Human nature isn’t it?
I chuckled when I realized I’d seen an academic study cited as gospel truth about supporting the world with only a third of current resources just after a post where everyone ignored the academic studies saying a proposed wealth tax would lower revenues etc.
Making more than $250,000 a year doesn’t make you wealthy, it just means you have disposable income.
Being wealthy means you don’t have any income, you just get loans against your static wealth at incredibly favorable interest rates.
Well, ≥$250,000 covers everything from $250,001 to $1,000,000 or 100,000,000 and beyond. The low end of that category includes people who are payed well for highly specialized and/or accredited labor, while the high end is mostly people who own things for a living.
Sure, it’s not exactly precise to lump the highest end of labor in with everything from your local car-dealership capitalist all the way the tippy top of hedge-fund owners. But it still indicates a very, very unhealthy consumer economy.
It’s more than that, because the wealth of those who utilize loans this way typically isn’t static. It’s not about just getting a good rate, it’s that the assets they use as collateral appreciate in value at a rate higher than inflation and the interest rate combined, so in practice, the interest rate is literally negative. The price of having access to these loans is that their net worth just grows a bit more slowly as a result.
Of course, this only works as long as said assets continue to appreciate at that rate.