we arrived there were so many people we knew - many of which also knew each other not through us.

You really end up in just like an orbit of other rich people if you do typical rich people things like private schools, philanthropy, luxury travel. I had no idea about this growing up MC (and LC at various times).

This! Private school spring break, people are traveling across the country, to the Carribbean, but even in a small school you'll find another family at the same resort you are.

[Anonymous]

I’m surprised how not rich I feel. I grew up in a poor immigrant family. We now have a seven figure income, live in a multi million dollar home, have a vacation home, fully funded retirement and college savings for our three children. We don’t think about money. I don’t really feel rich. I guess not having to worry or think about how much something costs is what being rich is.

[Anonymous]

I realized that you didn’t need an Ivy League education to become successful and wealthy. It certainly opened doors in the beginning but the vast majority of my wealthy friends did not attend top 25 schools. They certainly worked hard but attribute most of their wealth to timing, luck, and good financial acumen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in bottom 1% (food stamps, free hot lunches, absent father) and moved up to probably top 5% (est. 350k/yr.).
When I was coming up, I actually believed that poor people were poor because they didn't work hard, and that rich people busted their ass*s off to get rich. Hah, was I a fool.
1) The higher one moves up, the easier their job gets because of deference, prestige, etc.
2) 90+% of wealth in America is inherited, no one worked for it (except the dead people who actually built it).

PP here - I've worked cleaning restrooms and as a $600 an hour lawyer. I'd rather spend 70 hours per week as a lawyer (where people repect you and defer to you) vs. 40 hours cleaning (where people assume you are stupid).

With respect to net worth, most MC, UMC, & UC people will inherit most of their life's net worth when their parents pass away. Most poor people will inherit a funeral bill. So yes, most NW is inherited.

HuH? Most NW is NOT inherited.

Are you thinking about amount of net worth or the number of people whose wealth is from inheritances? Because “old” wealth, while inherited by a smaller number of people, is a much larger amount than the self made people making and saving a couple million. Take Trump. He received between 200-400M from his dad. It would take 100 self made multimillionaires to amass that amount of wealth.

That's cool but if you think about the richest people in the world right now, there are not so many Trumps. And the people who are like Trump are not that rich comparatively.

1. Bernard Arnault, inherited a small business from family and turned it into LVMH.
2. Jeff Bezos - Amazon
3. Elon Musk - Tesla, SpaceX, and I guess Twitter
4. Mark Zuckerberg - Facebook
5. Larry Ellison - Oracle
6. Warren Buffet - Berkshire Hathaway
7. Bill Gates - Microsoft
8. Larry Page - Google
9. Sergey Brin - Google
10. Steve Ballmer - Microsoft

All of these people have an estimated net worth of more than 100B, so just 50 times more than Trump. They're all relatively self-made. To the extent they may have received a million or two from a family member to start their business, no person, except maybe the very first Bitcoin investor, could have grew that million by 100,000X to 100B+.