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0 pointscsa8y ago0 comments

First, let me say that I sort of agree with you. I say "sort of", because I think that the way you define rich only sounds like slightly higher up the chain of upper middle class to me. If that's the case, then I completely agree.

That said, I personally define rich as being part of the capital class rather than the worker class. My perspective (note that some of these are a bit hand-wavy since the levels of money needed sometimes differ significantly and sometimes the lines are not clearly delineated):

- You don't sit on a commercial airplane. You own your own plane or take charters. Slightly lower on the totem pole is taking commuter jets (something akin to semi-charters).

- You typically/often don't drive a car for the purpose of transportation. Someone drives you. That said, you may own one or more cars. Some of these cars may not even be street legal, but they can be delivered to the track for times that you want to take them out for a spin.

- You do, in fact, listen to better music than most people. This might be in the form of live music. It might be in the form of a very well-designed high end music system in a listening room -- music you thought you knew well will sound completely different.

- You don't actually need to use the internet -- for the most part, you have people do those things for you. That said, if you need fast internet, you will probably live in an area that can accommodate your needs (depending on where you live in the US, access to fast internet is not a given even if you have the money).

- Any "work" that is done is done because it is an interesting problem to work on. Other than that, there is very real unofficial work of building and maintaining social capital. Sometimes this is the ugly kind of social climbing that is dramatized on TV. Other (often?) times, it is cultivating relationships and having experiences with people you like somewhere between a little and a lot (more time with the latter). Since money and (to a lesser extent) time are not limiting factors, incredible experiences can be had.

- Most things that people would consider "chores" are not a necessary part of your everyday life. No grocery shopping. No carpooling. No cooking. No restricted schedule due to child care (nanny almost always available).

Those a just a few things that I think are or can be different/better for people in the capital class. Some things that are worse is that often times folks born into the capital class have existential crises. Avoiding this type of crisis comes down to good parenting (and perhaps good parenting advisers and nannies).

Just my 2 cents...

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jdietrich8y ago

Being able to afford air travel makes a huge difference to your life. Irish people used to hold wakes for emigrants, because they were effectively saying goodbye forever. Until a few decades ago, the only chance most working people had of travelling internationally was in the armed forces.

How big is the difference between economy, business class and a private jet? You're a bit more comfortable for a few hours, but that's about it. The life-changing part of air travel has been democratised; the expensive add-ons are mostly status signals.

The difference between owning a car and not owning a car is huge; the difference between driving yourself and being driven is a nicety that even a lot of billionaires forgo. Motor racing isn't a particularly expensive hobby if you're willing to do it in a used Neon rather than a race-prepped Porsche.

I trained as an audio engineer and I can tell you that there's nothing in music that you'll hear on a $50,000 custom hifi system that you won't also hear on a $300 pair of Sennheiser or AKG headphones.

I think there's a general principle here, underpinned by economies of scale. If you make a million of just about anything, you can make them really good and really cheap. There's just not a lot of extra value that can be added above and beyond that sweet spot.

When our economy was mostly driven by labour, the rich got access to an array of luxuries that were completely unaffordable to the majority. Now that the economy is driven mostly by innovation and automation, you don't have to be that far above the poverty line to reap most of the benefits of our civilization.

csaOP8y ago

It seems like your thesis has changed slightly from "being rich doesn't get you much" to "the jump from limited means to middle class is a bigger QoL jump than middle class to extremely rich". Again, I think we agree on the latter point, although it may be a faulty comparison. My post was largely about things that being extremely rich gets a person, and I think that this can have tremendous value depending on priorities (e.g., valuing time or experiences very highly).

Some specific additional responses:

- private jet: With a private jet, time from car door to taxiing the runway adds about 5-10 extra minutes total on each side of the trip. On a commercial jet, that's more like 30-120 minutes extra on each side depending on the airport.

- audio: My most memorable listening experience was on a $100k+ system with B&W Nautilus speakers. I don't remember all of the peripherals, so I can't cost it out exactly. Anyway, we played some CDs (heathens!) of some baroque performances that I thought I knew well. When we started listening, I heard things that I had never heard before. It completely blew my mind. The music sounded totally different, and the subtle expressions of the performers via their instruments were far more obvious. I've listened to the same music on $300 Sennheiser headphones (which I love and recommend) -- totally not the same.

In general, extremely rich people are able to buy A LOT of time and very high quality experiences. Is this as much of a quality of life jump from upper middle class as a jump from limited means to middle class? I think it's a faulty comparison as the needs and wants (both practical and aspirational) of each of these starting groups is very different.

That said, ymmv.

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