If they own a house, make at least 100k a year and can support their family comfortably, I would consider that wealthy. My father is in this bracket and he goes on vacations over seas, owns 3 relatively expensive vehicles, and still saves enough for retirement.

You don’t need a million dollars to live a rich, fulfilling life.

Anybody who doesn’t have to work for the rest of their life because it’s voluntary + they don’t really have to look at the price tags of the things they want.

Rich - enough money to throw around and buy expensive things, but could lose everything with some poor decisions because they are spending their income instead of focusing on future wealth

Wealthy - expenses are easily paid using income from investments, easily accessible loans from property, or some other wealth based process. They don’t need to actively work to do the same kinds of thing a rich person can do, and it is difficult for them to lose their wealth.

There are not any specific dollar amount thresholds, because it depends on spending and local cost of living. Wealthy people will make decisions that maintain enough wealth that will increase in value over time to beat inflation, rich people make decisions based on whether they can afford it right now.

Bezos is not wealthy. He just has a lot of money. I can’t imagine he’s found any real happiness with it. Sure a brand new Ferrari every week can buy you some happiness, but that’s short lived.

The man has a serious mental illness that will not be addressed, because he has too much money and power for anyone to be allowed to tell him he’s ill.

Billionaires are a danger to themselves and others. They should be admitted into a mental hospital against their will and they should be treated until they are cured.

This isn’t even a “CEO bad” joke. I honestly believe it’s a mentally disorder. Or maybe a specific mix of different disorders and unfortunate environments, circumstances and enablers.

The point at which you no longer know the well being of the people that count on you to survive, albeit employees or percentage of wealth held relative to the region. If someone you interact with is no longer human, like a landlord with a tenant that falls on hard times, anyone that feels they have rights that are more important than the well being of those in their immediate vicinity are worthless subhuman monsters I call rich.

Nobody wants to give a hard number?

I’ll say six million dollars earning ~5%/year. That’s $300k/yr before taxes. Assuming long-term investments, that’s 15% gains tax, so take $45k for taxes (fed), no idea what state will be because they’re all different, so just round it down to $250k year income in your pocket.

$250k/yr isn’t a lot of money…(I can hear the wtf’s…just hang on)…out of that has to come all your expenses including medical insurance in the US, your mortgage, car payments, etc.

This is not “fuck you” money. This is living an upper middle class lifestyle. You’ll have nice cars but not crazy nice. A decent house but not a mansion. You can tweak it a little this way or that depending on the CoL of where you live, but not a lot. Yeah, you can earn more in interest, but I was being conservative.

You’re rich because you don’t have to lift a finger to enjoy it, and you have the time to enjoy it.

Want closer to fuck you money with the above conditions? Try $20 million in the investments at 5%. That’ll get you a million a year before tax.

Someone for whom the normal and inevitable experiences of suffering (illness, death in the family, natural disaster, etc) have no real economic consequences.

Wealth, to me, is relative, measured by how far-reaching you can do things.

In the top tier, there are billionaires who can make decisions on the world stage, such as Elon Musk making satellites to help various countries or L Ron Hubbard buying a navy and putting places of worship in other countries.

In the middle tier, there are people who can make decisions on the national level, such as smaller business chains putting their businesses in various states.

In the low tier, there are people who can make decisions on the local level, such as buying management at a local school.

And then there are the rest of us, who have our whole empires concentrated on a single street.

$5 million of spare money. Not net total wealth but actually $5 million investable dollars.

At that point, I’d you stick that money in a very conservative and safe brokerage account allocation, 5% return per year is $250k. That is a higher salary than almost anyone needs, meaning you can live very comfortably without working. You can’t buy a yacht but you can be “done” and so can your children and their children if they aren’t stupid.

If you choose to work, then you can just reinvest that $250k and let compound interest do its thing and get richer. Lucky you.

If literally running around in a warehouse full of 20 dollar bills collecting all you can with your hands and unlimited bags makes less money, there’s no fucking way your actual work is producing so much value.

not having to work and still get to live comfortably and afford most of the things you desire

I liked it back when the aristocracy was just called the “leisure” class. At least they didn’t spend their time playing at being an executive and pretending they earned what they have.

Someone who has everything they could possibly need and no bad debt. Does not need to be rich.

Being able to not worry about food, gas, standard bills and actually have something in savings

Personally, I’d consider myself rich. I live in Germany which is already among the richer countries in the world giving me access to an insane amount of infrastructure and opportunities. Furthermore, I work for an IT company and make more money than average and more than I need to satisfy my immediate needs (shelter, food, transportation etc.) and pay for my hobbies (mostly outdoor stuff). I might not be a millionaire and I can’t just retire tomorrow but still I’m very aware of what a huge privilege I have compared to a vast part of humanity.

Personally, I think already my taxes are too low. Not to start about millionaires or billionaires.