Thursday, December 8, 2011

How much money makes you rich?

Americans say they would need to earn a median of $150,000 a year to consider themselves rich. However, 30% say less than $100,000 would be enough, including 18% who would consider themselves rich if they made less than $60,000 a year. On the other hand, 15% say they would need to earn at least $1 million per year before thinking of themselves as rich.

This should actually vary from region to region—the amount of money I'd need to be comfortable in my Kansas hometown is probably a lot less than what I'd use here in Philadelphia. Nonetheless, $150,000 isn't a crazy number: It's three times the median household income in America. That's not not rich, at the very least.

2 comments:

namefromthepast said...

Maybe this goes to underscore that "rich" is relative and not to be determined by any one person or entity.

Should class be so casually thrown about in political rhetoric?

What constitutes lower, middle, upper class seems to be determined by the individual.

Notorious Ph.D. said...

I remember hearing in an undergrad poly sci class that a survey of people from various socio-economic statuses showed that most people thought that "enough" money was about 10% more than they had. I suppose we could say something for "rich", too.