Re: Business, Economics & Tax Policy 6.0: Nope, it only found woven strands
If you're at least 20% above that threshold you're no longer middle class and are in fact rich.
Where did 20% come from? Not attacking, just curious.
My definition is as follows. You have to use assets (
net worth), not income. Even if you have zero income if you own an island you're rich.
I'd use rough 10ths as delimeters. And at the beginning, age factors in because kids will have a far lower worth because they haven't accumulated yet.
So, at, say, age 50:
Below $10k: poor
$10k-$100k: lower middle class
$100k - $1M: middle class
$1M - $10M: upper middle class
Above $10M: rich
Then my aim as a government would be to move as many people as possible into the middle class. I suggest that means confiscating all assets above $100M and using them to improve the lives differentially of those in the middle class (a little), the lower middle class (a lot) and the poor (transformatively). Do it in a way which the people themselves take responsibility and do the work. Education, training, child care, health care all paid for. Your job as a poor citizen is to get yourself safely to the middle. You job in the middle is to flourish and do the work. Your job at the top is to subsidize the improvement of the bottom.
It's still going to be a hoot to be rich. $100M will still buy all the hookers and blow you want, you'll just have to settle for 5 houses instead of 25.
My guess is that right now the US is at: 50%, 30%, 15%, 4%, 1%.
My ideal shape of the "perfected" US is: 0%, 25%, 25%, 25%, 25%.
The key here is that $10M+ is restricted to $10M - $100M. It is currently unlimited and ranges $10M - nearly $100,000M. That warps the entire shape of the country because all those dollars above $10M are wasted -- they merely plow back into the future gains of the 1% and have zero benefit to anyone else. If they benefit anyone outside the US 1% it is the 1% of other nations.
Put those dollars to good use.
